Review of Biruk, Crystal. 2018. Cooking Data: Culture and Politics in an African Research World... more Review of Biruk, Crystal. 2018. Cooking Data: Culture and Politics in an African Research World. Durham: Duke University Press, 2018.
Kings of Disaster: Dualism, Centralism and the Scapegoat King in Southern Sudan (Michigan State &... more Kings of Disaster: Dualism, Centralism and the Scapegoat King in Southern Sudan (Michigan State & Fountain) is a remarkable ethnography of people whose sense of commonality is produced by their common opposition to their kings. The book brings together an impressive body of archival sources and excellent ethnographic research, but has remained underappreciated outside a small circle of specialists. Partly this was a matter of timing. Simonse carried out his first research trip in 1981, while he was teaching at Juba University. During the next five years, Juba came under siege, becoming a key government-controlled outpost circled by rebel-held territory. Extended work outside the town became more and more difficult. By the time the book was published in 1992, Sudan had been at war for nearly a decade and the book’s subject matter seemed part of the discipline’s history. Political anthropology was giving way to the anthropology of the state and interest shifted from ‘traditional regis...
Review of Christoph Brumann and David Berliner, World Heritage on the Ground: Ethnographic Perspe... more Review of Christoph Brumann and David Berliner, World Heritage on the Ground: Ethnographic Perspectives (New York, Berghahn, 2016)
The study of fauna in South Sudan during the first two-thirds of the twentieth century relied on ... more The study of fauna in South Sudan during the first two-thirds of the twentieth century relied on a web of collection stations, a vast field network of observers, the assembly of many disparate facts, and the collection of animals to be sold for display and study in zoos and museums in Sudan and other countries. This work of zoological study and the trade in animals mobilized great numbers of South Sudanese, relying on their labour, observations, and knowledge about how to capture and care for animals. These participants have rarely been credited for their own contributions to knowledge about the natural history of their country. This paper examines the work of Solomon Col Adol who was based at the zoological collection station in Bor, a small town on the White Nile, where he was a Game Ranger.
Review of Biruk, Crystal. 2018. Cooking Data: Culture and Politics in an African Research World... more Review of Biruk, Crystal. 2018. Cooking Data: Culture and Politics in an African Research World. Durham: Duke University Press, 2018.
Kings of Disaster: Dualism, Centralism and the Scapegoat King in Southern Sudan (Michigan State &... more Kings of Disaster: Dualism, Centralism and the Scapegoat King in Southern Sudan (Michigan State & Fountain) is a remarkable ethnography of people whose sense of commonality is produced by their common opposition to their kings. The book brings together an impressive body of archival sources and excellent ethnographic research, but has remained underappreciated outside a small circle of specialists. Partly this was a matter of timing. Simonse carried out his first research trip in 1981, while he was teaching at Juba University. During the next five years, Juba came under siege, becoming a key government-controlled outpost circled by rebel-held territory. Extended work outside the town became more and more difficult. By the time the book was published in 1992, Sudan had been at war for nearly a decade and the book’s subject matter seemed part of the discipline’s history. Political anthropology was giving way to the anthropology of the state and interest shifted from ‘traditional regis...
Review of Christoph Brumann and David Berliner, World Heritage on the Ground: Ethnographic Perspe... more Review of Christoph Brumann and David Berliner, World Heritage on the Ground: Ethnographic Perspectives (New York, Berghahn, 2016)
The study of fauna in South Sudan during the first two-thirds of the twentieth century relied on ... more The study of fauna in South Sudan during the first two-thirds of the twentieth century relied on a web of collection stations, a vast field network of observers, the assembly of many disparate facts, and the collection of animals to be sold for display and study in zoos and museums in Sudan and other countries. This work of zoological study and the trade in animals mobilized great numbers of South Sudanese, relying on their labour, observations, and knowledge about how to capture and care for animals. These participants have rarely been credited for their own contributions to knowledge about the natural history of their country. This paper examines the work of Solomon Col Adol who was based at the zoological collection station in Bor, a small town on the White Nile, where he was a Game Ranger.
Uploads