AFRICAN SOCIETIES SE512

2001/2002
Michaelmas and Lent Terms

Assessment Procedure: You will be assessed by a combination of two essays, a bibliography on one of the topics covered and three analytic notes on relevant readings. At the end, a three hour examination is held. The written examination constitutes 80% of the final mark. Coursework constitutes the other 20%. Of the latter, the bibliography and analytic notes constitute 50%, and essays the other 50%.

Assignment Requirements: Essays need to be of at least 2000 words, not more than 2500 in length and must be typed.

Deadlines for Assignments: All coursework must be handed in to the Departmental Office, L46 Eliot Extension and a receipt obtained as follows:

Essays:

Essays should be about 2000-2500 words (excluding bibliography), typed and double-spaced. The front page of the essay should state your name, the essay question number and title, and the length of the essay in words. (See deadlines below).

The essays themselves, should follow four key rules:-
1. Answer the question;
2. Have a definite 'shape', with beginning, middle and conclusion;
3. Sustain a continuous argument throughout (most writers fall down on rule 3);
4. Use examples.

In general, essays, and examinations, are marked in terms of these four rules, and in terms of the sensitivity which you show to contradictions between different interpretations of the same evidence. For example, the claim 'States are bad for people because they cause oppression, manipulation and persecution' contradicts, or, appears to contradict, 'States are good for people because they inhibit lawlessness and enforce co-operation'. What is that contradiction about?

At the end of essays indicate which books, articles or other sources you have used. Leave a wide margin on the left, to aid marking. You must write two essays, but you may write more if you want to do so. Essay titles and reading for them, and for each week's seminar, are indicated under the topic headings.

Analytic notes:

Analytic notes are to be made on material in the reading list, and the choice of readings should be made in arrangement with the Seminar Tutor. These notes will be useful for both writing essays and revising for exams, as well as providing material for seminar discussion. By the end of the first term each student must have completed and handed in one analytic note. Two more analytic notes must be submitted during the second term. Notes should be typed and of 1-2 pages in length, and should take the following format:
1. Your name.
2. Full reference details of the article read and analysed.
3. Quotation - a quotation (phrase, sentence, or longer passage) which you think is central to the authorís argument.
4. Argument - summarise as succinctly as possible the central argument of the text, and if necessary show how the argument is illustrated by the data presented. Be sure to include both what the author is arguing for, and what they are arguing against.
5. Ramifications - what are the implications of the argument put forward? What links can you make between this text and others you have read, either on this or another course? Does the argument confirm or contradict your own experience or common-sense standpoint? Try and make connections between this text and others, and between your own ideas and what the text is arguing.
6. Critique - assess the argument put forward and critically assess its plausibility: how does it advance the debate in which it engages? What criticisms might be levelled against it, whether with regard to interpretation, theory or quality of data? What questions do you feel it fails to address but are relevant to the issues it raises? What do you feel are the strengths and weaknesses of the authorís argument?

Note on the Bibliography

The bibliography should be a 3-4 page document that lists some of the material available to read on a particular subject. Beside each entry you should note the means you used to find the reference. A list of short abbreviations used should be given. For example you may have
Zeitlyn, D. 1993. Names for things or ideas? Mambila masks, museums, ìmedicinesî and the meaning of Sùàgà Paper presented at: ëAfrican Studies Association Conferenceí. Boston. Source: printed biblio from Zeitlyn 1994
Zeitlyn, D. 1994. Sua in Somié. Mambila Traditional Religion Sankt Augustin: Academia Verlag. Source: BIDS-IBSS

The intention is that you undertake some ëlibraryí research finding out what material is available (using standard and/or electronic sources). This can provide the basis for your reading for one of your essays, but thereís no problem if you want to write about different topics. Note: you must use one standard formatting convention, for example, as used in Africa or JRAI). It is your choice which to use, but you must be consistent.

Note on the email list:

There is a course email list for discussion and announcements. This is not assessed but we hope you will feel free to have open and widely ranging discussions with everyone on the course. To subscribe you must send an email to the following address:
list-manager@ukc.ac.uk containing the message: subscribe af-anth
You will then receive an automatic message to which you must reply in order to confirm your subscription. To send messages to the list, once you have subscribed, send them to
af-anth@ukc.ac.uk - they will be automatically sent to all subscribers.

Reading:

The culture of the peoples of Mediterranean Africa, the Sahara, the Ethiopian Highlands and the Horn of Africa differs markedly from that of the peoples further south. In this course the emphasis is on that southern area, the Sub-Saharan African Major Cultural Region, to give it a formal label. The aim throughout is to improve your detailed knowledge of the societies of this major region during the period since c1890, and to sharpen your judgment of how these societies differ from each other, and from European societies of the same period. Particularly important is the need to focus on the images of 'Africa' which people in Britain have, and to test these against the evidence available on this course. For instance, some people in Britain see Sub-Saharan Africa as covered with wet equatorial forest (which they call 'jungle'), Most of it is not!
There is no textbook fully suitable to the course, and the lectures are designed to provide a framework, and also a commentary on the more important features. However, it is possible to provide a list of books for background reading, covering all the major region or parts of it:-

Allen, Chris and Gavin Williams (eds.), Sociology of "Developing Countries", in Subsaharan Africa, Macmillan.
Birmingham, D. 1995. The decolonisation of Africa London: UCL Press.
Birmingham, D., & Martin, P. M. (eds.) 1983. History of Central Africa. 2 vols. London: Longmans.
Chabal, P. & J.-P. Daloz. 1999. Africa Works: Disorder as a Political instrument (African Issues). Oxford: International African Institute with James Currey and Indiana Press.
Fage, J.D., A History of Africa, Hutchinson.
Davidson, B. 1992. The Black Man's Burden: Africa and the Curse of the Nation-State London: James Curry.
Grinker, R., & Steiner, C. (eds.) 1997. Perspectives on Africa: Culture, History and Representation. Oxford: Blackwells.
Iliffe, John, The Emergence of African Capitalism (Anstey Memorial Lectures, 1982), Macmillan.
Mair, Lucy, African Kingdoms, Oxford.
Mair, Lucy, African Societies, Cambridge.
Mair, Lucy, Primitive Government, Scolar.
Rodney, Walter, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, East Africa Publishing House.
Internet African History Sourcebook <http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/africa/africasbook.html>

Many relevant readings are available online from the Human Relations Area Files
http://ehraf.hti.umich.edu/e/ehraf/ (No password is required if you access this on campus).
Other material is available as part of the ERA Project:
http://era.anthropology.ac.uk/

You may like to read what is happening south of the Sahara while this course is going on. A useful source is The Economist or Focus on Africa (per DT 1.F6). You should, however, note that for The Economist , and all British journalists, Africa is a Cinderella area, and does not receive the refined attention devoted to Europe and the United States.

