bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Labour Migration and its Relationship to Socio-Cultural Change in Mossi Society
Authors: Skinner Elliott P. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphLabour migration is an outstanding feature in most contemporary African societies. It not only touches on nearly all aspects of the lives of the peoples involved, but is often the cause as well as the result of important social and cultural changes. It therefore holds a special interest for students of such changes. Here they can observe the movements of vast numbers of people, and the concomitant problems which arise with the exposure of these people to new social, political, and economic conditions. Furthermore, working with data from migrants and their home and host communities, social scientists are able to test many theoretical assumptions which are held about the nature of socio-cultural change.
Right and Left in Nyoro Symbolic Classification
Authors: Needham Rodney 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe aims of this analysis are: (1) to investigate a puzzle in Nyoro ethnography; (2) to support the theme of a forthcoming handbook on the symbolism of right and left; (3) to make a further contribution to the understanding of secular-mystical diarchy or complementary governance; and (4) to carry out a routine exercise in the structural analysis of symbolism, in a continuing attempt to isolate its general principles.
Nyamayingi's Song: An Analysis of a Konzo Circumcision Song
Authors: Alnaes Kirsten 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphTo an outsider the most striking feature of the Konzo circumcision ritual is the songs which can be heard almost constantly from the circumcision lodges. The teaching of songs is an important part of the instruction which takes place during the ritual and in many of them a special language is used which is, to a large extent, unintelligible to a person who has not undergone the rites. In this paper I shall analyse one of the Konzo circumcision songs and try to show how, by its special language, the song conveys to the initiands certain aspects of the circumcision ritual and suggest some of their wider implications on both the social and the individual levels.
The Kpelle Moot: A Therapeutic Model for the Informal Settlement of Disputes
Authors: Gibbs James L. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphAfrica as a major culture area has been characterized by many writers as being -marked by a high development of law and legal procedures. In the past few years research on African law has produced a series of highly competent monographs such as those on law among the Tiv, the Barotse, and the Nuer. These and related shorter studies have focused primarily on formal processes for the settlement of disputes, such as those which take place in a courtroom, or those which are, in some other way, set apart from simpler measures of social control. However, many African societies have informal, quasi-legal, dispute-settlement procedures, supplemental to formal ones, which have not been as well studied, or—in most cases—adequately analysed.
Structural Dichotomy and Jural Processes among the Arusha of Northern Tanganyika
Authors: Gulliver P. H. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn his ethnographic survey of the Masai Huntingford remarks that ‘there is a constant dualism in the structure of Masai groups, largely expressed in terms of cattle colour. It is found not only in an antagonistic setting, as when cattle are divided after a raid, but also in the sections into which a tribe may be divided.’ He gives examples only of major divisions of the Kisongo and Wuasingishu Masai and the Samburu which, at least for the Kisongo, entail the apportionment of all clans to one of two groupings. In many kinds of social groupings and social activities the Arusha conceive of a similar organizational principle by which people can be aligned for particular purposes into two categories which are sociologically determined but not necessarily or perhaps even usually of numerical equality. It is possible that among the Masai this principle has a rather wider application and significance than has so far been reported; but for the Arusha, who derive much of their culture from the Masai, it is of major importance in social contexts concerning the family, lineages, dangroups, the territorial system, and the age-group system.
Chiefship and Politics in the Mlanje District of Southern Nyasaland
Authors: Wishlade R. L. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphMlanje is an Administrative District in the Southern Province of Nyasaland. It is densely populated compared with other parts of Central Africa, having a population of 209,522 in 1945, which represented a density of 138 per square mile. The population is tribally heterogeneous, and was composed, in 1945, of 71 per cent. Nguru, 21 per cent. Nyanja, and 5 per cent. Yao people. The Nguru are the most recent arrivals, having immigrated into Nyasaland mainly during the present century. The term Nguru is used to refer to the representatives in Nyasaland of a number of tribes inhabiting that part of Portuguese East Africa which Lies to the east of Nyasaland; these immigrants call themselves Lomwe and in Mlanje are mainly Mihavani and Kokola. The Nyanja are the indigenous inhabitants of the area, who were living there before the invasion of the Mangoche Yao during the nineteenth century. Although they are linguistically distinct, the social organization of these three groups is markedly similar, and there has been a great deal of intermarriage between them, particularly between the Nyanja and the Nguru. No one of them is in sole occupation of a continuous stretch of territory, even the smallest residential groups are often tribally heterogeneous, the similarity of the social organization enabling Nyanja to be absorbed into Nguru hamlets and vice versa. For this reason it is impossible to use a tribal unit as a unit of reference in a discussion of the political organization of this area.
