Serer people

The Serer people (Serer proper: Seereer or Sereer) are a West African ethnoreligious group and nation, "today scattered in several small states on the coast or pushed back into the woods of the interior, must be one of the oldest in Senegambia."

They are the third-largest ethnic group in Senegal, making up 16% of the Senegalese population. They also reside in northern Gambia and southern Mauritania.

The Serer people originated in the Senegal River Valley, at the border of present-day Senegal and Mauritania, and moved south in the 11th and 12th century. They migrated again in the 15th and 16th centuries as their villages were invaded and they were subjected to religious persecution by Islamic forces. They have had a sedentary settled culture and have been known for their farming expertise and transhumant stock-raising.

The Serer people have been historically noted as an ethnic group practicing endogamy, and elements of both matrilineality and patrilineality that long, violently resisted the expansion of Islam since the 11th century. They fought against jihads in the 19th century, and subsequently opposed French colonial rule - resulting in Serer victory at the famous Battle of Djilass (13 May 1859), and the French Empire taking revenge against them at the equally famous Battle of Logandème that same year.

In the 20th century, most of the Serer converted to Islam (Sufism), but some are Christians or follow their traditional religion. Despite resisting Islamization and jihads for almost a millennium - having been persecuted for centuries, most of the Serers who converted to Islam converted as recently as the 1990s, in part, trying to escape discrimination and disenfranchisement by the majority Muslim group surrounding them, who still view the Serers as "the object of scorn and prejudice." The Serer pre-colonial Kingdom of Sine, known for fiercely resisting Islamization and repelling Islamic expansion, is described by historian Iba Der Thiam as an "impregnable bastion of the anti-Islamic" due to its strong adherence to Serer religion and culture, and great determination to reject Islam forever, a religion which "threatened the faith of their forefathers and to rule their lives in defiance of their customs."

The Serer society, like other ethnic groups in Senegal, has had social stratification featuring endogamous castes and slaves. Other historians, such as Thiaw, Richard and others, believe that the Serer did not maintain a slave culture, or at least not to the same extent as other ethnic groups in the Senegambia region.