Perspectives on Africa: A Reader in Culture, History and Representation

Front Cover
Roy Richard Grinker, Stephen C. Lubkemann, Christopher B. Steiner
John Wiley & Sons, May 17, 2010 - Social Science - 712 pages
The second edition of Perspectives on Africa: A Reader in Culture, History, and Representation is both an introduction to the cultures of Africa and a history of the interpretations of those cultures. Key essays explore the major issues and debates through a combination of classic articles and the newest research in the field.
  • Explores the dynamic processes by and through which scholars have described and understood African history and culture
  • Includes selections from anthropologists, historians, philosophers, and critics who collectively reveal the interpenetration of ideas and concepts within and across disciplines, regions, and historical periods
  • Offers a combined focus on ethnography and theory, giving students the means to link theory with data and perspective with practice
  • Newly revised and updated edition of this popular text with 14 brand new chapters and two new sections: Conflict and Violent Transformations; and Development, Governance and Globalization
 

Selected pages

Contents

Representation and Discourse
19
The Meaning of Our Work
44
Kinship and Social Organization
61
Ethnicity in Southern African History
95
Economics as a Cultural System
109
Lele Economy Compared with the Bushong
123
The Cattle of Money and the Cattle of Girls among
151
HunterGatherers in Africa
167
The Economics of Polygamy
389
Managing Sexuality in a Maturing HIVAIDS Epidemic
411
Introduction
425
How Europe Underdeveloped Africa
439
The Invention of Tradition in Colonial Africa
450
Nations and Nationalism
471
On National Culture
484
The Paradox of Mau Mau
498

Gender and Ethnicity among
184
The Evolution of Illusion
200
Foragers Genuine or Spurious? Situating the Kalahari San in History
219
The Translation of Culture
237
Understanding a Primitive Society
257
An Essay
270
Ancestors Gods and the Philosophy of Religion
283
African Philosophy Myth and Reality
302
Arts Aesthetics and Heritage
323
Postmodernism and Contemporary African Art
348
Fashioning Coastal Identity
372
Masks Ethnicity and the State in Côte dIvoire
514
Rituals of Rebellion in SouthEast Africa
531
The Rwandan Genocide of 1994
555
Where to Be an Ancestor? Reconstituting Sociospiritual Worlds among
569
Development Governance and Globalization
583
The Case of Rwanda
609
The Politics of the Belly
629
Govern Yourselves Democracy and Carnage in Northern Mozambique
644
NuerAmerican Passages
660
Copyright

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Perspectives on Africa: A Reader in Culture, History and Representation
Roy Richard Grinker,Stephen C. Lubkemann,Christopher B. Steiner
No preview available - 2010

Common terms and phrases

administration Afikpo African art African Studies ancestors Anthropology authority Azande beliefs Botswana British Bushmen Bushong Cambridge University Press capital cattle central century Chicago colonial Comaroff concept conflict Congo contemporary context culture dansi discourse dominant economic elders ethnic European Evans-Pritchard fact female foragers forces forest FRELIMO gender global groups human hunter-gatherers Hutu ideology Igbo institutions Kalahari Kenya Kikuyu language Lele Lese lineage living London Machaze Machazian male marriage masks Mau Mau Mbuti means ment modern Mozambique Muedans native negritude ngoma Nigeria Nuer organization Oxford philosophy political polygyny production Pygmies region relations relationship RENAMO ritual role rural Rwanda scam sexual Sierra Leone slave social South Africa structure Swahili symbolic tion trade traditional tribal tribe Tswana Tutsi village violence virginity testing Western witchcraft wives women York young Zambia Zande

About the author (2010)

Roy Richard Grinker, Ph.D. is Professor of Anthropology and International Affairs at George Washington University, Director of the GW Institute for Ethnographic Research, and Editor-in-Chief of Anthropological Quarterly. He is author of four other books, including In the Arms of Africa: The Life of Colin M. Turnbull, Houses in the Rainforest: Ethnicity and Inequality Among Farmers and Foragers in Central Africa, and Unstrange Minds: Remapping the World of Autism.

Christopher B. Steiner is the Lucy C. McDannel ’22 Professor of Art History and Director of Museum Studies at Connecticut College. He is the author of the award-winning book African Art in Transit, and co-editor (with Ruth Phillips) of Unpacking Culture: Art and Commodity in Colonial and Postcolonial Worlds.

Stephen Lubkemann is Associate Professor of Anthropology and International Affairs at George Washington University. He is author of Culture in Chaos: An Anthropology of the Social Condition in War and is associate editor for Anthropological Quarterly and a co-founder of GWU’s Diaspora Research Program.

Bibliographic information

TitlePerspectives on Africa: A Reader in Culture, History and Representation
Volume 4 of Global Perspectives
EditorsRoy Richard Grinker, Stephen C. Lubkemann, Christopher B. Steiner
Edition2, illustrated
PublisherJohn Wiley & Sons, 2010
ISBN1444335227, 9781444335224
Length712 pages
Subjects ›  › 

Social Science / Anthropology / Cultural & Social
Social Science / Ethnic Studies / General
Social Science / Sociology / General
  
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