African societies become less baffling when you know some of the peoples in detail. It is worth choosing three groups, and studying each of them thoroughly. There is plenty of choice, but some accessible sources are :

1. Eades, J.S., The Yoruba Today NB an electronic version of this is available: http://lucy.ukc.ac.uk/YorubaT/yt.html
2. Heald, S. 1989. Controlling anger: the sociology of Gisu violence (International African library; 6). Manchester: Manchester University Press for the International African Institute.
3. Leakey, L.S.B., The Southern Kikuyu Before 1903 (This is in three volumes. You may like to concentrate on one)
4. Bowen, E.S. 1956. Return to Laughter. London: Readers Union. NB This is a novel about anthropological research in the 1950s
5. Caplan, P. 1997. African Voices, African Lives. Personal narratives from a Swahili village. London: Routledge.
6. Kaberry, P.M. 1952 Women of the Grassfields. Colonial Research Publication No 14 HMSO. NB This is online via http://era.anthropology.ac.uk/

LECTURES AND READING LIST

Week 1. Representations of Africa (David Zeitlyn)

Comparing different styles of writing about Africa -critical reading

Read at least one from each of the following categories of text:

African authored Novels about Africa
Achebe, C. 1958. Things fall apart. London: Heineman.
Achebe, C. 1987. Anthills of the Savannah. London: Heinemann.
Ngugi Wa Thiong'o 1982 Devil on the cross. London: Heinemann
Tansi, S.L. 1988. The anti-people: a novel. London: Boyars.
Tansi, S.L. 1995. The seven solitudes of Lorsa Lopez (African writers series). Oxford: Heinemann Educational.
Soyinka, W, 1981 Ake: the years of childhood. London: R. Collings n.b. strictly an autobiography
Toutuola, A, 1952 The palmwine drinkard & his dead palmwine tapster in the dead's town. London: Faber
Césaire, Aimé, 1995, Notebook of a return to my native land, Cahier d'un retour au pays natal. Newcastle upon Tyne, Bloodaxe Books
Kourouma, A, 1999 En attendant les votes des bêtes sauvages Paris: Le Seuil

European authored Novels about Africa
Barley, N. 1986 (1983). The Innocent Anthropologist. Notes from a mud hut. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Bowen, E.S. 1956. Return to Laughter. London: Readers Union.
Boyd, W 1982 A good man in Africa Penguin
Conrad, Joseph, 1994, Heart of darkness. London, Penguin Books.

A novel that does not fit the above classification!
Naipaul, V. S., 1980. A bend in the river. Penguin
and another book that is hard to classify:
Curtin, P.D. (ed.) 1997. Africa Remembered. Narratives by West Africans from the Era of the Slave Trade. Prospect Heights, Illinois: Waveland Press.

Academic Africanists
Barley, N. 1983. Symbolic Structures: an Exploration of the Culture of the Dowayos. Cambridge & Paris: Cambridge University Press & Maison des Sciences de l'Homme.
Caplan, P. 1997. African Voices, African Lives. Personal narratives from a Swahili village. London: Routledge.
Uchendu, V.C. 1965. The Igbo of Southeast Nigeria. New York: Holt Rinehart & Winston.
Rattray, R S, [1923] Ashanti. Oxford: Clarendon Press
Machin, Noel 1998"Government Anthropologist" a life of R.S. Rattray Electronic document http://lucy.ukc.ac.uk/Machin/
Birmingham, D. 1995. The decolonisation of Africa London: UCL Press.
Davidson, B. 1992. The Black Man's Burden: Africa and the Curse of the Nation-State London: James Curry.
Jean Comaroff and John Comaroff Of revelation and revolution London, University of Chicago Press, 1991

Unclassifiable
Laura Bohannan ëShakespeare in the bushí (from Natural History, Aug/Sept. 1966) online http://www.oberlin.edu/~njones/English200/Bohannan.html

Seminar and Essay Topics
1 Should 'novels' be treated differently by anthropologists from 'academic' writing? Compare at least two examples in your answer.
2 How can we be critical readers of autobiography? Compare at least two in your answer.
3. Does cultural identity alter the validity of the written? Compare at least two examples in your answer.

Week 2. Society, Culture and the Physical Environment (David Zeitlyn)

Climate and vegetation. Types of subsistence activity and their distribution. Population distribution. Main linguistic and cultural boundaries.

Reading
Fage, J.D., A History of Africa, chapter 1.
Forde, D., "The cultural map of West Africa" (photocopy in Short Loan).
Hopkins, A., An Economic History of West Africa, chapter 1.
Mabogunje, A.L., "The land and peoples of West Africa" in J.F.A. Ajayi and M. Crowder (eds.), History of West Africa, vol.1.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. What general relationships (if any) are there between the physical habitat and African social and cultural patterns?
2. If you had to devise a course on African societies, what kinds of political or cultural units would you focus on, and what problems might arise in defining them?

Week 3. Stateless Societies: Politics and Social Control (David Zeitlyn)

States and stateless societies. Definitional problems. Bands, segmentary lineages and age-sets. Social order and dispute settlement.

Reading General
Fortes, M., and E.E. Evans-Pritchard, "Introduction" in Fortes and Evans-Pritchard (eds.), African Political Systems.
Horton, R., "Stateless societies in the history of West Africa" in J.F.A. Ajayi and M. Crowder (eds.), A History of West Africa, vol.1.
Mair, Lucy, Primitive Government, part 1, chapters 1-4.
Obayemi, A., "The Yoruba and Edo-speaking peoples and their neighbours before 1600" in Ajayi and Crowder (eds.), History of West Africa, vol.1 (2nd edition only).
Shorter, A., East African Societies, chapter 4.
Anigbo, O.A.C. ëCommensality as Cultural Performance: the struggle for leadership in an Igbo Villageí, in The Politics of Cultural Performance, edited by David Parkin, Lionel Caplan and Humphrey Fisher, 101-14. (Oxford: Berghahn Books, 1996).
Stevenson, Robert F., Populations and Political Systems in Tropical Africa.

Further Case Studies
Bohannan, Paul, "Political aspects of Tiv social organisation" in J. Middleton and D. Tait (eds.), Tribes Without Rulers.
Fortes, M., "The political system of the Tallensi" in M. Fortes and E.E. Evans-Pritchard (eds.), African Political Systems.
Gibbs, J.L. (ed.), Peoples of Africa, chapters on Igbo, Fulani, Tiv.
Mair, Lucy, African Societies, chapters 3, 10, 11, 16.
Gibbs, J.L. (ed.), Peoples of Africa, chapters on Jie, Somali, Bantu Tiriki.
Gulliver, P., Social Control in an African Society.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. What do stateless African societies reveal about anthropological concepts of power?
2. How useful or rigid is the distinction between stateless and centralised societies in the African context?

Week 4. Hunters and Gatherers (David Zeitlyn)

Foraging techniques. Social structure of hunting and gathering bands. Foraging and the environment. Relations with outsiders. Sedentarisation.

