bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Biotechnological Potential of Marine Sponges and their Associated Bacteria as Producers of New Pharmaceuticals (Part I)
Authors: Thoms Carsten , Schupp Peter 
Published: April 2006

AbstractThroughout human history natural products have provided the basis for medicinal treatment. About 60 years ago the advent of SCUBA diving techniques granted access to a thitherto untapped source of pharmacologically highly active natural products: the marine environment. In the oceans not plants but sessile animals, particularly sponges, have proven to be the most fruitful organisms in this context. Sponges have evolved a vast arsenal of chemical weapons to defend themselves against various threats from their environment. These molecules remarkably often show potent activities in pharmaceutical assays. Several sponge-derived compounds are already in clinical trials as agents against cancer, microbial infections, inflammation and other diseases. However, in many cases drug development is severely hampered by the limited supply of the respective compounds, as they are often present only in minute amounts in the sponge tissue. Big hope to circumvent this obstacle lies on the supposition that sponge-associated bacteria and not the sponges themselves are in many cases the true producers of the pharmaceutically relevant agents. Once these microorganisms are determined and cultivated outside the sponge tissue, they could be fermented for large-scale compound production. This in future could substantially increase the number of powerful sponge-derived drugs on the market.
Native Education at the Cross-Roads in South Africa
Authors: Hoernlé R. F. Alfred 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphNative Education in the Union is in an unhealthy state. Three years ago, the doctors were called in to diagnose and prescribe a cure. The result was the Report of the Interdepartmental Committee on Native Education, 1935-1936. Some of its recommendations displeased another set of doctors, viz. the Native Affairs Commission, who, on their own initiative, offered their view of the case, agreeing on the symptoms of sickness, but prescribing, in the Report of the Native Affairs Commission for the Year 1936, quite a different mode of treatment.
Evil and Witchcraft among the Ndogo Group of Tribes
Authors: Santandrea Fr. S. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn the native mind evil, and especially any sort of disease as well as death is due either to beings out of a man's reach (spiritual beings) or to human beings endowed with extraordinary power (witches, sorcerers, operators of black magic).There are a few cases in which the natives accept the evidence of facts: perhaps the only one in which almost all of them agree is in the case of murder. Should a man be deliberately killed, suspicions of witchcraft are not entertained. But should he be killed by a wild beast while hunting, inquiries may be made as to the indirect cause of his death. It will be asked: who advised him to go hunting? who brought that bad beast on to his path? who caused the hunter to miss it?
Tradition and Prestige among the Ngoni
Authors: Read Margaret 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphI. The Ngoni People. Before I made my first camp in an Ngoni village, many Europeans had said to me, ‘There are practically no Ngoni left to-day. They are all hopelessly mixed with other tribes. None of them keep to the Ngoni customs any longer. Their chiefs are no good.’ From the doorway of my hut I saw people coming all day long to the Paramount Chief, behaving towards him with profound respect, bringing him presents, working for him. His children formed a special group in the village, easily recognizable by their bearing and their manners. Old indunas came to instruct me, as they had instructed chiefs in their day, on the duties of a ruler, and the code of Ngoni laws. Old warriors in war dress came and danced by the cattle kraal and sang praise songs. Courts were held with scrupulous regard for order and justice. Other chiefs came visiting from distant parts with their retinues, and were received ceremonially. It soon became apparent that here was the centre of a political state, whose head was invested with prestige and authority over a wide area, and where behaviour to the Paramount and to every one else was strictly regulated by custom, and as strictly observed. These were Ngoni, and they and their fellow Ngoni in other areas for the next ten months introduced me to the Ngoni people. The European assertion, that they no longer existed as a people, they laughed at, and proceeded to demonstrate that the contrary was true.
L'Évolution du Mariage Coutumier chez les Musulmans du Sénégal
Authors: Robin J. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphCe n'est pas sans angoisse qu'un jeune citadin du Sénégal envisage aujourd'hui de se marier. La littérature sénégalaise de langue française en témoigne: de plus, il n'est guère de numéro du journal dakarois Réveil qui ne reflète cette préoccupation. Elle est si caractéristique de la vie sociale de ce qu'on appelle ‘les escales’ dans la terminologie sénégalaise, qu'un envoyé de la presse métropolitaine n'a pas craint de donner pour titre à son reportage sur cette question: ‘le marché noir des noires’.
