Review: With Frobenius in KasaiAuthor(s): Jan VansinaReviewed work(s):

Leo Frobenius: Ethnographische Notizen aus den Jahren 1995 und 1906. III: Luluwa, Sud-Kete, Bena Mai, Pende, Cokwe by Hildegard Klein

Source: The Journal of African History, Vol. 31, No. 2 (1990), pp. 322-323Published by: Cambridge University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/182777Accessed: 09/10/2009 18:56

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JOURNAL OF AFRICAN HISTORY JOURNAL OF AFRICAN HISTORY

population reformulee, h la fois a travers la mode de production et la mode de vie (ainsi qu'en temoignent les projets d'urbanisation au dix-neuvieme siicle). Que ceci passe par la captation du pouvoir intellectuel et la formulation d'une culture de gouvernement, voila qui ne saurait surprendre et qui constitue une pertinente relecture de nos sources ideologiques traditionnelles.

D'un petit fait - banal constat - Timothy Mitchell cree un systeme sophistique d'explication qui prend en charge les multiples aspects de ce processus d'evolution dans lequel l'Egypte s'engage a partir du regne de Muhammad 'Ali, avec l'espoir pathetique de dominer par la meme la nature in6galitaire des rapports entre nations a l'epoque coloniale. C'est h cette pensee que l'Egypte doit aussi le role phare qui a ete le sien dans ce chapitre de la longue duree historique que nous pla,ons sous le signe du 'Global Civilisation'.

Timothy Mitchell nous fournit ainsi, avec Colonising Egypt, une grille de lecture, qui pour etre constituee en paradygme parfois artificiel ou, pour le moins, excessivement intellectualise, n'en est pas moins une apprehension large de cette realite egyptienne, suscitant, par la meme, l'int6ret de l'historien, toujours h la recherche de quelque fil d'Ariane. En un mot, Timothy Mitchell a reussi h de- banaliser une epoque dont trop d'ouvrages quelconques avaient fini par nous lasser. Recommandons donc cette lecture stimulante.

Universite de la Sorbonne Nouvelle MAGALI MORSY

WITH FROBENIUS IN KASAI

Leo Frobenius: Ethnographische Notizen aus den Jahren I905 und I9o6. III: Luluwa, Siid-Kete, Bena Mai, Pende, Cokwe. Edited by HILDEGARD KLEIN.

(Studien zur Kulturkunde, 87). Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, I988. Pp. xxi+278; 500 ill., 15 plates. DM. 98.

This third instalment of the notebooks and ethnographic journal of Frobenius deals with what is now the core of the province of western Kasai in Zaire. As with the first two volumes, this has not been a straightforward editorial task, as the facsimile (p. 81) of a page of the journal shows. The notes are so sketchy as to be almost meaningless by themselves. Dr Klein used the whole legacy: jottings in the notebooks, the journals, the sketchbooks of Hans Lemme (the painter who accompanied Frobenius), the notecards Frobenius made for the objects which went to the Museum in Hamburg, other miscellanea at the Frobenius Institut (Atlas of drawings and collection of photographs), and information from Froben- ius' travel book Im Schatten des Kongostaates (Berlin: Reimer, 1907) and from his Dichtkunst der Kassaiden (Atlantis XII) (Berlin: Diederichs, 1928). To make the materials accessible, Dr Klein had to organize the materials under her own twelve headings: 'general and historical', 'hairstyles, ornament, mutilations', 'house and settlement patterns', 'agriculture, nutrition, food taboos, smoking', 'weapons and rituals of hunting', ' industries', ' data about the cycle of life ', ' social and political structure', 'religion and magic', 'masks', 'musical instruments' and 'various '. The headings are hers but the text is the original and her own comments are clearly separated from it. The text is followed by over five hundred of the illustrations by Frobenius and Lemme.

Like its predecessors, this volume discloses treasures, especially with regard to art and material culture. The data were gathered at a time when there was as yet no colonial administration on the ground and are therefore irreplaceable, even for this area of Kasai which has been described by various authors of the i88os. The descriptions of day-to-day life remain invaluable to social historians. Data

population reformulee, h la fois a travers la mode de production et la mode de vie (ainsi qu'en temoignent les projets d'urbanisation au dix-neuvieme siicle). Que ceci passe par la captation du pouvoir intellectuel et la formulation d'une culture de gouvernement, voila qui ne saurait surprendre et qui constitue une pertinente relecture de nos sources ideologiques traditionnelles.