Reading:
Kalahari Bushmen
Barnard, A. "Kalahari Bushmen settlement patterns" in P. Burnham and R.F. Ellen (eds.), Social and Ecological Systems.
Lee, Richard B., "!Kung Bushman subsistence" in A. Vayda (ed.), Environment and Cultural Behaviour.
Lee, Richard B., "The !Kung Bushmen of Botswana" in M.G. Bicchieri (ed.), Hunters and Gatherers Today.
Lee, R.B. and I. De Vore (eds.), Kalahari Hunter-Gatherers.
Marshall, Lorna, The !Kung of Nyae Nyae.
Marshall, L. "The !Kung Bushmen of the Kalahari" in J.L. Gibbs (ed.), Peoples of Africa.
Shostak, M. 1981. Nisa. The life and Words of a !Kung Woman. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Katz, R. 1982. Boiling energy : community healing among the Kalahari Kung. Cambridge, Mass.; London: Harvard University Press.
Kent, S. 1992. The Current forager Controversy: Real versus Ideal views of Hunter-Gatherers. Man 27(1), 45-70.
Kent, S. 1993. Sharing in an egalitarian Kalahari community. Man 28(3), 479-514.
Kent, S. 1995. Does sedentarization promote gender inequality? A case study from the Kalahari. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 1(3), 513-536.
Wilmsen, E. N. 1989. Land filled with flies: a political economy of the Kalahari Chicago; London: University of Chicago Press.
An online simulation: based on R. Lee's paper (1969), !Kung Bushman subsistence. An input-output analysis http://lucy.ukc.ac.uk/Simulate/java/Kung/Kung.html
Hadza
Woodburn, J., "An introduction to Hadza ecology" in Lee, R.B. and De Vore (eds.), Man the Hunter.
Woodburn, J., "Residential stability" in Lee and De Vore (eds.) op.cit.
Woodburn, James. 1982 Egalitarian societies, Man (N.S.) 17: 431-51.

Mbuti
Turnbull, Colin, "The Mbuti pigmies of the Ituri forest" in J.L. Gibbs (ed.), Peoples of Africa.
Turnbull, C., The Forest People.
Turnbull, C., Wayward Servants.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. How justified is it to continue talking about 'hunters and gatherers' in Africa?
2. How well have hunters and gatherers fared in their relations with more complex societies around them?
3. Is equality a bequest or an achievement?

Week 5. Centralised States (David Zeitlyn)

Definitional problems. Kingship: checks and balances. Centralisation and bureaucratisation. Military technology and state development.

Reading: General
Lloyd, P.C., "The political structure of African kingdoms" in M. Banton (ed.), Political Systems and the Distribution of Power. NB available on CD in the library ó as part of the ASA Monographs CD
Mair, Lucy, African Kingdoms.

West Africa
Goody, J., Technology, Tradition and the State in Africa.
Law, R., Oyo: a West African cavalry state Journal of African History, 1975.
MacGaffey, W. 1970. The Religious Commissions of the Bakongo. Man (n.s.) 5(1), 27-38.
Morton-Williams, P. 1960. The Yoruba Ogboni cult in Oyo. Africa 30, 362-374.
Smaldone, J., Warfare in the Sokoto Caliphate.
Wilks, I., "Ashanti in the 19th century" in D. Forde and P. Kaberry (eds.), West African Kingdoms in the 19th Century.
Wilks, I., "Land, labour, capital and the forest kingdom of Asante" in J. Friedman and M. Rowlands (eds.), The Evolution of Social Systems.

East Africa
Gibbs, J.L. (ed.), Peoples of Africa, chapter on Ganda, Rwanda.
Mair, Lucy, African Societies, chapters 12-14.
Mair, Lucy, Primitive Government, part II, chapters 5-10.
Shorter, A., East African Societies,chapter 5.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. Assess the impact of either trade or military technology on state formation in Africa.
2. What strategies did African rulers use to concentrate power in their own hands, and what constraints were there on them achieving this?

Week 6. Concepts of the tribe (David Zeitlyn)

Creation and maintenance of identity. Problems with concepts and descriptive labels. Is tribe a useful category?

General reading.
Fried ìThe notion of tribe.î
Southall, A. 1970. ëThe illusion of tribeí, Journal of Asian and African Studies 5(1-2), 28-50.
this is in the library as a BOOK: The passing of tribal man in Africa, Peter C.W. Gutkind, (ed.) and reprinted in Grinker, R., & Steiner, C. (eds.) 1997 Perspectives on Africa.

Kopytoff, I. 1987. The Internal African Frontier: the making of African political culture. In The African Frontier: the reproduction of traditional African societies (ed.) I. Kopytoff. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

Peel, J. D. Y. 1989. The cultural work of Yoruba ethnogenesis. In History and ethnicity (eds.) E. Tonkin, M. McDonald, & M. Chapman. London: Routledge.
B. Davidson ëBlack manís Burdení chapter 4
Chabal, P. & J.-P. Daloz. 1999. Africa Works: Disorder as a Political instrument (African Issues). Oxford: International African Institute with James Currey and Indiana Press. chapter 4
THE KALELA DANCE Aspects of Social Relationships among Urban Africans in Northern Rhodesia BY J. CLYDE MITCHELL 1956
This is online via http://era.anthropology.ac.uk/

Case study: The Tikar
Jeffreys, M. D. W. 1964. Who are the Tikar? African Studies 23(3/4), 141-153.
Chilver, E. M., & Kaberry, P. M. 1971. The Tikar problem: a non-problem. Journal of African Languages 10(2), 13-14.
Price, D. 1979. Who are the Tikar now? Paideuma 25, 89-98.
Fowler, I. & D. Zeitlyn. 1997. Introductory Essay: the Grassfields and the Tikar. In African Crossroads: intersections of history and anthropology in Cameroon (eds.) I. Fowler & D. Zeitlyn. Oxford: Berghahn. In Short-term loan and also available electronically at http://lucy.ukc.ac.uk/dz/xroads/intro.html

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. Is the tribe a western construct?
2. Which units best help us understand African societies?
3. Are tribes and ethnic groups different?

Week 7. Kinship: Anthropologists and African descent systems (David Zeitlyn)

The distribution of kinship systems in Africa. The influence of environment on kinship structure. Patrilineal, Matrilineal, double unilineal and cognatic procedures: definitional problems. Kinship and changing economic conditions. Residential flexibility and organisation. Impact on matrilineal procedures of economic change and social mobility.

Reading:
General
Lewis, I.M., Problems in the comparative study of unilineal descent groups in M. Banton (ed.), The Relevance of Models for Social Anthropology. NB available on CD in the library ó as part of the ASA Monographs CD
James, W. 1993 (1978). ëMatrifocus on African Women,í in S. Ardener (ed.) Defining Females, pp.140-62 Oxford: Berg.
Barber, K. 1991. I could speak until tomorrow: Oriki, Women and the Past in a Yoruba Town Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press for the I.A.I. Chapter 5 ëOriki of Originí on Kinship and ile.

Classic Unlineal Systems
Fortes and Evans-Pritchard (eds.), African Political Systems, chapters on Nuer and Tallensi.
Gough, K., Nuer kinship: a re-examination in T.O. Beidelman (ed.), The Translation of Culture.
Mair, L., Peoples of Africa, chapters 5, 10 (Nuer and Tallensi).
Worsley, P., The kinship system of the Tallensi: a re-evaluation, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 86, 1956, 37-75.
Douglas, M., Is matriliny doomed in Africa? in M. Douglas (ed.), Man in Africa.
Fortes, M., Kinship and marriage among the Ashanti in A.R. Radcliffe-Brown and D. Forde (eds.), African Systems of Kinship and Marriage.
Fortes, M., Time and social structure in Time and Social Structure and Other Essays.
Fortes, M., Kinship and the Social Order, chapters 9 and 10.

Longer Monographs
Evans-Pritchard, E., The Nuer.
Evans-Pritchard, E., Kinship and Marriage Among the Nuer.

