bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Bw Anga Among the Bemba
Authors: Moore R. J. B. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe conception of bwanga among the Bemba of Northern Rhodesia is very similar to that recorded by Edwin Smith among the Ila and by C. Doke among the Lamba. In collecting the following material I have, however, followed a slightly different method. The traditional method of studying this subject has been in the main categories of ‘Magic’, ‘Taboo’, ‘Omen’, and so on. While this has proved useful in collecting together many facts under their appropriate heads it has resulted in taking, as it were, a cross-section through native thought. The native does not think in these categories, he observes an object and knows certain facts about it; whether it is edible, fierce, or dangerous, whether if found in a certain way it constitutes an evil omen. The arrangement of my material, therefore, has been according to this latter method, i.e. taking one object at a time and recording as much about it as possible. The two methods are represented diagrammatically on a later page, the traditional method being equivalent to reading the columns vertically: the method here adopted reads them horizontally.
Le Problème des Mulâtres
Authors: Hulstaert G. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphDans cette étude nous nous limitons aux problèmes posés pat l'existence des mulâtres et nous éliminons la discussion de l'opportunité du mélange des races, qui est une toute autre question. On peut déplorer ce mélange ou l'apptouver — d'après les circonstances, d'après ses idèes philosophiques ou ses sentiments, ses préjugés, etc. — mais il est une réalité objective dont on doit tenir compte; il pose un problème auquel il faut chercher une solution. Si la solution de tout problème doit, pour être raisonnable, équitable, viable et utile, se baser sur des principes sûrs et sains, cela est doublement nécessaire quand il s'agit d'un problème gravement complexe et d'une portée sociale considérable comme est celui qui nous occupe ici.
Yoruba Food
Authors: Bascom William R. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe subsistence economy of the Yoruba of West Africa, like that of their neighbours, on the Guinea Coast, is based on sedentary hoe agriculture. Hunting, fishing, animal husbandry, and the gathering of wild foods are practised, but the basis of the Yoruba diet consists of starchy tubers, grains, and fruits grown on their farms, supplemented by vegetable oils, wild and cultivated fruits and vegetables, and meat and fish. The commercial economy of the Yoruba is based on cocoa (koko, from English) Theobroma cacao, originally native to Central America, which has become the principal cash crop of the Yoruba during the present century. Today Nigeria's major export, cocoa, is produced almost entirely by the Yoruba. More than 99 per cent, of the total tonnage of Nigerian cocoa graded in 1940-1 was produced in Yoruba territory, only 741 out of 97,862 tons coming from Benin and Warri provinces. First exported in the last decade of the nineteenth century, cocoa has increased in importance until in 1947 it ranked first among Nigeria's exports in terms of value. It is the principal cash crop in Ǫyǫ, Ondo, Ijębu-Ode and Abęokuta provinces and part of the Colony, all of which are inhabited by the Yoruba.
The Sacrificial Role of Cattle Among the Nuer
Authors: Evans-Pritchard E. E. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn my two books on the Nuer I gave some account of the importance of cattle in their economy and social life. I scarcely mentioned their role in religion as I did not wish to stray too far from the topics I was then discussing. I summarize very briefly what was said there before discussing their religious significance.
The Age-Set System of the Pastoral Pokot: Mechanism, Function and Post-Sapana Ceremonies
Authors: Peristiany J. G. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe following features of the sapana initiation ceremony were isolated in my first article.(1) This ceremony is held towards the end of the rainy season as often as there are candidates for initiation; (2) each candidate is, usually, initiated separately; and (3) the immediate effect of this ceremony is not so much to integrate the initiate into a new corporate group, as to permit him to participate in some of the activities of manhood.The initiated are divided into various ranks of seniority, and passage from the lower to the immediately higher rank is the result of a specific initiation ceremony. The main difference between such a ceremony and that of sapana is that sapana admits initiates to manhood individually whereas the ceremonies which follow it raise a whole group of initiated men through a series of progressively senior age-ranks. They function, that is, as parts of a true age-set mechanism. The moment a man enters one of these strata, his vertical age-mobility is conditioned by their movements, and individual transition is no longer possible.