D'un petit fait - banal constat - Timothy Mitchell cree un systeme sophistique d'explication qui prend en charge les multiples aspects de ce processus d'evolution dans lequel l'Egypte s'engage a partir du regne de Muhammad 'Ali, avec l'espoir pathetique de dominer par la meme la nature in6galitaire des rapports entre nations a l'epoque coloniale. C'est h cette pensee que l'Egypte doit aussi le role phare qui a ete le sien dans ce chapitre de la longue duree historique que nous pla,ons sous le signe du 'Global Civilisation'.

Timothy Mitchell nous fournit ainsi, avec Colonising Egypt, une grille de lecture, qui pour etre constituee en paradygme parfois artificiel ou, pour le moins, excessivement intellectualise, n'en est pas moins une apprehension large de cette realite egyptienne, suscitant, par la meme, l'int6ret de l'historien, toujours h la recherche de quelque fil d'Ariane. En un mot, Timothy Mitchell a reussi h de- banaliser une epoque dont trop d'ouvrages quelconques avaient fini par nous lasser. Recommandons donc cette lecture stimulante.

Universite de la Sorbonne Nouvelle MAGALI MORSY

WITH FROBENIUS IN KASAI

Leo Frobenius: Ethnographische Notizen aus den Jahren I905 und I9o6. III: Luluwa, Siid-Kete, Bena Mai, Pende, Cokwe. Edited by HILDEGARD KLEIN.

(Studien zur Kulturkunde, 87). Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag, I988. Pp. xxi+278; 500 ill., 15 plates. DM. 98.

This third instalment of the notebooks and ethnographic journal of Frobenius deals with what is now the core of the province of western Kasai in Zaire. As with the first two volumes, this has not been a straightforward editorial task, as the facsimile (p. 81) of a page of the journal shows. The notes are so sketchy as to be almost meaningless by themselves. Dr Klein used the whole legacy: jottings in the notebooks, the journals, the sketchbooks of Hans Lemme (the painter who accompanied Frobenius), the notecards Frobenius made for the objects which went to the Museum in Hamburg, other miscellanea at the Frobenius Institut (Atlas of drawings and collection of photographs), and information from Froben- ius' travel book Im Schatten des Kongostaates (Berlin: Reimer, 1907) and from his Dichtkunst der Kassaiden (Atlantis XII) (Berlin: Diederichs, 1928). To make the materials accessible, Dr Klein had to organize the materials under her own twelve headings: 'general and historical', 'hairstyles, ornament, mutilations', 'house and settlement patterns', 'agriculture, nutrition, food taboos, smoking', 'weapons and rituals of hunting', ' industries', ' data about the cycle of life ', ' social and political structure', 'religion and magic', 'masks', 'musical instruments' and 'various '. The headings are hers but the text is the original and her own comments are clearly separated from it. The text is followed by over five hundred of the illustrations by Frobenius and Lemme.

Like its predecessors, this volume discloses treasures, especially with regard to art and material culture. The data were gathered at a time when there was as yet no colonial administration on the ground and are therefore irreplaceable, even for this area of Kasai which has been described by various authors of the i88os. The descriptions of day-to-day life remain invaluable to social historians. Data

322 322

concerning houses, settlements and burials are of special interest to archaeologists and any historian of precolonial Kasai. The jottings on social and political structures and religion are sometimes priceless because they often diverge from the then received anthropological wisdom. Notes on historical tradition, such as those

concerning the Bena Mai, for instance, bring fresh information. A particular advantage of this volume is that with the exception of materials

about the Pende and the Cokwe, and much of the data about art, the contents of this volume can be compared to the first 426 pages of P. Denolf's Aan de rand van de Dibese (Brussels: I. R. C. B., 1954) which deal with the same topics. Denolf collected his data from 1919 to I950. Each author has his advantages: much of what Frobenius still describes as living usage had become obsolete and the author was more attuned to African life and values, but Denolf was fluent in Tshiluba and

stayed for a generation. Both volumes enrich each other, and jointly they allow one to follow in realistic detail how, when, and in what measure colonialism destroyed the old ways of life.

Dr Klein has painstakingly reconstituted a rich and important legacy that seemed hopelessly lost. She will be remembered with deep gratitude for genera- tions by students of these areas. These three volumes are her legacy to scholars. Unfortunately she did not live to complete the task. A fourth volume dealing mostly with the Luba and Songye of eastern Kasai still needs to be completed. Let us hope that the Frobenius Institut will be able to publish this as well. It would be a most suitable tribute to Dr Klein and her work.