Religious Affiliation in Freetown, Sierra Leone
Authors: Porter Arthur T. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphAn attempt will be made in this paper to examine religious affiliation in Freetown (the capital town of Sierra Leone) at the formation of the Colony, and its later developments, from an historical viewpoint, with a view to assessing its contribution to the social evolution of the community. Freetown is rich in missionary records and journals and these, though they deal mainly with the evangelistic aspect of church activity, provide sufficient data to justify some tentative generalizations on the relationship between religious affiliation and the social stratification and growth of the community.Freetown is an assembly of African peoples of different ethnic origins who became integrated into a community around norms and patterns of behaviour which were not African but western. The main agents in this cultural transformation were the Negro Nova Scotian and Maroon settlers. But the transformation was aided by the patronage and favour which the settlers received from the European administration, and, more important, by the missionary and evangelical activities of the Protestant churches. The Christian religion in Freetown was thus from the outset a positive, cohesive influence rather than a disintegrating force as it has been in some other parts of Africa.
Conservatism and Modern Adaptation in Luvale Female Puberty Ritual
Authors: White C. M. N. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe present account of Luvale female puberty rites has a twofold object. Firstly to provide a short factual description of the ritual, on which existing information is scanty. Data from the Luvale provide the basis of the present notes, but occasional reference is made to the allied tribes. Secondly an attempt is made to estimate how far the rites have been affected by present-day influences.
Les Phonèmes du Ganda et du Bantou Commun
Authors: Meeussen A. E. , Tucker A. N. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphLa nouvelle édition du dictionnaire de Kitching et Blackledge par Mulira et Ndawula fournit une base solide à l'étude comparative du Ganda. L'objet du présent article est d'exposer les règles de correspondance qui résultent de la comparaison du Ganda avec les formules du bantou commun posées par Meinhof, Homburger, Bourquin, et d'autres, et surtout de dormer des listes provisoires d'irrégularités réelles ou apparentes (voir la partie D). Celles-ci permettront à ceux qui étudient d'autres langues bantoues de rectifier certaines reconstructions, d'établir de nouvelles variantes, et de faire meilleure part aux emprunts et autres faits dus à des facteurs d'ordre géographique.
Anomie in Ashanti?
Authors: Goody Jack 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphMiss Ward, in her paper on Some Observations on Religious Cults in Ashanti, maintains that the spread of ‘new witch-finding cults’ in Ashanti results from an emotional malaise deriving from structural changes in the society. The hypothesis is one which has been put forward on other occasions to account for the reported increase in such activities. The basic propositions appear to be four: firstly, that major changes in the social system increase the overall malaise in a society: secondly, that such increased malaise will be reflected in an increase in witchcraft: thirdly, that an increase in witchcraft will be reflected in an increase in witch-finding cults: fourthly, that there has been such an increase in Ashanti.
Zulu Literature
Authors: Malcolm D. Mck. 
Published: April 2006

The great mass of Zulu literature is still unwritten. It has been handed down by X word of mouth from generation to generation, and is still preserved by the people —an indestructible possession of story, legend, and song.There are first of all the great national legends; for instance, the legend of the origin of the race. uMvelingqangi, the first man, came out of the reeds as did Moses, and he had a wife with him. These two were the Father and Mother of the race. It is not unlikely that this tradition originated from the fact that the Bantu came from the north, following the Nile to its source at the great lakes, then down the tributaries of the Zambezi, and finally reached this southern part of Africa. Colour is given to this by the tradition which says, Sehla ngesilulu (‘we came down on rafts’), thus indicating how many crossings they had to make.
Testate Succession in Ashanti
Authors: Matson J. N. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphAshanti customary law, in common with the law of other branches of the Akan people, recognizes a form of oral will, or rather a form of inchoate gift that takes effect on death. This is called saman-nse, saman being an ancestral spirit and nse (or nseε) meaning a formal or solemn declaration; di nse, for example, means to take an oath as a witness does in court. This is the derivation accepted in Ashanti and, with all respect to Rattray's great knowledge, he is in error if he suggests the root is sie, to put, preserve, take care of. His contemptuous rejection of phonetic spelling makes it a little uncertain what sound he meant to record, but on linguistic grounds it is clear the word is not sie. The second a of saman is not modified; the use of a final eε instead of e in certain positions in a sentence is common in Ashanti; and the corresponding Fante forms are saman-nsew, dzi nsew, and sie.
Dahomean Marriage: A Revaluation
Authors: Bohannan Laura 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphWe are fortunate in possessing enough good ethnographic material on Dahomey to attempt a reassessment in the light of later theoretical developments of the very interesting types of marriage reported there.Analysis shows that three criteria are involved in the thirteen ‘types’ of marriage as given by Herskovits's Dahomean informants: (i) the method of arranging the marriage, including courtship and payment of the bride-wealth; (2) the status of the children; and (3) the relationship between man and wife—a constant which is, however, influenced by the distribution of rights and duties in regard to the children. The nature of the social groups concerned in the configuration of rights and duties connected with marriage is a point of great importance which does not appear in connexion with Herskovits's analysis of marriage; he divides these ‘types’ into a matrilineal and a patrilineal class on the basis of the status of the children. The starting-point of the following analysis is the transfer or non-transfer of puissance, or jural authority, through marriage—a criterion emphasized by Le Hérissé.