Agnatic or Cognatic?
Bender, D.R., Agnatic or cognatic?, Man, 1970.
Eades, J.S., The Yoruba Today, chapter 3.
Lloyd, P., Agnatic and cognatic descent among the Yoruba, Man, 1966.

Cognatic Systems
Goody, Esther, Contexts of Kinship.
Smith, M.G., The Hausa in Gibbs (ed.), Peoples of Africa.
Schildkrout, E. 1978. People of the zongo. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Double Descent Systems
Forde, D., Kinship and marriage among the Yako in A.R. Radcliffe-Brown and D. Forde (eds.), African Systems of Kinship and Marriage.
Goody, J., The fission of domestic groups among the LoDagaba in J. Goody (ed.), The Developmental Cycle in Domestic Groups.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1 How relevant is descent in defining African identities?
2 Why is matriliny a problem for anthropologists but not Africans?

Week 8. Marriage (David Zeitlyn)

Husbands and wives in a polygynous society. Bridewealth. Terminal separation and divorce. Marriage, class and social mobility. Alternatives to marriage.

Reading General
Radcliffe-Brown, A. R. 1950. Introduction. In African Systems of Kinship & Marriage (eds.) A. R. Radcliffe-Brown, & D. Forde. Oxford: OUP.
All the chapters in African Systems of Kinship & Marriage (eds.) A. R. Radcliffe-Brown, & D. Forde. Oxford: OUP. are recommended.
Goody, J. R., & Tambiah, S. J. 1973. (eds.) Bridewealth and dowry Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Several chapters are good including Goody
Bohannan, Paul ëThe impact of money on an African subsistence economyí. Journal of Economic History 19 , 491-503 (1959) reprinted in (ed.) Dalton ìTribal and Peasant economiesî

Marriage Presentations
Evans-Pritchard, E., Kinship and Marriage Among the Nuer.
Gray, R., Sonjo brideprice in LeClair and Schneider (eds.), Economic Anthropology.
Goody, E.N. & J.R. Goody. 1967. The Circulation of Women and Children in Northern Ghana. Man (N.S.) 2(2), 226-248.
Sharon Hutchinson The Cattle of Money.... in Grinker, R., & Steiner, C. (eds.) 1997

The Economic Role of Women
Allen, C. and G. Williams (ed.), 'Sociology of "Developing Countries"' in Subsaharan Africa, section 2.
Hafkin, Nancy and Edna Bay (eds.), Women in Africa, read "Introduction" and select from other papers.
Schildkrout, E., Dependency and autonomy in C. Oppong (ed.), Male and Female in West Africa.
Schlegel, Alice, Sexual Stratification, papers by Smock and Lewis.
Sudarkasa, N., Where Women Work.

Alternatives to Marriage
Cohen, A., Custom and Politics in Urban Africa, chapter 2.
Dinan, C., Pragmatists or feminists? The professional single women in Accra, Cahiers d'Etudes Africaines, 65, 1977, 155-76.
Dinan, C., Sugar daddies and gold diggers: the white-collar single women in Accra in C. Oppong (ed.), Female and Male in West Africa.
Pitten, R., Houses of women: a focus on alternative life-styles in Katsina City in C. Oppong (ed.), Female and Male in West Africa.
Greene, B. 1998. The institution of woman-marriage in Africa: A cross-cultural analysis. Ethnology 37(4), 395-412.
Mitzi Goheen (1995) Gender And Accumulation In Nso'. Available online: http://lucy.ukc.ac.uk/Chilver/Paideuma/index.html
Kaberry, P.M. 1952 Women of the Grassfields. Colonial Research Publication No 14 HMSO. NB This is online via http://era.anthropology.ac.uk/

Social Mobility and Marriage
Harrell-Bond, B., Modern Marriage in Sierra Leone.
Oppong, C., Marriage Among a Matrilineal Elite.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. How subordinate were women in precolonial African society, and have recent changes altered their position?
2. What alternatives to marriage are available to African women, and how far are they socially accepted?
3. How do African women combine their economic and domestic roles?
4. Discuss the ways in which the organisation of marriage in Africa is related to other social factors.

Week 9. Agriculture and Food Production (David Zeitlyn)

The household and the organisation of farm labour. Indigenous concepts of land-tenure and their modification with the growth of a market economy. African farmers as peasants. The intensification of agriculture: cash-crops, new methods and the role of the state.

Reading: General
Allen, C. and G. Williams (eds.) 'Sociology of "Developing Countries"' in Subsaharan Africa, section 3.
Hart, K., The Political Economy of West African Agriculture.
Iliffe, John, The Emergence of African Capitalism, chapter 2.

Indigenous Farming Systems
Hill, P., Rural Hausa.
Kaberry, P.M. 1952 Women of the Grassfields. Colonial Research Publication No 14 HMSO. NB This is online via http://era.anthropology.ac.uk/
Netting, R., Household organisation and intensive agriculture: the Kofyar case, Africa, 1965.
Netting, R., Hill Farmers of Nigeria 1968.
Netting, R.M. & M.P. Stone. 1996. Agro-Diversity On a Farming Frontier - Kofyar Smallholders On the Benue Plains Of Central Nigeria. Africa 66(1), 52-70.
Leach, M. 1994. Rainforest relations: gender and resource use among the Mende of Gola, Sierra Leone (International African library; 13). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Fairhead, J. & M. Leach. 1996. Misreading the African landscape: society and ecology in a forest-savannah mosaic. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Richards, A., Land, Labour and Diet in Northern Rhodesia.
Snyder, F., Capitalism and Legal Change.

Cash Crops and Peasants
Beer, C. and G. Williams, "The politics of the Ibadan peasantry" in G. Williams (ed.), Nigeria: Economy and society.
Berry, S.S., Cocoa, Custom and Socio-Economic Change in Rural Western Nigeria.
Eicher, K. and C. Liedholm (eds.), The Growth and Development of the Nigerian Economy, papers by Berry and Hogendorn.
Goody, J., Rice burning and the green revolution in Northern Ghana, Journal of Development Studies, 16, 1980, 136-55.
Harrison, R.K., "Work and motivation" in D.J. Murray (ed.), Studies in Nigerian Administration.
Hill, P., Studies in Rural Capitalism in West Africa, chapter 2.
Pottier, J. 1988. Migrants no more: settlement and survival in Mambwe villages, Zambia (International African Library; 4). Manchester: Manchester University .
Pottier, J. 1989. Threes-a-crowd - knowledge, ignorance and power in the context of urban agriculture in Rwanda. Africa 59(4), 461-477.
Swindell, K. 1984. Farmers, traders, and laborers - dry season migration from northwest Nigeria, 1900-33. Africa 54(1), 3-19.
Swindell, K., & Mamman, A. B. 1990. Land expropriation and accumulation in the Sokoto periphery, northwest Nigeria 1976-86. Africa 60(2), 173-187.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. Is there any relationship between social structure and farming techniques in African societies?
2. Are African cultivators "peasants" and, if so, is this a recent development?

Week 10. Distribution and Trade (David Zeitlyn)

Markets and market networks. Ethnic monopolies. Role of women in trade. Local traders and foreign capital. Marketing and the state. Alternative distribution channels?

