Toward an African Periodic Table of Strengths: A Preliminary Ethno-Linguistic Cartography (v0.1)

Abstract

This paper presents a preliminary lexicon and cartographic mapping of culturally and linguistically grounded constructs related to human strengths, values, and ways of being across 54 African countries. The work is inspired, in part, by discussions at the first African Positive Psychology Conference (2017/2018, South Africa), where the idea of developing a “periodic table of strengths” beyond existing taxonomies was raised as a future direction for the field.

In response, this lexicon offers a first-pass exploration of how strengths-related constructs are expressed across African contexts. Each entry identifies a term that is attested within a specific linguistic or cultural setting, accompanied by a concise interpretive meaning and core idea. The intention is not to assert national representativeness, but to document the presence of meaningful constructs within particular traditions, languages, or communities.

Accordingly, this lexicon adopts a presence-based rather than prevalence-based approach: inclusion reflects that a concept exists and carries recognised meaning within a given context, without implying universal adoption across populations. Many entries reflect broader ethno-linguistic or philosophical distributions (e.g., Bantu, Arabic, Mandé, or Creole systems), highlighting that cultural constructs often transcend contemporary national boundaries.

The resulting dataset reveals both localised and trans-regional patterns of meaning. Certain constructs cluster across linguistic families (e.g., Ubuntu/Botho/Bomoto within Bantu humanism traditions; Niyyah, Sabr, and Ihsan within Arabic/Islamic ethical systems; Sankofa, Teranga, and Maaya within West African philosophical traditions), suggesting the early architecture of a distributed and culturally embedded “periodic table” of strengths.

This version (v0.1) is intentionally exploratory and is positioned as a collaborative foundation for further empirical, linguistic, and theoretical refinement.