Somali scholar who critiqued the Barre regime's rhetoric against its reality
His 1988 Socialist Somalia: Rhetoric and Reality diagnoses the widening gap between the Barre regime's rhetoric and realities and is cited as the standard scholarly critique of that era; it is the source of the 'internal militarism and external supplication' framing.
A Somali scholar and writer, he is the James Wallace Professor of International Studies at Macalester College and was founding dean of its Institute for Global Citizenship. He is founding editor-in-chief of Bildhaan: An International Journal of Somali Studies and the brother of scholar Abdi Ismail Samatar. Educated at the University of Wisconsin–La Crosse (B.A., 1978) and the University of Denver (M.A. 1981, PhD 1984), he taught about ten years at St. Lawrence University before moving to Macalester in 1994. His 1988 book Socialist Somalia: Rhetoric and Reality criticized the gap between the Barre military regime's claims and its actual record, and remains cited as the standard scholarly critique of that regime. The book's own formulation of a 'deeper slippage into internal militarism and external supplication' in mid-1980s Somalia is attributed to it rather than asserted as neutral fact.
Activities and affiliations
Career Timeline
- 1978Graduated from the University of Wisconsin–La Crosse
- 1978–1984M.A. and PhD at the University of Denver
- 1984–c. 1994Taught about ten years at St. Lawrence University
- 1988Published Socialist Somalia: Rhetoric and Reality
- 1994–James Wallace Professor of International Studies, Macalester College
Related historical events
Early life and broadcasting career
Ahmed Ismail Samatar was born into and raised in Gabiley, a small agricultural town about 40 km west of Hargeisa that he dates to the turn of the twentieth century. His schooling began in a traditional Islamic school and continued at the Gabiley primary and intermediate school, where in 1952 he was its first enrolled pupil and completed his lower education; his middle and secondary schooling was at Amoud in the Borama area. Three years after independence in 1960 he entered the British-established Amoud boarding school, one of the youngest pupils to do so, and spent eight years there. His family carried a tradition of poetry and drama, and the poet Abdillahi Suldaan Tima'ade and the playwright Hassan Sheikh Mumin were relatives. In his own later account, poetry and a cappella dance came before recorded music in the household that formed him.
After finishing secondary school he moved to Mogadishu, where he was hired as a radio broadcaster at Radio Mogadishu. He applied against an advertisement for three broadcasting apprentices and placed first among 77 candidates in a week of examinations; after about nine months of training and practice he began broadcasting as a newsreader on the national network at barely seventeen. In the late 1960s he filled a vacancy at the BBC African service and served as a BBC broadcaster until the mid 1970s, when he decided to obtain a higher education. He then left London for the United States, where he studied at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse and the University of Denver.