Reading -General
Meillassoux, C., Introduction in Meillassoux (ed.), The Development of Indigenous Trade and Markets in West Africa.

Market Structure and Trading Techniques
Collins, J.D., The Clandestine movement of groundnuts across the Niger-Nigeria border, Canadian Journal of African Studies, 10, 1976, 259-78.
Handwerker, W.P., Kinship, friendship and business failure among market sellers in Monrovia, Africa, 1973.
Meillassoux, C. (ed.), op.cit., select from papers by Lawson, Smith, Hill and Hodder.
Quinn, N., Do Mfantse fish sellers estimate probabilities in their heads?, American Ethnologist, 5, 1978, 206-26.

Long-distance Trade and Ethnic Monopolies
Cohen, A. 1969. Custom and politics in urban Africa: a study of Hausa migrants in Yoruba towns. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Cohen, Abner, The social organisation of credit in a West African cattle market, Africa, 1965.
Cohen, A., Politics of the kola trade, Africa, 1966.
Cohen, A., Cultural strategies in the organisation of trading diasporas in Meillassoux (ed.), op.cit.
Eades, J.S., Kinship and entrepreneurship among the Yoruba in northern Ghana in W. Shack and E.P. Skinner (eds.), Strangers in African Societies.
Khuri, F.I., Kinship, emigration and trade partnership among the Lebanese of West Africa, Africa, 1965.
Leighton, N.O., The political economy of a stranger population: the Lebanese of Sierra Leone in W. Shack and E.P. Skinner (eds.), Strangers in African Societies.
Sudarkasa, N. Commercial migration in West Africa with special reference to the Yoruba in Ghana in W. Shack and E.P. Skinner (eds.), Strangers in African Societies.
Winder, W.C., The Lebanese in West Africa, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 1962.
Eades, J.S. 1993. Strangers and traders: Yoruba migrants, markets and the state in Northern Ghana (International African library; 11). Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press for the International African Institute.
Schildkrout, E. 1978. People of the zongo. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Guyer, J.I. 1995. Women in the rural economy: contemporary variations. In African Women South of the Sahara (eds) M.J. Hay & S. Stichter. London: Longman.
Guyer, J.I. 1991. Female farming in anthropology and African history. In Gender at the crossroads of knowledge, feminist anthropology in the postmodern era (ed.) M.d. Leonardo. Berkeley, London: University of California Press.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. Why are ethnic monopolies so common in the markets of Africa?
2. What methods for accumulating capital are available to African traders?
3. Discuss the theoretical implications of the relationship between agriculture and trade in a single african society.

Week 11. Pastoralism (John Kesby)

Pastoral techniques. Social structure of pastoralism: lineages and age-sets. pastoralism and the environment. Pastoralism and the market economy. Prospects for pastoralists: alternatives?

Reading General
Dyson-Hudson, N., "Subsistence herding in Uganda" (photocopy in Short Loan).
Monod, T. (ed.), Pastoralism in Tropical Africa, "Introduction" and papers by Baxter, Gulliver and Lewis.
Swift, J., Sahelian pastoralists: underdevelopment, desertification and famine, Annual Review of Anthropology, 6, 1977, 457-78.

Further Case Material
Frantz, C., The open niche, pastoralism and sedentarization in the Mambila grasslands of Nigeria, in P. Salzman (ed.), When Nomads Settle.
Gibbs, J.L. (ed.), Peoples of Africa, Chapters on Jie, Karimojong, Somali, Fulani.
Gulliver, P., The Family Herds.
Mair, Lucy, African Societies, chapter 3.
Monod, T. (ed.), Pastoralism in Tropical Africa, select from papers by Baker, Frantz, Horowitz, Jacobs, Swift.
Spencer, P. 1965. The Samburu, a study of gerontocracy in a nomadic tribe. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Spencer, P. 1988. The Maasai of Matapato, a study of rituals of rebellion. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.
Spencer, P. 1998. The pastoral continuum: the marginalisation of tradition in East AFrica Oxford: Clarendon.
Stenning, Derrick J. Savannah Nomads. A study of the Wodaabe Pastoral Fulani of Western Bornu Province, Northern Region, Nigeria. (London: O.U.P., 1959).
Riesman, Paul, Freedom in Fulani Social Life.
Fratkin, E. 1997. Pastoralism: Governance and development issues. Annual Review of Anthropology 26, 235-261.
Moore, H., Sanders, T., & Kaare, B. (eds.) 1999. Those who play with fire: gender fertility and transformation in East and Southern Africa. London: Athlone Press.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. How justified is it to continue talking about 'pastoralists' in Africa?
2. Have African pastoralists ever been isolated? - discuss with examples.

Week 12. Reading Week (No lecture, No seminars)


Week 13. African Worlds (John Kesby)

God and the cosmos. Interpretation of ritual and symbolism.

Reading
Cosmic Structure and Social Structure
Douglas, Mary, Natural Symbols.
Evans-Pritchard, E., Nuer Religion.
Horton, R., The Kalabari world view Africa, 1962.
Lienhardt, G., Divinity and Experience, especially Part I.
Morton-Williams, P., An outline of the cosmology and cult organisation of the Oyo Yoruba Africa, 1964.

The Interpretation of Symbols
Sperber, Dan, Rethinking Symbolism.
Turner, V., The Ritual Process.
Turner, V., The Forest of Symbols.
Wescott, Joan and P. Morton-Williams, The symbolism and ritual context of the Yoruba laba Shango Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 1962.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. What relationship (if any) do you detect between social structure and views of the cosmos in African societies?
2. How far can one establish the meaning of the symbols used in African ritual?

Week 14. World Religions in Africa - Christianity (John Kesby)

The spread of Christianity. Politics of conversion. Christianity and education. Mission and indigenous churches. Christianity and protest.

Reading:
The Sociology of Conversion
Goody, J., Religion, social change and the sociology of conversion in J. Goody (ed.), Changing Social Structure in Ghana.
Horton, R., African conversion Africa, 1971.
Fisher, H.J. 1973. Conversion reconsidered: Some Historical Aspects of Religious Conversion in Black Africa. Africa 63, 27-40.
Horton, R. and J.D.Y. Peel, Conversion and confusion Canadian Journal of African Studies, 1976.
Ifeka-Moller, C., White power: socio-structural factors in conversion to Christianity Canadian Journal of African Studies, 8, 1974.
Peel, J.D.Y., Syncretism and religious change Comparative Studies in Society and History, 1968, 121-141.
Peel, J.D.Y., The christianisation of African society, in E. Fashole-Luke (ed.), Christianity in Independent Africa.
Gausset, Q. 1999. Islam or Christianity? The choices of the Wawa and the Kwanja of Cameroon. Africa 69(2), 257-278.

Missionaries and Independent Churches
Ayandele, A., The Missionary Impact on Modern Nigeria.
Douglas, M. 1999. Sorcery accusations unleashed: The Lele revisited, 1987. Africa 69(2), 177-193.
Mitchell, R.C., Religious protest and social change: the origins of the Aladura movement in Western Nigeria, in R.I. Rotberg and A. Mazrui (eds.), Protest and Power in Black Africa.
Peel, J.D.Y., Aladura.
Roberts, A.D., The Lumpa church of Alice Lenshina, in Rotberg and Mazrui (eds.), op.cit.