University of Wisconsin, Madison JAN VANS INA

SOMALI POLITICAL ECONOMY

The State and Rural Transformation in Northern Somalia I884-I986. By ABDI ISMAIL SAMATAR. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1989. Pp. xix+ 204. $40 ($i7.50 paperback).

Abdi Ismail Samatar's book has very clearly stated objectives. First, he wishes to challenge the dominant 'infertile' paradigm of Somali studies represented most recently by the work of David Laitin and S. S. Samatar. Second, he asserts the concept of the 'suspended state' as central to understanding Somalia's post- colonial underdevelopment. Throughout the book Samatar struggles to reconcile Somalia's unusual colonial history to dominant theories of the African state founded upon experience from settler or agriculturally based colonies.

Though he organizes the six chapters chronologically, the book's overall argument divides more subtly into two strangely contradictory narratives. The dominant story is the growth of the colonial state and capitalist relations from the late nineteenth century through its post-colonial phase. Northern Somaliland was administered by a colonial state concerned more with strategic interests and a small livestock export to Aden than intervention in rural production. The post-colonial manifestation of this philosophy has been the emergence of a petit-bourgeois Somali state suspended above its rural political economy and dependent on international aid. In Samatar's view, this peculiar state structure, along with the capitalist world economy, bears primary responsibility for the poverty, under- development, and suppression of democratic institutions in modern Somalia.

The book's more subtle sub-plot, consisting of some interesting field data and effective use of colonial records, however, narrates a quite different story: the gradual transformation of a rural economy in which both pastoralists and a new group of agriculturalists respond admirably to new markets and technologies. The

11-2

concerning houses, settlements and burials are of special interest to archaeologists and any historian of precolonial Kasai. The jottings on social and political structures and religion are sometimes priceless because they often diverge from the then received anthropological wisdom. Notes on historical tradition, such as those

concerning the Bena Mai, for instance, bring fresh information. A particular advantage of this volume is that with the exception of materials

about the Pende and the Cokwe, and much of the data about art, the contents of this volume can be compared to the first 426 pages of P. Denolf's Aan de rand van de Dibese (Brussels: I. R. C. B., 1954) which deal with the same topics. Denolf collected his data from 1919 to I950. Each author has his advantages: much of what Frobenius still describes as living usage had become obsolete and the author was more attuned to African life and values, but Denolf was fluent in Tshiluba and

stayed for a generation. Both volumes enrich each other, and jointly they allow one to follow in realistic detail how, when, and in what measure colonialism destroyed the old ways of life.

Dr Klein has painstakingly reconstituted a rich and important legacy that seemed hopelessly lost. She will be remembered with deep gratitude for genera- tions by students of these areas. These three volumes are her legacy to scholars. Unfortunately she did not live to complete the task. A fourth volume dealing mostly with the Luba and Songye of eastern Kasai still needs to be completed. Let us hope that the Frobenius Institut will be able to publish this as well. It would be a most suitable tribute to Dr Klein and her work.

University of Wisconsin, Madison JAN VANS INA

SOMALI POLITICAL ECONOMY

The State and Rural Transformation in Northern Somalia I884-I986. By ABDI ISMAIL SAMATAR. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1989. Pp. xix+ 204. $40 ($i7.50 paperback).

Abdi Ismail Samatar's book has very clearly stated objectives. First, he wishes to challenge the dominant 'infertile' paradigm of Somali studies represented most recently by the work of David Laitin and S. S. Samatar. Second, he asserts the concept of the 'suspended state' as central to understanding Somalia's post- colonial underdevelopment. Throughout the book Samatar struggles to reconcile Somalia's unusual colonial history to dominant theories of the African state founded upon experience from settler or agriculturally based colonies.

Though he organizes the six chapters chronologically, the book's overall argument divides more subtly into two strangely contradictory narratives. The dominant story is the growth of the colonial state and capitalist relations from the late nineteenth century through its post-colonial phase. Northern Somaliland was administered by a colonial state concerned more with strategic interests and a small livestock export to Aden than intervention in rural production. The post-colonial manifestation of this philosophy has been the emergence of a petit-bourgeois Somali state suspended above its rural political economy and dependent on international aid. In Samatar's view, this peculiar state structure, along with the capitalist world economy, bears primary responsibility for the poverty, under- development, and suppression of democratic institutions in modern Somalia.

The book's more subtle sub-plot, consisting of some interesting field data and effective use of colonial records, however, narrates a quite different story: the gradual transformation of a rural economy in which both pastoralists and a new group of agriculturalists respond admirably to new markets and technologies. The

11-2

REVIEWS REVIEWS 323 323