Homtodzoe: Expiation by Cremation among some Tongu-Ewe in Ghana
Authors: Ametewee Victor K. , Christensen James B. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThere is a general belief among the Ewe of Ghana and Togo that when a person dies the soul of the deceased goes to live in a nether world which is beyond a river, a common belief along the Guinea Coast of West Africa. This spirit-world, known as Tsiefe to the Ewe, is believed to be divided into two units, one for those who have led exemplary lives and the other for ‘criminals’ such as witches, sorcerers and murderers. Some Ewe believe that even the ‘bad part’ of the underworld will not accept the spirit of a criminal unless a special type of ritual has been performed following death. In this case the spirit of the deceased criminal lingers on in this world, plaguing and punishing members of his family or lineage until the appropriate ceremony is performed.
Visibility and Vulnerability: the Politics of Pacemakers
Authors: Vincent Joan 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphPacemaking groups are characterized first by their success with the authorities; second, by their achievements in economic life; and, third, by their efficient mobilization and organization of supporters (Morris, 1968: 34). The existence of such groups tends to inhibit the emergence of occupational or class interests since less successful individuals attribute the success of the pacemaking group to their corporate ethnic solidarity rather than to any organizational skills. This essay explores the characteristics of two such groups, ethnically distinctive pacemakers and the salariat (government paid officials), by presenting the case of an individual who sees both types as his reference groups in the small country town of Gondo in Eastern Uganda in 1966. Because of their marked visibility, both types of pacemaking group are politically vulnerable at times of change, transition, and unrest. They become the object of political scapegoating and, in extreme cases, are subject to ‘cephalicide’. An analysis of the context in which this is likely to occur throws light upon the position and role of pacemakers in the total situation.
Social Theory and the Study of Christian Missions in Africa
Authors: Beidelman T. O. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn the past anthropology was concerned with alien, exotic societies such as Indians, Africans, and Pacific Islanders. Today it is in vogue to do the anthropology of modern societies. Abroad this is termed the study of nation-building and development; at home it becomes the study of various sub-cultures with attention towards ethnic minorities and deviant groups rather than upon the more powerful and prominent segments of our society. Anthropologists tend to neglect those groups nearest themselves, and in the scurry to conduct relevant research, a broad area of great theoretical interest has been passed by. Almost no attention was ever paid by anthropologists to the study of colonial groups such as administrators, missionaries, or traders. Today we can read anthropological studies of the impact of such groups upon native populations, but the focus of such work dims with the colour line. Thus, an anthropologist has studied the machinations of the members of a Nigerian emirate but not the tactics of the British Resident and his staff. Another applied potted Weberian bureaucratic theory to Soga local government but neglected to discuss the British district officers in the same chiefdom. Another asked how Christian Tswana behaved, but not about those missionaries who had converted them. Anthropologists may have spoken about studying total societies, but they did not seem to consider their compatriots as subjects for wonder and analysis.* In the studies of Christianity in Africa, consideration was mainly in terms of the relations of the convert to his traditional society, to the process of social change, or sometimes to the development of native separatist churches. It never included the missionaries who had made the conversions or described everyday affairs at the mission station, clinic, or school.
Rural-urban movement among Botswana's skilled manpower: some observations on the two sector model
Authors: Bell Morag 
Published: April 2006

Theoretical Background and AimsOrthodox theories of social change emphasise the importance of formal training in the structural transformation of traditional systems within less developed countries (Peil 1973; Dore 1978). It is assumed that through investment in human capital economically-backward societies will achieve modernisation and growth, and that a sequence of changes in the social and occupational structure following the typical Western model will occur. A close association between educational and occupational attainment is postulated which forms the basis for a new system of social stratification defined by educational qualification and income level (Foster 1977). Intervening between the academic achievement of individuals and their entry into the job market an important additional spatial variable is included in the dual sector model (Lewis 1954; Forde 1968). Given that rural-urban dichotomy exists between traditional and modern sectors the model suggests that considerable selective movement from countryside to town is an additional necessary condition for economic growth. Finally it is assumed that the resultant spatial separation of the educated from their traditional environment coupled by secure employment in town consolidates the process of acculturation into a Western value system (Foley 1977).
Religion and Authority in a Korekore Community
Authors: Bourdillon M. F. C. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn her lucid and persuasive Henry Myers Lecture on ‘The power of rights’ (Man, 1977), Professor La Fontaine argues that since the Gisu themselves cite transition from one status to another as the purpose of their initiation rites, this transformation cannot logically explain them. Taking up Maurice Bloch's idea that religion is concerned with inequality and hierarchy (1974; 1977), La Fontaine argues convincingly that the explanation of Gisu initiation rites lies in their functions of validating traditional knowledge and of maintaining traditional authority. The relationship between religion and political power had been noticed before but it had not previously been applied to the field of rites of passage nor had the mechanism of the supportive role of traditional knowledge been so clearly analysed.
