Tunisians

a nation (natsiia; “nation” in the historical sense) and the basic population of Tunisia. The Tunisians number about 5.5 million (1975, estimate). Almost all Tunisians speak the eastern Maghribi, or Tunisian, dialect of Arabic. Fewer than 1 percent, who live on the island of Djerba and in the southern mountainous regions, speak a local dialect of Berber. Religious Tunisians are predominantly Sunni Muslims of the Malikite school. The majority of the Tunisians are engaged in agriculture; the inhabitants of the interior steppe regions are seminomadic herdsmen.

The Tunisians represent a mixture of the ancient indigenous inhabitants of the country, the Berbers, with Arabs who appeared in northwest Africa, beginning in the seventh century, during the formation of the Tunisian state. The consolidation of the Tunisians into a nation was furthered by the national liberation struggle against French colonial domination from 1881 to 1956 and by the strengthening of Tunisian political and economic independence after a republic was proclaimed in 1957.