Greater Ethiopia: The Evolution of a Multiethnic Society Book

In the midst of ethnic, religious, linguistic, and cultural diversity, what are the driving forces that allow Ethiopian or "Habeshan" culture to be considered a single entity? And what are the factors that have allowed Ethiopia to maintain its independence when the remainder of Africa fell to colonization? Levine attempts to answer these questions in this short, yet densely information-packed book. After providing an overview of the various ethnocultural groups of Ethiopia and a description of the various tropes that have historically defined outsiders views of Ethiopia--typically including "mysterious land" "land of desperate poverty", "ethnological museum", "outpost of semitic civilization" etc., Levine turns to a specific analysis of the largest ethnocultural influences within Ethiopian culture. The main portion of Levine's work focuses on the influence of the various national scripts that have contributed to the Greater Ethiopian culture --the Amhara Script, heavily influenced by the Kibre Negest ("Book of Kings") and its role in the formation of the Solomonid Dynasty which controlled much of Greater Ethiopia from the end of the first Millennium until the 20th Century, the Tigrean script/culture--with its strong links/affinity to the Amharic culture, and the Oromo script/culture (often referred to here by Levine with the outdated term "Galla") defined by an egalitarian collectivism and the role of the intricate Gada system in defining social roles in the Oromo. Levine makes the point that it is precisely because of the Oromo lack of a defined cultural canon or written tradition that has allowed an openness to other cultural influences and therefore facilitated their unity within the Amhara-Tigrean culture to form a "Greater Ethiopian" culture that has unified in resistance to outside incursion from both European, Arab, and other African sources. Although Levine relies a little too heavily on academic jargon from scholars such as Talcott Parsons (his theory of social organization informs much of Levine's approach/perspective), this is overall a solid, if somewhat dated and essentialist work in describing the balance of ethnic (Amhara, Tigrean, Oromo, Somali), religious (Orthodox Christian, Muslim, Jewish/Falasha, Evangelical/Pentecostal Christian), and linguistic elements that make up a truly "Greater Ethiopian" culture.