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

Keese, Alexander

ISBN 10: 9004307346 / ISBN 13: 9789004307346

Published by Brill, 2015

About this Item

Unread book in perfect condition.

Seller Inventory # 24831819

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Ethnicity and the Colonial State : Finding and Representing Group Identifications in a Coastal West African and Global Perspective (1850?1960)
• Publisher: Brill
• Publication Date: 2015
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 9004307346
• ISBN 13: 9789004307346
• Binding: Hardcover
• Condition: As New

About this title

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.

About the Author

Alexander Keese, Ph.D. (University of Freiburg, Germany, 2004), is SNSF Professor at the Université de Genève, Switzerland. He is the author of Living with Ambiguity: Integrating an African Elite in French and Portuguese Africa, 1930–61 (Stuttgart: Steiner, 2007).