Description

Book Synopsis
Ethnicity and the Colonial State analyses, through a comparison of three West African communities (Wolof, Temne, and Ewe), the ways in which ethnic labels and arguments are used (or omitted) in dealings with colonial administrations. It follows these strategies and choices over more than a century, between the conquest periods and independence. Where state structures were weak as a factor of group cohesion, ethnic arguments were especially likely to come into play. The analysis discusses internal fissures and conflicting interests within the communities as other incentives for ethnic coalition-building. The observations made in this book are put into the context of a global historical perspective, for which “ethnicity” has so far remained a badly defined concept.

Table of Contents
Acknowledgements ... vii Maps ... x 1 Introduction ... 1 2 Group Identifications: African and Global Categories ... 36 3 Wolof and Wolofisation: Statehood, Colonial Rule, and Identification in Senegal ... 84 4 Fragmentation and the Temne: From War Raids into Ethnic Civil Wars ... 158 5 ‘Ethnic Identity’ as an Anti-colonial Weapon? Ewe Mobilisation from the Late Nineteenth Century to the 1960s ... 220 6 Conclusion ... 293 Bibliography ... 313 Index ... 361

Ethnicity and the Colonial State: Finding and Representing Group Identifications in a Coastal West African and Global Perspective (1850–1960)

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      View other formats and editions of Ethnicity and the Colonial State: Finding and Representing Group Identifications in a Coastal West African and Global Perspective (1850–1960) by Alexander Keese

      Publisher: Brill
      Publication Date: Publication Date: 04/12/2015
      ISBN13: 9789004307346, 978-9004307346
      ISBN10:
      Also in:
      Ethnic studies / Ethnicity Globalization Migration, immigration and emigration

      Description

      Book Synopsis
      Ethnicity and the Colonial State analyses, through a comparison of three West African communities (Wolof, Temne, and Ewe), the ways in which ethnic labels and arguments are used (or omitted) in dealings with colonial administrations. It follows these strategies and choices over more than a century, between the conquest periods and independence. Where state structures were weak as a factor of group cohesion, ethnic arguments were especially likely to come into play. The analysis discusses internal fissures and conflicting interests within the communities as other incentives for ethnic coalition-building. The observations made in this book are put into the context of a global historical perspective, for which “ethnicity” has so far remained a badly defined concept.

      Table of Contents
      Acknowledgements ... vii Maps ... x 1 Introduction ... 1 2 Group Identifications: African and Global Categories ... 36 3 Wolof and Wolofisation: Statehood, Colonial Rule, and Identification in Senegal ... 84 4 Fragmentation and the Temne: From War Raids into Ethnic Civil Wars ... 158 5 ‘Ethnic Identity’ as an Anti-colonial Weapon? Ewe Mobilisation from the Late Nineteenth Century to the 1960s ... 220 6 Conclusion ... 293 Bibliography ... 313 Index ... 361

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