Sacrifice and Social Structure among the Kuranko
Authors: Jackson Michael 
Published: April 2006

Sacrifice and DivinationThe Kuranko term for sacrifice issarake(from the Arabicsadaqa). Any gift, offering or material object over which invocations to spirits are made is a sacrifice.Sarakethus includes offerings made to the three major categories of spirit: (1)AlaorAltala(God), (2)BəmbanuorFɔl' mɔryonu(‘Ancestors’ and ‘First/original people’ respectively), (3)Njεnnenu(Spirits of the wild or djinn). Sacrifice also includes material objects (medicines and fetishes) which are prayed over.
Some contradictions in missionizing
Authors: Wyllie R. W. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn a recent paper Beidelman (1974: 235—249) has argued cogently for a more systematic study of missions on the part of students of colonial societies and has indicated, in a preliminary fashion, several analytical themes which might provide a general theoretical framework for such a study. The present paper is not offered as a comment on Beidelman's overall scheme but has a somewhat narrower focus, addressing itself to two aspects of missionary study mentioned by that author: the contradictions in missionizing and the nature of colonial society. Given the preliminary nature and schematic intent of Beidelman's paper it is understandable that the connections between these aspects are not made explicit. One of our tasks, therefore, will be to show how the contradictions revealed in the practice of missionizing relate to the kind of society in which missions typically operate. Like Beidelman, we illustrate our argument with references to the work of an African mission, in this case the Wesleyan Methodist mission in southern Ghana (formerly the Gold Coast).
Sexualité et Continence Prénuptiale chez les Toucouleur du Sénégal
Authors: Wane Yaya 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphL'une des caractéristiques fondamentales de la société toucouleur traditionnelle est, assurément, la chasteté imposée à l'individu pendant une période prolongée de son existence. Car il apparaît que la sexualité, hormis dans le cadre pour ainsi dire exdusif du mariage, se présente généralement en termes de prohibition formelle. Peut-être convient-il de voir en cela l'effet naturel de la très stricte obédience islamique toucouleur, aux termes de laquelle tout contact sexuel illicite – done extra-conjugal – est une souillure si grave, que son expiation appelle l'Enfer et la carbonisation littérale du pécheur.
The History of Trade at Ikom, Eastern Nigeria
Authors: Harris Rosemary 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIkom, on the Cross River and with a total population of just over 7,000 in 1953, lies near the boundary between Nigeria and southern Cameroons. It has been commercially important in recent years, as was indicated, for example, by the presence there in 1953 (the date of the last fairly reliable census) of over 1,500 Ibo. But the Ibo are newcomers, and this paper is concerned with examining earlier patterns of trade as they had developed down to the nineteen-twenties. More recently the people of Ikom have derived their prosperity from the exploitation of their soil, which is eminently suitable for producing cocoa. According to a visiting soil scientist in the 1960s, there are in the locality 140 square miles of suitable cocoa land, which in fact is so plentiful that although two-thirds of it was still held in a forest reserve there was in 1966 no public pressure to have any portion released for agriculture. The affluence based on cocoa is, however, recent; the traditional path to prosperity and influence was through participation in trade, especially trade with Mamfe to the east and with Calabar on the coast, principally along the Cross River.
Boys' circumcision and girls' puberty rites among the Swahili of Mafia Island, Tanzania
Authors: Caplan A. P. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn the north of Mafia Island, the rites surrounding the circumcision of boys and the first menstruation of girls are no longer, if indeed they ever were, universally performed. This article attempts to explain this situation, and in so doing, draws on some of Turner's work on symbolism. In particular, his distinction between different levels of meaning expressed by symbols—the exegetical, the operational and the positional (1962)—is followed in a discussion of the political implications of performance or rejection of the rites.
Myth, Motive, and Selection in Southern African Rock Art
Authors: Vinnicombe Patricia 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphRecent publications on the rock art of Africa have again focused attention on the tremendous wealth of painted and engraved sites in that continent (Brentjes, 1969; Cooke, 1969; Lee and Woodhouse, 1970; Rudner, 1970). At the same time, however, it is made all too clear that the collection of data is largely unsystematic and subjective and, because of the incomplete nature of the evidence, valid analysis or comparison is difficult. Small wonder, then, that there is such a diversity of often conflicting views on the significance of the art (Vinnicombe, 1972).
