called Tupuri. Zulgo While being a Chadic people, their language is from the Zulgu-Gezmek apart from the Chadic language family. Name origins There is controversy regarding the name “Kirdi”, as it has come to be associated as a pejorative. This derogatory term has been adopted by Fulani and other Cameroonian languages. The term has an origin from Kanuri and is ultimately thought to be derived from the Arabic language word for "monkey". Although some writers have considered the name as a proper moniker for the collection of peoples. Presently, Kirdi bears the general meaning "pagan," in opposition to the Fulani and other Muslim groups. In recent years, many have reclaimed the label as a means of identification and political unity, giving rise to the “kirditude” movement. Kirditude is thought to have been kickstarted as a movement in opposition to the largely Muslim Fulani political base for Maigari Bello Bouba’s UNDP during the 1991 election campaign. The term is only recognized in the Extreme North and North regions, while it is not used in the Adamawa region, the Fulfulde term Matchoubé, meaning "slave" or "servant," is used instead. Most groups, that are recognized under the umbrella term that is the kirdi peoples speak Afro-Asiatic languages, though some speak Niger-Congo Languages, this depends on the geographic dispersal of the groups, while there are still groups considered kirdi that have remained within the governance of Nigeria as opposed to Cameroon. Like Cameroon, the kirdi are a vast multitude of many diverse languages, some of which vary by entire language families. The historical meaning of the word, kirdi, can be best translated to mean the following, ‘all those who were non-Muslims and who could therefore be subjected to slavery’. Those that rejected conversion to Islam or to be relegated as merely a tributary during the Adamawa Emirate were capture as slaves. This is where the term kirdi earned its use. However, writers have repurposed the term to encompass a general collective group not united with language, customs, or religion, but of the specific negation of one religion, as well as being historical peoples of the Mandara Mountains. From this, Kirdi has come to be interpreted in the context of a group of people united by the social ideology that emphasizes resistance overall. History The Republic of Cameroon, the locus of most Kirdi began at the start of colonization from insurgent Muslim groups. By the