Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-2plfb Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-22T05:40:08.106Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

New Guinea Models in the African Savannah

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 January 2012

Ivan Karp
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Fourteen years have passed since J. A. Barnes published his short article on ‘African models in the New Guinea Highlands’ (1962). In it Barnes raised the question of whether the concepts used to analyse systems of descent in African societies were applicable to descent systems in New Guinea that appeared at first glance to be similar. This article signalled the beginning of a debate over the nature of descent and kinship in New Guinea and the advisability of using concepts and results derived from field research in another continent and in a different context. The very status of social anthropology as a comparative and generalizing science is called into question by the debate initiated by Barnes, for if African research has no relevance for New Guinea research, then neither cross-cultural typologies nor generalizations about social behavior are possible. Hence, the New Guinea literature has more than just an area specialist's significance.

Résumé

MODÈLES DE NOUVELLE GUINÉE DANS LA SAVANNE AFRICAINE

Depuis le début des années 1960, les études des systèmes de descendance parmi les sociétés des hautes terres de la Nouvelle Guinée ont fait surgir la question suivante: dans quelle mesure les modèles fournis par l'analyse de la descendance dans la société africaine sont-ils applicables? On se propose ici de voir si les progrès qui ont marqué les analyses de la descendance en Nouvelle Guinée pourront être appliques à l'étude du système de descendance des Iteso du Kenya. On pose ici la nécessité d'une distinction entre trois dimensions du systéme de descendance, à savoir l'idéologie, l'aspect juridique et le comportement. La qualité et le type des rapports qui lient ces trois aspects d'un système de descendance dépendent de domaines sociaux qui n'entrent pas dans le cadre de la descendance. Ainsi, toute analyse du système de descendance d'une société donnée devra tenir compte des domaines d'action politique, domestique et rituelle dans son explication de la structure de ce système. On distingue chez les Iteso trois niveaux de descendance que l'auteur appelle le clan nominal, le clan exogame et la lignée. L'examen des croyances Iteso relatives à l'hérédité, la gestation et la descendance démontre que la logique des conceptions des Iteso sur ces sujets mettent en jeu une croyance à la descendance patrilinéaire. Cependant ces mêmes croyances n'entrainent pas l'existence de divers niveaux d'organisation patrilinéaire: ces niveaux (on le montre ici), sont le résultat du prolongement des domaines politique, domestique et rituel dans le domaine de la descendance, si bien que ce dernier est déformé par ses rapports avec les autres domaines sociaux.

Type
Research Article
Information
Africa , Volume 48 , Issue 1 , January 1978 , pp. 1 - 16
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 1978

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Barnes, J. A. 1962 ‘African models in the New Guinea Highlands,’ Man 62: 5–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bloch, Maurice 1971 ‘The moral and tactical meaning of kinship terms,’ Man (NS) 6: 468–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blok, Anton 1969 ‘Variations in patronage,’ Sociologische Gids 16: 365–78.Google Scholar
Brown, Paula 1962 ‘Non-agnates among the patrilineal Chimbu,’ J. Polynesian Society 71: 57–69.Google Scholar
Dyson-Hudson, Neville 1966 Karimojong Politics. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Evans-Pritchard, E. E. 1940 The Nuer. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Falding, Harold 1968 The Sociological Task. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Fortes, Meyer 1969 Kinship and the Social Order. Chicago: Aldine.Google Scholar
Fortes, Meyer 1970 Time and Social Structure and Other Essays. London: Athlone Press.Google Scholar
Jack, Goody (ed.) 1958 The Developmental Cycle in Domestic Groups. London: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jack, Goody (ed.) 1973 The Character of Kinship. London: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Jackson, Michael 1974 ‘The structure and significance of Kuranko clanship,’ Africa XLIV: 397–416.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jacobson, David 1971 ‘Mobility, continuity, and urban social organization,’ Man (NS) 6: 630–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kaberry, Phyllis 1967 ‘The plasticity of New Guinea kinship,’ in Freedman, Maurice (ed.) Social Organization: Essays Presented to Raymond Firth. London: Athlone Press.Google Scholar
Karp, Ivan 1976 ‘The Iteso response to political domination,’ in Arens, W. (ed.) A century of Change in East and Central Africa. The Hague: Mouton & Co.Google Scholar
Karp, Ivan forthcoming Fields of Change among the Iteso of Kenya. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, International Library of Anthropology.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Karp, Ivan and , Patricia 1973 ‘The Southern Iteso: beliefs and practices,’ in Molnos, A. (ed.) Cultural Source Materials For Population Planning in East Africa. Nairobi: East African Publishing House.Google Scholar
Keesing, Roger 1971 ‘Descent, residence, and cultural codes,’ in Hiatt, L. R. and Jayawardena, C. (eds.) Anthropology in Oceania. Sydney: University of Sydney Press.Google Scholar
Leach, E. R. 1961 Rethinking Anthropology. London: Athlone Press.Google Scholar
Lewis, I. M. 1965 ‘Problems in the comparative study of unilineal descent,’ in Banton, M. (ed.) The Relevance of Models for Social Anthropology. London: Tavistock.Google Scholar
Meggitt, M. J. 1965 The Lineage System of the Mae-enga. Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd.Google Scholar
Mitchell, J. Clyde 1965 ‘Theoretical orientations in African urban studies,’ in Banton, M. (ed.) The Social Anthropology of Complex Societies. ASA Monographs 4. London: Tavistock.Google Scholar
Moore, Sally Falk 1969 ‘Descent and legal position,’ in Nader, L. (ed.) Law in Culture and Society. Chicago: Aldine.Google Scholar
Needham, Rodney 1974 ‘Prescription,’ Oceania 43: 166–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Parsons, Talcott 1951 The Social System. Glenco: The Free Press.Google Scholar
Sahlins, Marshall D. 1965 ‘On the sociology of primitive exchange,’ in Banton, M. (ed.) The Relevance of Models for Social Anthropology. ASA Monographs 1. London: Tavistock.Google Scholar
Scheffler, H. W. 1966 ‘Ancestor worship in anthropology: or observations on descent and descent groups,’ Current Anthropology 7: 541–51.Google Scholar
Schneider, David 1967 ‘Kinship and culture: descent and filiation as cultural constructs,’ Southwestern Journal of Anthropology 23: 65–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Strathern, Andrew 1968 ‘Descent and alliance in the New Guinea Highlands: some problems of comparison,’ Proceedings of the Royal Anthropological Institute for 1968. 37–53.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Strathern, Andrew 1972 One Father, One Blood. Canberra: Australian National University Press.Google Scholar
Strathern, Andrew 1973 ‘Kinship, descent, and locality: some New Guinea examples,’ in Goody, J. (ed.) The Character of Kinship. London: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Wagner, Roy 1967 The Curse of Souw. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar