Strength beyond structure : social and historical trajectories of agency in Africa

This book explores the notion of agency in a range of empirical situations in Africa. It emphasizes the possibilities individuals and social groups perceive when faced with the constraints that tend to mark African social life. Contributions: Social and historical trajectories of agency in Africa: an introduction (Rijk van Dijk, Mirjam de Bruijn and Jan-Bart Gewald); Manchester as the birth place of modern agency research: the Manchester School explained from the perspective of Evans-Pritchard's book 'The Nuer' (Wim van Binsbergen); Dreams and agency during Angola's war of independence (Inge Brinkman); Chief Hosea Kutako: a Herero royal and Namibian nationalist's life against confinement 1870-1970 (Jan-Bart Gewald); Agency in Kapsiki religion: a comparative approach (Wouter van Beek); Les enveloppes pour Papa Daniel: la transformation des relations domestiques dans les m nages des Congolais de la diaspora (Julie Ndaya); From individual act to social agency in San trance rituals (Thomas Widlok); The dynamics of families, their work and provisioning strategies in the changing economies in the urban townships of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe (Otrude N. Moyo); Images of Africa: agency and nature conservation in South Africa (Malcolm Draper, Marja Spierenburg and Harry Wels); Solitary births in T ra, Niger: a local quest for safety (Gertie Janssen); Agency in and from the margins: street children and youth in N'Djam na, Chad (Mirjam de Bruijn); Negotiating the memory of Fulbe hierarchy among mobile elite women (Lotte Pelckmans); The safe and suffering body in transnational Ghanaian Pentecostalism: towards an anthropology of vulnerable agency (Rijk van Dijk); Epilogue: theorizing agency in and on Africa: the questions are key (Francis B. Nyamnjoh). [ASC Leiden abstract]