Christianity and Economic Change
Barrett, S.R., The Rise and Fall of an African Utopia.
Iliffe, J., The Emergence of African Capitalism, chapter 3.
Long, N., Social Change and the Individual.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. Either (a) What effects has Christianity had on African society? or (b) What effects has African society had on Christianity?
2. Is the Protestant Ethic a factor in accounting for economic growth in Africa?
3. How can African Christians deal with witches?

Week 15. Religion and the Social Order: Social Control and Ancestors (John Kesby)

Witches, rulers and ancestors.

Ancestors
NB most of the reading material is available electronically via http://era.anthropology.ac.uk/Ancestors/
From this address you will be able to find the full text of:
Kopytoff, I. 1971. Ancestors as Elders, Africa 41, 129-42.
Calhoun, C. J. 1980. The authority of ancestors: a sociological reconsideration of Fortes's Tallensi in response to Fortes's critics, Man (n.s.) 15(2), 304-319, and the ensuing correspondence with Kopytoff in Man: 16(1), 135-138; 17(3), 548 etc
Fortes, M., Pietas and ancestor worship, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 1961.
Gluckman, M. 1937. Mortuary customs and the belief in survival after death among the South-Eastern Bantu. Bantu Studies 11, 117-36.

Edwards, A. 1984. On the Non-existence of an Ancestor Cult among the Tiv. Anthropos 79(1/3), 77-112. NB This is available from HRAF
and DZís discussion of this literature with regard to Mambila data:
Mambila avatars and the ancestor cult: Problems of History and Interpretation. (online in ERA)

These are also available in the library as normal. other possible sources (on paper) include
Bradbury, R., Fathers, elders and ghosts in Edo religion, in M. Banton (ed.), Anthropological Approaches to the Study of Religion. NB available on CD in the library ó as part of the ASA Monographs CD
Goody, J., Death, Property and the Ancestors.
Goody, E., Legitimate and illegitimate aggression in a West African state, in M. Douglas (ed.), Witchcraft Confessions and Accusations.
Middleton, J., Witchcraft and sorcery in Lugbara, in J. Middleton and E. Winter (eds.), Witchcraft and Sorcery in East Africa.
Middleton, J., Lugbara Religion.
Also recent articles in Africa on Ancestors in Madagascar.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. Do Mambila have ancestors?
2. How are systems of ancestors best understood?
3. In what ways are the methods of African healers and diviners similar to those of western medical specialists?
4. See Qn 1 from previous week

Week 16. Chiefs, Colonialism and Independence (John Kesby)

Chiefs and kings under colonial rule. Stateless societies under colonial rule. Changes in boundaries, succession and administration. Chiefs and the growth of nationalism. The fate of chiefs in independent Africa.

Reading:
General
Fage, J., A History of Africa, chapters 15-16.
Lemarchand, R., ìIntroduction" and "Conclusion" in African Kingships in Perspective.
Rodney, W., How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, chapters 5-6.

Further Case Studies
Crowder, M. and O. Ikime (eds.), West African Chiefs, read "Introduction" and select from papers by Paden, Skinner, Jones, Asiwaju, Schildkrout, Ferguson and Wilks.
Bradbury, R., "Continuities and discontinuities in pre-colonial Benin politics" in Benin Studies.
Lemarchand, R. (ed.), African Kingships in Perspective, select from papers by Clapham, Lemarchand, Young, Doornbos and Lloyd.

Longer Case Studies
Asiwaju, A., Western Yorubaland Under European Rule.
Atanda, A., The New Oyo Empire.
Lemarchand, R., Rwanda and Burundi.
Staniland, M., The Lions of Dagbon.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. In what ways were the roles of rulers and chiefs modified by their incorporation into colonial administration?
2. What problems did colonial officials have in dealing with the administration of stateless societies, and how did they attempt to overcome them?

Week 17. Gender and the Body (Philip Thomas)

Body symbolism and gender. The body, sexual difference and gender: the sex/gender debate.

Main readings:
Astuti, R (1998) ëItís a boy,í ëitís a girl!í: reflections on sex and gender in Madagascar and beyond, in M Lambek & A Strathern (eds.) Bodies and Persons: Comparative Perspectives from African and Melanesia, pp. 29-53
Beidelman, T (1980) ìWomen and men in two East African societies,î in I Karp and C Bird (eds.) Explorations in African Systems of Thought.
Moore, H (1993) ìThe differences within and the differences between,î in T del Valle (ed) Gendered Anthropology, pp.193-204; OR ìThe divisions within: sex, gender and sexual difference,î in Moore (1994) A Passion for Difference, pp.8-27; OR ìUnderstanding sex and gender,î in T Ingold (ed) (1994) Companion Encyclopedia of Anthropology, pp.783-312
Morris, R (1995) ìAll made up: performance theory and the new anthropology of sex and gender,î Annual Review of Anthropology 24: 567-592


Seminar readings:
Broch-Due, V (1993) ìMaking meaning out of matter: perceptions of sex, gender and bodies among thew Turkana,î in Broch-Due et al (eds.) Carved Flesh/Cast Selves: Gendered Symbols and Social Practices, pp. 53-82
Feldman-Savelsberg, P (1995) ìCooking inside: gender and kinship in Bangangté idioms of marriage and procreation,î American Ethnologist 22: 483-501; reprinted in M Maynes et al (eds.) Gender, Kinship, Power, pp. 177-197
Mitzi Goheen (1995) Gender And Accumulation In Nso' available online: http://lucy.ukc.ac.uk/Chilver/Paideuma/index.html
Hansen, K (1997) ìBody politics: sexuality, gender and domestic service in Zambia,î in R Grinker & C Steiner (eds.) Perspectives on Africa, pp. 550-566
Kaspin, D (1998) ìA Chewa cosmology of the body,î American Ethnologist 23: 561-578
Middleton, K (2000) ìHow Karembola men become mothers,î in J Carsten (ed.) Cultures of Relatedness, pp. 104-127
Power, C & I Watts (1997) ìThe woman with the zebraís penis: gender, mutability and performance,î Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute 3: 537-560

Seminar and Essay Topics:
1. Are there any common themes in gender symbolism throughout Africa?
2. Do you find the analytic distinction between sex and gender a useful one for understanding gender in African societies?
3. What body parts and/or body functions appear to be fundamental to gender representations (both within a particular society and comparatively)?
4. Are their variations in gender representation within societies (e.g. between women and men)?
5. Discuss the relationship between the body and gender in any ONE society
6. Are ëwomení and ëmení natural categories of human being?

