Mandé (name of a region)
Mandé is a region of Mali stretching from the south of Bamako to beyond the border of
Guinea Conakry. In Mandé, the population is mostly Mandéka, Maninka or Malinké. The Dogon people living in the centre of Mali on the cliffs of Badiangara say that they emigrated from MANDÉ to create the Dogon country on these cliffs. Their nearest neighbours were the people of Macina, the Bozo, the Tuareg. There was a lot of mixing between these different ethnic groups, whether as farmers or livestock farmers.
The Tuareg are the cousins in jest of the Dogons.
Marriages between Dogon and Peul began early in the fifteenth century that's why there are many Peul words in Dogon dialect!!
The song Mandé, which is sung in Dogon, invites all these fine people to the Tougouna' (a hangar style meeting room where people have to sit down to talk because the low ceiling doesn't allow them to stand) where they join forces to build their common country: Mali.