Maasai Society Part 7 - Not all Maa speakers are Maasai

Added: 2026-06-01

[00:00:00]Not everyone who speaks Ma is Masai. Ma is a language spoken across several related peoples. Within the Masai people, you have sections as we've previously learned. For example, Elco etc. These are not clans. They are sections shaped by place and history.

[00:00:22]Then there are related Ma speaking peoples.

[00:00:25]El Samur Samburu speak a ma language but they are distinct people. El tamus also called gems are ma speaking too with their own history around lake bingo. El barakuyo also called baraguyu orqavi are mas speaking pastoralists mostly in Tanzania closely related to Masai but with their own identity and history.

[00:00:49]Elarosa or Arushia are connected to the m speaking world around Arushia and Mount Meu with a strong agricultural history. Then there are mukor mukordu and yaku communities. They originally spoke yakonte a kushaitic language but many later adopted ma and masai identity. So the simple point is this speaking ma does not automatically means identity. The Wama speaking world is connected, but it is not all the