Further reading (books and edited collections only):
Evans-Pritchard, E E (1956) Nuer Religion, chapters 9-10
Held, S (1999) Manhood and Morality: Sex, Violence and Ritual in Gisu Society
Huntington, R (1988) Gender and Social Structure in Madagascar
Hutchinson, S (1996) Nuer Dilemmas: Coping with Money, War and the State
Llewelyn-Davies, M (1981) Women, warriors, and patriarchs,î in S Ortner & H Whitehead (eds.) Sexual Meanings, pp.330-358
MacCormack, C (1980) ìProto-social to adult: a Sherbro transformation,î in MacCormack & Strathern (eds.) Nature, Culture and Gender, pp.95-118
Matory, J L (1994) Sex and the Empire that Is No More: Gender and the Politics of Metaphor in Oyo Yoruba Religion
Moore, H et al (eds.) Those Who Play with Fire: Gender, Fertility and Transformation in East and Southern Africa
Piot, C (1999) Remotely Global: Village Modernity in West Africa, chapter 4
Richards, A (1956) Chisungu: A Girlís Initiation Ceremony among the Bemba of Zambia
Sanday, P & R Goodenough (1990) Beyond the Second Sex: New Direction in the Anthropology of Gender, articles by Kopytoff, Gottlieb
Schloss, M (1988) The Hatchetís Blood: Separation, Power and Gender in Ehing Social Life
Talle, A (1993) ìTransforming women into ëpureí agnates: aspects of female infibulation in Somalia,î in V Broch-Due et al (eds) Carved Flesh/Cast Selves: Gendered Symbols and Social Practices, pp.83-102

see also: readings on ìconcepts of personî

Week 18. Concepts of Person (Philip Thomas)

Concepts of individual, self and person. Elements of personhood: the body, the soul, ethnopsychology, morality. Personhood and the life-cycle. Tallensi personhood as case study.

Main readings:
Harris, G (1989) ìConcepts of individual, self and person in description and analysis,î American Anthropologist 91: 599-612
Fortes, M (1973) ìThe concept of the person among the Tallensi,î in La Notion de la Personne en Afrique Noire, pp.283-320; reprinted in Fortes (1987) Religion, Morality and the Person: Essays on Tallensi Religion, pp.247-286
Lienhardt, G (1985) ìSelf: public, private; some African representations,î in M Carrithers et al (eds.) The Category of the Person, pp.141-155
Morris, B (1994) The Anthropology of the Self, chapter 6 on Africa
Riesman, P (1986) ìThe person and the life-cycle in African social life and thought,î African Studies Review 29(2): 71-138

Seminar readings:
Comaroff, J (1980) Healing and the cultural order: the case of the Barolong boo Ratshidi of Southern Africa, American Ethnologist 7: 637-657
Englund, H (1999) The self in self-interest: land, labour and temporalities in Malawiís agrarian change, Africa 69: 139-59
Piot, C (1991) Of persons and things: some reflections on African spheres of exchange, Man 26: 405-424
Jacobson-Widding, A (1997) ëI lied, I farted, I stole . . .í: dignity and morality in African discourses on personhood, in S Howell (ed) The Ethnography of Moralities, pp.48-73
Lambek, M (1990) Exchange, time and person in Mayotte, American Anthropologist 92: 647-661
Taylor, C (1990) Condoms and cosmology: the fractal person and sexual risk in Rwanda, Social Science and Medicine 31: 1023-1028

Seminar and Essays Topics:
1. Is the self a social construct?
2. Is the concept of the individual an alien one to African philosophies?
3. What is the relationship between personhood and (i) gender, (ii) kinship
4. Discuss the relationship between personhood and life-cycle rites in any ONE society
5. Compare the relationship between personhood and EITHER the body OR morality in TWO societies from different regions of Africa.

Further reading (books and edited collections only):
Barber, K (1995) ìMoney, self-realization and the person in Yoruba texts,î in J Guyer (ed) Money Matters, pp.205-224
Beidelman, T (1986) Moral Imagination in Kaguru Modes of Thought
Biebuyck, D (1973) Lega Culture: Art, Initiation and Moral Philosophy among a Central African People
CNRS, La Notion de la Personne en Afrique Noire, articles by Abimbola, Nukunya, Middleton
Fardon, R (1990) Between God, the Dead and the Wild: Chamba Interpretations of Ritual and Religion
Fortes, M (1959) Oedipus and Job in West African Religion
Huntington, R (1988) Gender and Social Structure in Madagascar
Jackson, M (1989) Paths Toward a Clearing
James, W (1988) The Listening Ebony: Moral Knowledge, Religion and Power among the Uduk of Sudan
Lambek, M (1993) Knowledge and Practice in Mayotte: Local Discourses of Islam, Sorcery and Spitrit Possession, chapter 7
Lambek, M & A Strathern (eds.) (1998) Bodies and Persons: Comparative Perspectives from African and Melanesia
Lienhardt,G (1961) Divinity and Experience: The Religion of the Dinka
Parkin, D (1991) Sacred Void: Spatial Images of Work and Ritual among the Giriama of Kenya, chapter 8
Pool, R (1994) Dialogue and the Interpretation of Illness: Conversations in a Cameroon Village
Riesman, P (1977) Freedom in Fulani Social Life
see also: readings on ìgender and bodyî and bibliography in Riesman (1986), above

Week 19. Slavery (Philip Thomas)

Problems concerning the definition of slavery. Slavery and kinship: the debate between Kopytoff and Meillassoux. Slavery and personhood. Tallensi as case study.

Main readings:
Fortes, M (1973) ìThe concept of the person among the Tallensi,î in La Notion de la Personne en Afrique Noire, pp.283-320; reprinted in Fortes (1987) Religion, Morality and the Person: Essays on Tallensi Religion, pp.247-286
Guyer, J (1993) Wealth in people and self-realization in Equatorial Africa, Man 28: 243-267
Kopytoff, I & S Miers (1977) ìAfrican ëslaveryí as an institution of marginality,î in Miers & Kopytoff (eds.) Slavery in Africa, pp.3-81
Kopytoff, I (1982) Slavery, Annual Review of Anthropology 11: 207-230
Meillassoux, C (1991) The Anthropology of Slavery, esp. pp. 9-40 and 324-333
Wolf, E (1982) Europe and the People Without History, chapter 7

Seminar readings:
Evers, S (1999) ìThe construction of history and culture in the southern highlands: tombs, slaves and ancestors,î in K Middleton (ed.) Ancestors, Power and History in Madagascar, pp.257-282
Feeley-Harnik, G (1982) The Kingís men in Madagascar: slavery, citizenship, and Sakalava monarchy, Africa 52(2): 31-50 (SLC)
Markis, G (1996) Slavery, possession and history: the construction of self among slave descedants in the Sudan, Africa 66: 159-182
Piot, C (1996) Of slaves and the gift: Kabre sale of kin during the era of the slave trade, Journal of African History 37: 31-49 (SLC)
Shepherd, G (1980) ìThe Comorians and the East African slave trade,î in J Watson (ed) Asian and African Systems of Slavery , pp.73-99
Stilwell, S (2000) Power, honour and shame: ideology and royal slavery in the Sokoto Caliphate, Africa 70: 394-421

Seminar and Essay Topics:
1. Is the distinction between slavery and freedom a useful one for understanding the ethnographic material under discussion?
2. Is there a commonality linking all of the kinds of practices and institutions labelled slavery?
3. What work did slaves and non-slaves do? are these types of work differently valued?
4. In what ways is the personhood of slaves distinguished from non-slaves?
5. Analyse the similarities and differences in the practice of slavery in TWO societies from different parts of Africa.
6. What can the concept of personhood contribute to our understanding of slavery?