The Age-Set System of the Pastoral Pokot: The Sapana Initiation Ceremony
Authors: Peristiany J. G. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe society to which this paper refers is a Nilo-Hamitic tribe of north-western Kenya among whose people, the Pokot, I carried out field-work for a period of approximately 6 months in 1947. For the opportunity to do so I am indebted to the Government of Kenya.The population of West Suk does not exceed 25,000 but is dispersed over an area of 1,810 square miles. The eastern and western sections of this tribe are composed of semi-nomadic pastoralists, the pi-pa-tich (cattle people) who live in arid and often semi-desert plains. Between the plains rise the Suk Hills, inhabited by the pi-pa-pagh (people of the grain) who, in certain areas, practise intensive irrigation agriculture and in others follow the usual ecological pattern of the mixed-economy Kipsigis and Nandi. The hill people have close cultural affinities with the Nandi group, while the pastoralists have been strongly influenced by their Karamojong and Turkana neighbours.
An Analytical Commentary on the Social Structure of the Dogon
Authors: Tait David 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIt is useful to review existing ethnographic writings from time to time in the light of advancing theory. The data considered here are contained in an impressive body of first-rate material collected in accordance with the best descriptive methods on which French ethnographers rely. This paper is in no sense a summary of the data collected by the various Missions Griaule; it is an ‘analytical commentary’ dealing only with the social system of the Dogon of Sanga that a structural analysis of the material reveals. Its purpose is to direct attention to some problems of structure for which further investigation is needed. It can most usefully be read side by side with the principal works on this people so far published.
The Problem of Language in Education in the Gold Coast
Authors: Asamoa E. A. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn a memorandum on education published in 1952, the Government of the Gold Coast declared that its policy was ‘to provide as soon as possible a six-year basic primary course for all children at public expense’. This policy has naturally led, not only to a rapid multiplication of the number of existing primary schools, but also to a widening of the individual classes, in order to make room for the increased number of children now entering school.
La Coutume du Hlonepho
Authors: Laydevant F. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphAu Basutoland ainsi que dans beaucoup d'autres tribus indigènes du Sud de l'Afrique, il arrive souvent que le magistrat dans son office, ou le missionnaire à son bureau, doit écrire les noms et prénoms des individus, soit pour la célébration d'un mariage, ou d'un baptême, soit pour quelqu'autre raison.
Structural Change in the Sierra Leone Protectorate
Authors: Little Kenneth 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn recent centuries indigenous West African society has experienced the impact of two external cultural forces, the one personified by Moslem invaders and migrants from the north, the other by European colonists from the West. With the spread of Islam, the way of life of whole peoples has been largely transformed, but the main changes which have occurred in the structure of African society are the result of Western and Westernizing influences. It is the purpose of this article to examine a particular aspect of these structural changes which is exemplified by the appearance of a new class of ‘educated’ and ‘literate’ individuals and their relationship with traditional society in the Sierra Leone Protectorate. The Protectorate, with which this article is exclusively concerned, comprises the hinterland of the Sierra Leone Colony, and is under a Native Authority system of government. In the Colony, political and legal institutions are modelled mainly on the English system. As explained later, the terms ‘educated’ and ‘literate’ are used throughout to denote relative degrees of Westernization due to education.
The Lyric in the Fante Methodist Church
Authors: Williamson S. G. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe Methodist Church in Ghana, in common with all the missionary-implanted Churches in the area, strongly reflects its Western origins: its organization and polity, its worship and discipline, and its ethos are manifestly those of the British Methodism which gave it birth. Methodist institutions have been present in parts of Ghana, particularly in the coastal strip, for over a century and have thereby become part of the social and religious landscape; but whether they are related to it or rooted in the soil has been seriously questioned. It is therefore all the more notable that within this implanted institutional framework typically Ghanaian attitudes seek expression, and that in one direction at least a Fante cultural form has found an honoured place within the Church's life. This is the Fante lyric.