A Nineteenth-Century Ruhr in Central Africa
Authors: Warnier Jean-Pierre , Fowler Ian 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphOver two hundred thousand cubic metres of slag and smelting debris, at least two hundred and seventy smelting sites, more than seven hundred recorded kaolin pits for building and lining furnaces, and probably half as many again not visited by us—these are a few figures that establish three villages of the Ndop Plain, in the highlands of Western Cameroon, as a nineteenth-century Ruhr in Central Africa. To this day, this all Sub-Saharan African record leaves Meroe, ‘the Birmingham of Africa’ well behind. Perhaps the record remains unbroken, however, just because scholars interested in African iron industries seem to have been unconcerned with the overall output of these industries.
Production, income and expenditure patterns of Yoruba smallholders
Authors: Flinn J. C. , Zuckerman Paul S. 
Published: April 2006

IntroductionThere is a growing acceptance of the position that low resource farmers act and make decisions in a manner consistent with economic ‘rationality’ (Helleiner, 1975; Schultz, 1964). As a result, agriculturalists are becoming increasingly concerned to design technological innovations which are consistent with the needs and means of low resource farmers (CIMMYT, 1980; Zandstra et at., 1980). In particular, constraints due to the quantity or intensity with which a farmer can cultivate his land (land and labour scarcity), his low asset level and access to credit, other demands of the household on the farm-family resources, and the uncertain environment (both natural and man-made) within which the smallholder operates, all influence his capacity and willingness to adopt what are thought to be ‘improved’ agricultural technologies (Clark and Haswell, 1970; Reynolds, 1975; Wharton, 1968).
Nyoro symbolism: the ethnographic record
Authors: Needham Rodney 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThis paper is an attempt to establish certain contested facts about Nyoro symbolism. The need to do so results, in brief, from the following circumstances. Eight years ago I published an analysis of the significance of right and left in Nyoro symbolic classification (Needham 1967). John Beattie, who had done field research among the Nyoro, then brought out an article in which he contended that I had seriously misrepresented the nature of Nyoro representations of their own culture and history, ‘even in so far as these can be understood from readily available published sources’. His main concern in his critique, consequently, was ‘to set the Nyoro ethnographic record straight’ (Beattie 1968: 413).
A Summary-Report on the Oral Traditions of Yoruba Musicians
Authors: Thieme Darius L. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThis paper reports briefly on some oral traditions collected from Yoruba musicians in western Nigeria in 1964-6. These relate mainly to the origins of their musical instruments. The research sought to answer these questions: Do Yoruba musicians have an established body of traditional beliefs with respect to their instruments? If so, how can these beliefs best be collected for collation and comparative study?
Religious Courts, Community, and Ethnicity among the Swahili Of Mombasa: An Historical Study of Social Boundaries
Authors: Swartz Marc J. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe purpose of this paper is to examine the role of Koranic courts in asserting and maintaining the boundaries of a social group, the Swahili, in Mombasa, Kenya. It is a basic thesis here that these Muslim tribunals, called Kadhis courts, have played an important role in maintaining the distinctiveness of the Swahili throughout much of their long history. There are other important elements in the boundary processes that separate the Swahili from their neighbors and several of these will be noted here, but primary attention is focused on the workings of the courts. Through controlling these courts the Swahili community is able to have a direct influence on some of the areas of life its members look upon as central to the community's proper functioning. The courts now deal almost exclusively with domestic affairs and, although they are available to all Muslims, their use is optional and anyone who wishes to may use the secular courts instead. Because of the optional status of the courts, their use is itself an assertion of group membership.
Home-Town: A Study of an Urban Centre in Southern Ghana
Authors: Middleton John 
Published: April 2006

The Town and its SettingSouthern Ghana has for centuries been a region marked by continuous movement of population, both of groups and individuals; by ever-changing forms of social stratification; by urban centres of various kinds and sizes; and by trade with the outside world. Yet tradition and ‘custom’ are of great importance for the people. And despite marked economic and political development, kingship, matrilineal descent, and urbanism have remained central in most of the area in both national and local social systems.
‘Three's a crowd’: knowledge, ignorance and power in the context of urban agriculture in Rwanda
Authors: Pottier Johan 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe themes of knowledge and ignorance are explored in this article, as is their dialectic, in the light of the continuing failure of development efforts based on top-down procedures. My specific aim is to deliver a statement about the intricate relationship between knowledge, ignorance and power in the context of a Rwandan development project. I will demonstrate how ignorance is generated through agricultural extension and will argue that agronomic services rely on power structures reminiscent of the ‘old’ premise of social inequality (Maquet, 1961; for a summary of the debate on social inequality in Rwanda, see Reyntjens, 1985: 21–30). My concern will be to assess whether the project-induced creation of ignorance—such as the distorted portrayal of practices outside the project area—leads to the displacement of local knowledge and the adoption of new methods.