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Ethnic classifications vary from country to country and are therefore not comparable across countries. While some countries make classifications based on broad ancestry groups or characteristics such as skin color (e.g., the white ethnic category in the United States and some other countries), other countries use various ethnic, cultural ...
Mauritania, [a] formally the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, [b] is a sovereign country in Northwest Africa. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Western Sahara to the north and northwest, Algeria to the northeast , Mali to the east and southeast , and Senegal to the southwest .
The original inhabitants of Mauritania were the Bafour, presumably a Mande ethnic group, connected to the contemporary Arabized minor social group of Imraguen ("fishermen") on the Atlantic coast. The territory of Mauritania was on the fringe of geographical knowledge of Libya in classical antiquity. Berber immigration took place from about the ...
Predominantly Muslims, the Soninke were one of the early ethnic groups from West Africa to convert to Islam in about the 10th century. [8] The contemporary population of Soninke people is estimated to be over 2 million. [9] The cultural practices of Soninke people are similar to the Mandé peoples, and those of the Imraguen of Mauritania.
The Beidane people comprise roughly 30 percent of the population, [3] making them the largest ethnic minority. Haratines (Black Moors) make up roughly 40 percent of the population and constitute the ethnic plurality. [3] The remaining 30 percent are "Sub-Saharan Mauritanians," according to the 2023 CIA World Factbook entry on Mauritania. [3]
By land area Mauritania is the 11th-largest country in Africa and 28th-largest in the world; 90% of its territory is in the Sahara. Most of its population of some 4.3 million lives in the temperate south of the country, with roughly a third concentrated in the capital and largest city, Nouakchott , on the Atlantic coast.
The lists are commonly used in economics literature to compare the levels of ethnic, cultural, linguistic and religious fractionalization in different countries. [1] [2] Fractionalization is the probability that two individuals drawn randomly from the country's groups are not from the same group (ethnic, religious, or whatever the criterion is).