The Effect of Western Influence on Akan Marriage
Authors: Amoo J. W. A. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe term ‘Akan’ is applied to all the Twi-speaking tribes of Ashanti and the J- Gold Coast, including the Fante, Wassa, Akwapim, Denkera, Agona, Efutu, Ahanta, Sefwi, and other minor tribes. The most vital association in which the Akan lives is the matrilineal clan, the group of people who through the female line is of common descent and therefore is of one soul—ntoro. Succession is matrilineal.Marriage among the Akans is a contract between two groups, the woman's and the man's clans, and for the security of both parties it is surrounded by definite customs and laws. By marriage one group delivers one of its members to the other for the purpose of the propagation of the group. The individual man or woman remains a member of his or her group, which continues to have an active interest in his or her well-being. Akan marriage does not result from love, its entire foundation lying in the desire for children. Every child has a place in the abusua (clan) even though it may be born out of wedlock, i.e. without the transference of aseda. It is cared for and has legal rights of inheritance. The unmarried mother loses social status, but not the child.
Headmanship and the Ritual of Luapula Villages
Authors: Cunnison Ian 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThis article is intended primarily as a contribution to the study of the village headman in British Central Africa. While most reports from the area have paid attention to the headmanl's structural position, this has been specifically considered by Gluckman, Barnes, and Mitchell in ‘The Village Headman in British Central Africa’ (Africa, xix, no. 2, 1949) and, more recently, by Mitchell in his forthcoming analysis of The Yao Village. The closely related question of the values attached to village life has received attention notably from Prof. M. Wilson in Good Company.
God, Man, and the Land in a Northern Ibo Village-Group
Authors: Horton W. R. G. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe fact that most of the studies recently carried out on the Ibo have been initiated in response to an urgent political situation, has resulted in an emphasis on those aspects of the culture of most immediate interest to administrators; and although a considerable body of data on religion has been included in the results, this sphere of activity has perhaps received rather less attention than others.In this article an attempt is made to sketch some salient features of religious belief in a single Ibo village-group, which, it is hoped, may illuminate some facets of the problem not emphasized in previous work. My investigations were carried out in the Northern Ibo Nike group which lies to the immediate north-east of Enugu, capital of the Eastern Provinces of Nigeria. Rich land and low population density (48 per sq. mile) have here mitigated the usual economic pressures towards education for a life of migrant labour, commerce or clerkship in the towns, with the result that, despite their proximity to a very highly developed urban area, the Nike people tend to take little interest in mission activity. Ibagwa, the senior village of the group, contains some 260 adult males, of whom only a bare half-dozen practise a loose form of Roman Catholicism, so that mission influence is not at all developed. This of course is a distinct advantage for the present study.
On the Survival of the Bushmen: With an Estimate of the Problem Facing Anthropologists
Authors: Tobias Phillip V. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe last decade has seen a considerable revival of interest in the physical anthropology of the Bushman-Hottentot peoples. In the period 1952-5 no fewer than 34 papers with a bearing on this topic have been published, of a total of 46 in the decade 1946-55. This contrasts with 7 works in this category in the four years 1948-51. The subject-matter has been shared fairly evenly between studies on the living and those on skeletal remains. In the former category are studies on Nama Hottentots (Wells), Strandlopers (Dart), Koranas (Grobbelaar, Tobias), Sandawe (Trevor), Lake Chrissie Bushmen (Toerien), Northern Bushmen (Wells, Gusinde, Erikson, Williams, Tobias), River Bushmen (Hurwitz and Harington), Central Bushmen (Tobias), hybrids (Trevor, Wells, Tobias), and on blood groups (Zoutendyck, Kopec and Mourant, Grobbelaar). In the second category are craniological studies by Cosnett, Dart, Drennan, Dreyer and Meiring, Grobbelaar, Hope, Keen, Sauter, Tobias, Toerien, Wells, on a variety of recent, proto-historic, and prehistoric remains. Two thirds of all these studies have been focused primarily upon Bushmen. Furthermore, plans for additional anthropometrical and anthroposcopic surveys of surviving Bushmen are at present being elaborated in the Department of Anatomy of the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg—from which Department, under the general direction and inspiration of Professor Raymond A. Dart, more than half the studies referred to have emanated. It is hoped that, in the coming years, a series of expeditions will visit Bushman tribes, more particularly in those areas which have not hitherto been studied from a physical anthropological point of view.