The Influence of Ecological Factors and External Relations on the Mbembe Tribes of South-East Nigeria
Authors: Harris Rosemary 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThis paper is concerned with the significance of environmental factors for the reconstruction and interpretation of the history of the Mbembe tribes during the period immediately prior to the first arrival of the Europeans in the late 1880's. It seems probable that developments occurring mainly during the nineteenth century led to differences between the tribes, both in the distribution of their populations and in the character of their villages. These in turn resulted in considerable divergences in political organization despite the fact that the tribes remained adjacent and culturally very similar, and that the main principles and assumptions on which their organization was based remained essentially similar. It would be possible to discuss these political differences simply in terms of the present variations in demography and village structure. But an attempt to discover the processes by which they came about will, I think, increase our understanding of the development of these divergent political structures.
Migrant Aŋlo Fishing Companies and Socio-Political Change: A Comparative Study
Authors: Wyllie Robert W. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe Aŋlo are an Ewe-speaking people who occupy the low-lying coastal area between the Volta river in Ghana and Lome, the capital of Togo. They are among the most mobile of West African peoples, Aŋlo beach seine fishing companies having for many years operated from beaches as far afield as Sierra Leone and Angola. In recent years, however, the governments of certain West African countries have ordered their removal in attempts to protect the interests of indigenous fishermen. This has meant that these companies have tended more and more to return to Ghanaian beaches, but have found that the increasing mechanization of Ghanaian coastal fishing presents a serious threat to their continued operation.
Craft Work in Bida
Authors: Vernon-Jackson Hugh 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphAccording to the last census (1952) the population of Bida, capital of the Emirate of the same name in Niger Province, Nigeria, is about 26,000, of which some 2,000 are listed as craftsmen. But many Bida men described in the census as having other occupations, most women, and many children are to some extent craft-workers, either part-time or spasmodic, often skilled in several crafts.
The Categories of Number in Noun forms in the Borana Dialect of Galla
Authors: Andrzejewski B. W. 
Published: April 2006

IntroductionThe aim of this article is to give a brief account of certain inflexional features in Borana Nouns, which may throw light on similar characteristics in other dialects of Galla.The inflexional features under discussion are those set out in the lists in Section II of this article. These features are not described in formal terms, as I have found that, in this case, a formal approach leads to a confused and unsatisfactory statement. Instead, I have endeavoured to correlate the given inflexional features with notional categories which have been established through direct observation of the speakers' behaviour rather than simply on the basis of translation. These categories were obtained by analysing the situations in which the forms listed in Section II were used, a process which was based on personal observation of these situations, together with my knowledge of the events which preceded them.
Mosque-Building and Tribal Separatism in Freetown East
Authors: Proudfoot L. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphOf recent years many mosques have been built in Sierra Leone, while in Freetown itself the number and character of these new buildings is transforming the Eastern Ward into a visibly Islamic city. Several of the new Freetown mosques are alike in their ambitious scale, their architectural style, and in being associated with a particular sponsoring tribe. The older mosques, even the two or three which were built of permanent materials, were small in scale, had but few architectural pretensions, and were communal rather than tribal in character. The new mosques—the Temne, the Mandinka, the Fula, and the Hausa—are all very large and advertise the ecclesiastical architecture of the Near East; a particular tribe was responsible for the building of each, and the tribal vernaculars are—except in the case of the Mandinka—either being used already within them, or about to be introduced. Moreover, the process is obviously continuing. The foundation-stone has been laid of a Limba mosque; land has been acquired and collections are being taken for a Mende mosque, and both are intended to be large buildings in the new style. Finally, a small Susumosque, scarcely finished as yet, is reported to be destined for demolition in order that it may be replaced by a more handsome structure.
Indirect Rule—French and British Style
Authors: Crowder Michael 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn his witty and thought-provoking Lugard Memorial Lecture, ‘Et maintenant, Lord Lugard?’ (Africa, xxxiii. 4, 1963), Gouverneur Deschamps has provided us with an excellent general appraisal of the relative achievements and failures of French and British ‘native’ administration in Africa. But he does not do full justice to the fundamental differences between the two systems. Though he hints at these differences on several occasions in his lecture, he contends that, far from what is generally supposed, the two were in practice very similar, since they both reposed on indigenous chiefs. He insists that ‘la seule différence est que nous n'avons pas tenté, comme vous, Lord Lugard, de moderniser ces états anciens, ni de créer des embryons d'états là où il n'en existait point’; or‘…[our administrative practice] ne différait de la vôtre (au moins en Afrique noire) que par une allure plus familière et des buts moins définis’. This seems seriously to underestimate the nature of the differences between the two systems, which were rather those of kind than of degree.
Hill Settlements and their Abandonment in Western Yorubaland
Authors: Gleave Michael B. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIt is well known that villages and small towns in the savanna and derived savanna area of West Africa have, at some time, moved down from hill sites to their present position on the plains. It has been suggested that settled conditions resulting from the penetration of colonial administration provided the stimulus in a number of cases in the Western Region of Nigeria, notably Okeiho which was moved in 1917, and Igbetti in 1905. In the Afenmai district of northern Benin, fortified hill sites were abandoned and villages were moved down to the plains after British administration entered the district in 1904, while New Idanre in Ondo Province was laid out with broad streets on a rectangular plan at the foot of the hill, leaving Old Idanre on the hill-top site. This paper outlines the reasons for the earlier choice of hill-top sites and for later movement of settlements in a small part of the derived savanna in Ibadan and Oyo Provinces, bounded by arbitrary limits to the north and east, by the Dahomey frontier to the west, and by the boundary between Ibadan and Abeokuta Provinces to the south.
Notes sur la Situation du Sango à Bangui: Résultats d'un Sondage
Authors: Jacquot André 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphLa langue véhiculaire dite sango commercial, ou tout simplement sango, est parlée principalement sur le territoire de la République Centrafricaine, ne débordant que légèrement sur la rive gauche du fleuve Oubangui et sur la République du Congo dans la région comprise entre la Sangha et l'Oubangui. Elle est dérivée du parler des Sango de Mobaye, sur le Haut Oubangui, qui appartient d'après Tucker à un agrégat de dialectes qu'il désigne par le nom du principal, ngbandi.
Nden-Bobo, l'Araignée-Toilière
Authors: Gaspard  , Towo-Atangana Françoise 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphCe conte a été enregistré, transcrit, traduit et présenté sous les auspices du Centre Fédéral Linguistique et Culturel de Yaoundé (Cameroun) et grâce à une subvention de l'Institut International Africain. Après un rapide commentaire, nous le donnons sous la version française d'abord et ensuite sous sa version Eton avec une traduction linéaire.
Univers Religieux et Cohésion Interne dans les Communautés Villageoises Bwa Traditionnelles
Authors: Capron Jean 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphOn a souvent répété des cultures négro-africaines qu'elles étaient imprégnées de spiritualité sinon de religiosité; pourtant, comme le remarquait dans un récent article Madame Calame-Griaule: ‘il serait faux de croire que le facteur religieux y joue un rôle essentiel’; il se situe en réalité sur le même plan que les autres manifestations de la vie sociale; il concourt à la construction de cet ensemble fonctionnel que constitue toute culture. C'est dans cette perspective que nous voudrions tenter d'examiner comment la religion bwa – dont les manifestations les plus élaborées et les plus valorisées s'expriment dans l'organisation et le fonctionnement de la société du do – s'intègre dans un complexe institutionnel précis dont elle n'est pas seulement, à certains égards, le reflet, mais l'un des rouages essentiels.