Further reading (edited collections only):
Miers, S & I Kopytoff (eds.) Slavery in Africa: Historical and Anthropological Perspectives
Watson, J (ed.) Asian and African Systems of Slavery.

also: using library keyword search facility, check ëslavery africaí

Week 20. Reading Week (No lecture, No seminars)


Week 21. History and Memory (Philip Thomas)

Anthropology and history. History and memory. Narrative and other forms of historical consciousness; ritual, the body and historical memory. Sakalava history as case study.

Main readings:
Connerton, P (1989) How Societies Remember
Comaroff, J & J Comaroff (1992) ìEthnography and the historical imagination,î in Comaroff & Comaroff, Ethnography and the Historical Imagination, see esp. pp.18-27
Evans-Pritchard, E E (1962) Essays in Social Anthropology, chapters 1 and 3
Feeley-Harnik, G (1978) ìDivine kingship and the meaning of history among the Sakalava of Madagascar,î Man 13: 402-417
Feeley-Harnik, G (1988) ìSakalava dancing battles: representations of conflict in Sakalava royal service,î Anthropos 83: 65-85
Feeley-Harnik, G (1991) ìFinding memories in Madagascar,î in S Kuchler and W Melion (eds) Images of Memory: On Remembering and Representation, pp.121-140
Lambek, M (1998) ìThe Sakalava poeisis of history: realizing the past through spirit possession in Madagascar,î American Ethnologist 25: 106-127

Seminar readings:
Cole, J (1998) ìThe work of memory in Madagascar,î American Ethnologist 25: 610-633
Comaroff, J and J Comaroff (1987) The madman and the migrant: work and labor in the historical consciousness of a South African people, American Ethnologist 14: 191-209
de Boeck, P (1998) ìBeyond the grave: history, memory and death in postcolonial Congo/Zaire,î in R Werbner (ed) Memory and the Postcolony: African Anthropology and the Critique of Power, pp.21-57
Middleton, K (1999) ìCircumcision, death and strangers,î in K Middleton (ed.) Ancestors, Power and History in Madagascar, pp.219-254
Peel, J (1984) Making history: the past in the Ijesha present, Man 19: 111-132
Shaw, R (1997) The production of witchcraft/witchcraft as production: memory, modernity, and the slave trade in Sierra Leone, American Ethnologist 24: 856-876

Seminar and Essay Topics:
1. Is there more to the study of the past than the analysis of written historical records?
2. Are some things easier to remember than others?
3. What practices of memory can you identify that help record events in the historical past?
4. In what ways do people bridge the gap between personal memory and experience, and the memory of the historical past?
5. Can the study of the past be divorced from the politics of the present?
6. Is the study of African history only relevant to an understanding of the past?
7. Using examples from one or more society, analyse the political use of history

Further reading on history and memory (books and edited collections only):
Bloch, M (1998) How We Think They Think: Anthropological Approaches to Cognition, Memory and Literacy, chapters 5, 7 and 8
Boyer, P (1990) Tradition as Truth and Communication
Faubion, J (1993) History in anthropology, Annual Review of Anthropology 22: 35-54
Fentress, J & C Wickham (1992) Social Memory
Ohnuki-Tierney, E (1990) ìIntroduction: the historicization of anthropology,î in Ohnuki-Tierney (ed.) Culture through Time, pp.1-25
Vansina, J (1985) Oral Tradition as History

Further reading (ethnography):
Antze, P & M Lambek (eds.) Tense Past: Cultural Essays in Trauma and Memory, articles by Lambek, Bloch
Apter, A (1992) Black Critics and Kings: The Hermeneutics of Power in Yoruba Society
Barber, K (1991) I Could Speak Until Tomorrow: Oriki, Women and the Past in a Yorba Town
Cohen, D & E S Atieno Odihambo (1989) Siaya: The Historical Anthropology of an African Landscape
Comaroff, J (1985) Body of Power, Spirit of Resistance: The Culture and History of a South African People
Cunnison, I (1969) History of the Luapula
Feierman, S (1990) Peasant Intellectuals: Anthropology and History in Tanzania
Harms, R (1987) Games Against Nature: An Eco-Cultural History of the Nunu of Equatorial Africa
McCall, J (2000) Dancing Histories: Heuristic Ethnography with the Ohafia Igbo
Matory, J L (1993) ìGovernment by seduction: history and the tropes of ëmountingí in Oyo-Yoruba religion,î in J & J Comaroff (eds.) Modernity and its Malcontents: Ritual and Power in Postcolonial Africa, pp.58-85
Stoller, P (1995) Embodying Colonial Memories: Spirit Possession, Power and the Hauka in West Africa
Thornton, R (1980) Space, Time and Culture among the Iraqw of Tanzania, chapters 7-8
Tonkin, E (1992) Narrating Our Pasts: The Social Construction of Oral History
Weiss, B (1996) ìDressing at death: clothing, time and memory in Buhaya, Tanzania,î in H Hendrickson (ed.) Clothing and Difference: Embodied Identities in Colonial and Post-Colonial Africa, pp.133-154.

Week 22. Epilogue: Africa Past and Present (Alan Bicker)

Political development and the politics of decolonisation. Political stability in the post-independence era. Party politics, the one-party state and the role of the military.

Reading:
Bayart, J.-F., S. Ellis, B. Hibou & I. International African. 1999. The criminalisation of the state in Africa (African issues). Oxford: The International African Institute in association with James Currey.
Chabal, P. & J.-P. Daloz. 1999. Africa Works: Disorder as a Political instrument (African Issues). Oxford: International African Institute with James Currey and Indiana Press.
Davidson, B. 1992. The Black Man's Burden: Africa and the Curse of the Nation-State London: James Curry.
Epstein, A L. 1981 Urbanization and kinship; the domestic domain on the copperbelt of Zambia 1950-56. London: Academic Press.
Ferguson, J. 1999. Expectations of modernity, myths and meanings of urban life on the Zambian Copperbelt, Berkeley: University of California Press.
Furedi, F. 1989. The Mau Mau war in perspective, London : James Currey.
James, W. 1988. The listening ebony, moral knowledge, religion, and power among the Uduk of Sudan, Oxford, Clarendon Press, New York, Oxford University Press.
Mazrui, A. 1975. Soldiers and kinsmen in Uganda, the making of a military ethnocracy, Beverly Hills: Sage Publications.
Lan, D. 1985. Guns and Rain: Guerrillas and Spirit Mediums in Zimbabwe. London: James Currey Ltd.
Moore, H. & M. Vaughan. 1994. Cutting down trees, gender, nutrition, and agricultural change in the Northern Province of Zambia, 1890-1990, London, J. Currey, Lusaka, University of Zambia Press.
J. D. Y. Peel and C. C. Stewart (eds.) 1985. Popular Islam south of the Sahara, Manchester : Manchester U.P. (also in Africa. (1985) Vol. 55, no. 4 p 364-464.
Pottier, J. 1988 Migrants no more, settlement and survival in Mambwe villages, Zambia, Manchester, Manchester U.P., for the International African Institute.
Shivji, I. 1976. Class Struggle in Tanzania, Heinemann.

Seminar and Essay Topics
1. What factors have contributed the emergence of one-party states in Africa?
2. How would you define a one-party state or a military government , and how appropriate are these labels to the African context?
3 Has democracry burgeoned in Africa since the 1990s?

Week 23. Revision (No lecture, seminars by arrangement)


Week 24. Revision (No lecture, seminars by arrangement)