Social Problems and Research in British West Africa
Authors: Firth Raymond 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe broad characteristics of the British West African colonies and their main social and economic problems are already fairly familiar from the relevant sections of Lord Hailey's African Survey (1938), and Professor Hancock's Survey of British Commonwealth Affairs (1942). A recent article by Dr. M. Fortes (1945) helps to bring the analysis up to date and makes very clear how great and rapid are the changes taking place in the social and economic structure. In this present contribution, the result of a very brief study, I attempt only to underline some of the salient features as they appear to one new to the West African scene, and to estimate the problems from the point of view of sociological research.
On Swearing. An account of some Judicial Oaths in Northern Nigeria
Authors: Kirk-Greene A. H. M. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphOne of the Lecturers at the University College of Ibadan recently declared that a vital and often neglected source of information for the would-be anthropologist was the tribal court records. Here, written down with the ingenuous casualness of banality, is a treasure-trove of tribal lore and law, superstitions and suppositions, which can provide the anthropologically minded student with hours of absorbing, and sometimes original, research work. How often do we pause to consider what is entailed in the typical verdict entered in the tribal court book ?
The Culture of Akan
Authors: Danquah J. B. 
Published: April 2006

Underlying Eva Meyerowitz's remarkable work, The Sacred State of the Akan, are two assumptions, partly expressed and in part left to be inferred by the reader from the great mass of evidence which her thorough and painstaking research has made available.The first assumption is that the culture of the Akan today shows a decline from a higher culture which they formerly possessed. The second assumption is that the culture with which the Akan must be identified is the ancient heliolithic culture which once flourished in the Mediterranean and the Ancient East.
Education and the Culture Concept
Authors: Musgrove F. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe culture concept carries many implications for the educationist which have still to be worked out. Perhaps its greatest value will prove to lie in providing a corrective to the intellectualist fallacy to which teachers and educationists are singularly prone. By taking into account the complex and largely non-intellectual processes of acculturation, the teacher in Africa will realize that he is unlikely to effect a direct transference of intellectual propositions and idea-systems; and he may be saved from disappointment when he sees the truths he has dealt in employed to subserve ‘illegitimate’ ends.
African Traditional Thought and Western Science
Authors: Horton Robin 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe first part of this paper seeks to develop an approach to traditional African thought already sketched in several previous contributions to this journal. My approach to this topic is strongly influenced by the feeling that social anthropologists have often failed to understand traditional religious thought for two main reasons. First, many of them have been unfamiliar with the theoretical thinking of their own culture. This has deprived them of a vital key to understanding. For certain aspects of such thinking are the counterparts of those very features of traditional thought which they have tended to find most puzzling. Secondly, even those familiar with theoretical thinking in their own culture have failed to recognise its African equivalents, simply because they have been bunded by a difference of idiom. Like Consul Hutchinson wandering among the Bubis of Fernando Po, they have taken a language very remote from their own to be no language at all.
The Social Organization of Credit in a West African Cattle Market
Authors: Cohen Abner 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphCredit is a vital economic institution without which trade becomes very limited. In the industrial Western societies, where it is highly developed, it operates through formal, standardized arrangements and procedures by which the solvency of the debtor is closely assessed, securities against possible default are provided, and the conditions of the agreement are documented and endorsed by the parties concerned. Ultimately, these arrangements and procedures are upheld by legislated rules and sanctions administered by central, bureaucratized, fairly impartial, efficient, and effective courts and police. In West Africa, on the other hand, where long-distance trade has been fostered by varying ecological circumstances, such organization has not yet evolved, particularly for long-distance trade. Nevertheless extensive systems of credit have been developed.
The Manipulation of Ritual among Plateau Nigerians
Authors: Conant Francis P. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphDespite great linguistic and cultural diversity, sustained political relations among the many different groups of the Jos-Bauchi Plateau are a notably regular feature of this area of Northern Nigeria. That these relations are often expressed in a ritual context is an observation frequently made in the literature on the Plateau Pagans. My intention here is to specify some of theregularways in which ritual paraphernalia may be manipulated for a variety of secular purposes (often political) among communities of such very different kinds as those of the Plateau mountain people and neighbouring plainsmen. These manipulative techniques appear to be important in the analysis of such widely different phenomena as the adoption of Islam, technological diffusion, the spread of art styles, and, more generally, the successful persistence, through time, of relations between societies of very different levels of complexity and organization. My data are drawn from field experience among Barawa mountain settlements and the Bankalawa–Jarawa plains communities of Dass Independent District, Bauchi Province, on the east-south-eastern slopes of the Plateau.