African Traditional Thought and Western Science
Authors: Horton Robin 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn Part I of this paper, I pushed as far as it would go the thesis that important continuities link the religious thinking of traditional Africa and the theoretical thinking of the modern West. I showed how this view helps us to make sense of many otherwise puzzling features of traditional religious thinking. I also showed how it helps us to avoid certain rather troublesome red herrings which lie across the path towards understanding the crucial differences between the traditional and the scientific outlook.
Land Concentration around a Few Individuals in Igbo-land of Eastern Nigeria: Its Processes, Scope and Future
Authors: Mbagwu Theo C. 
Published: April 2006

IntroductionAmong most groups of people in Nigeria, land is a basic and high value resource. This is not due simply to the people's dependence on agriculture to gain a livelihood. It owes more to the fact that the pattern of traditional rural life has continued to raise the demand for the available land.The agricultural land is used as a fund-type resource which is exploited and abandoned, rather than as a flow-type resource whose productivity is maintained indefinitely. Every new farming season numerous old farm sites not considered, because of their low estimated nutrient status, to be adequate for exploitation are left idle. What then becomes available for use is, in most cases, not enough to meet the demand. This built-in idle capacity in the land utilisation system is a key factor conferring high scarcity value on agricultural land.
The social structure of the Sotho-speaking peoples of Southern Africa
Authors: Kuper Adam 
Published: April 2006

IntroductionIn this paper I draw together modern reports on various Sotho-speaking peoples and attempt to indicate the relationship between the political arrangements within each ‘tribe’ and certain aspects of its social system—in particular, patterns of marriage preference and residential alignment.The richest data and some of the most penetrating analysis is to be found in Schapera's writings on the Tswana, and his Tswana material provides my central case-study. The Kgalagari and the Southern Sotho (Basuto) systems are obviously similar in many ways, although I shall point out some interesting variations. In the second part of the paper I attempt to show that the variables abstracted in the first part are related in only slightly different ways in the superficially divergent systems of the Pedi and the Lovedu, and even in some groups whose organization has been fundamentally disrupted by colonial or settler intervention.The Sotho-speaking peoples have intrigued many anthropologists particularly because of their preference for marriage with close kin, usually including all cousins, and sometimes even closer relatives. It was with this in mind that Radcliffe-Brown (1950: 69) remarked that the Tswana ‘are decidedly exceptional in Africa, and might almost be regarded as an anomaly’. This is a problem which is central to my analysis, and in order to clear the ground something must be said about marriage strategies in general. Broadly speaking, there are three options, which I will now outline.
Social Anthropology and the ‘Bantu Expansion’
Authors: Kuper Adam , van Leynseele Pierre 
Published: April 2006

IntroductionThe debate on the ‘Bantu expansion’ has been notable for the relative absence of contributions by social and cultural anthropologists. Murdock's rather extravagant contribution (1959) has assumed a quite inordinate significance, as the only direct attempt to discuss the sociology of large linguistically defined areas. This anthropological silence is particularly noteworthy in view of the close collaboration between anthropologists, linguists and archaeologists in the Americas. It is fair to say that nothing in the Africanist literature approaches the sophistication of, say, Dyen and Aberle's Lexical reconstruction: the case of the proto-Athapaskan kinship system (1974). Studies like that are the outgrowths of a living tradition stemming from Boas and Kroeber and Sapir. There is nothing comparable in Africa—H. Baumann, the only candidate, lacked sociological interests and did not systematically relate his findings and hypotheses to those of the linguists. Yet it is surely obvious that an anthropological contribution is needed here, if only in a critical role. The present paper outlines a few of the ways in which social and cultural anthropologists might contribute; and begins with a critique of traditional ‘culture area’ approaches, since these are generally thought of as the kind of thing that anthropologists can do, however poorly.