The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
Today's winner of the "most contrived discussion of Occupy Wall Street" award is brought to you courtesy of Arts & Letters Daily: It's all about the people of Betafo, you see:
It was on this island nation off the coast of Africa that David Graeber, one of the movement's early organizers, who has been called one of its main intellectual sources, spent 20 months between 1989 and 1991. He studied the people of Betafo, a community of descendants of nobles and of slaves, for his 2007 book, Lost People.
Betafo was "a place where the state picked up stakes and left," says Mr. Graeber, an ethnographer, anarchist, and reader in anthropology at the University of London's Goldsmiths campus.
I do not think we should neglect the obvious influence upon this movement of the festival for Inana at Nippur in the late Sargonic period. It's all so Ur-III. And who could fail to discern the echos of the early Tudor enclosure riots? Not I.
- Comment (14)
- · Quote
- · UnfollowFollow (1)
Comments :
Jul '10
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
I thought it was more along the Teutonic idiom where, after three straight years of misfortune, they would kill their king in a ritual sacrifice and eat his remains to consume the bad luck. Throw in a cricket test and it develops a pan-Continental flavor adored in all the more sinister institutions.
May '10
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
The movement, such as it is, could learn much from the ciompi riots in quattrocento Firenze and the Yellow Turban rebellion against the Han Dynasty. Though they seem to draw more inspiration from The Walking Dead.
May '10
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
Anthropology: Two years in the field, the balance of life as a tedious bore.
Mar '11
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
Oh, man, don't do this to me. I've been observing these Occupy Wherever doofusses (doofi?) for about a month and I watched Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf followed by a Chicago Bears press conference yesterday and my absurdism quota is already exhausted! And I need all that for the status meeting I have today where I have to tell the suits that we are going to be able to budget for the remediation of problems with the software that we haven't yet detected because we haven't written the software yet because the hardware is late.
It is absurdism, right? Because if it's not, I might have already crossed over to the other side of the looking glass and will need to consider a career change.
Are there any Lutheran monasteries?
Sep '11
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
Whoa, Claire!
Check your calendar--April Fool's Day isn't until, well, April.
...I mean, this is a joke, right?
May '10
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
Anyone remember Margaret Mead's sojourn among some Islanders in the South Pacific that "proved" that western sexual mores was unnatural and unhealthy?
Reminds me of a line from Newman: "They are forever searching for some fabulous primitive simplicity: we repose in catholic fullness."
Edited on Oct 17, 2011 at 6:14amMar '11
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
Some ideas are so stupid that only an intellectual could believe them. (Perhaps the best line attributed to Orwell.)
May '10
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
Lucky Graeber did not base his study on that other great success of freed slaves, the disaster that is Liberia, or Zimbabwe, or either of the Congoes, or..., well you get the point.
(I wish Liberia's Madam President Sirleaf the best of luck, perhaps a women will provide honest and sensible leadership after decades of Big Man politicians/looters)
Aug '10
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
Percival:
Are there any Lutheran monasteries? · Oct 17 at 5:02am
Dunno. But there are plenty of Lutheran convents.
Aug '10
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
This isn't fair to Graeber and is a bit like saying that Steven Pinker only knows about lab work measuring how toddlers learn to work. That is, you have someone who started out as a specialist but has developed into a generalist. Graeber may have done his fieldwork in a particular place but he has since written a broad history summarizing all of economic anthropology and history. I've read a few short essays and heard him interviewed a few times and I'm very much looking forward to reading his book, even though I completely disagree with his policy platform.
Aug '10
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
[duplicate comment deleted]
Edited on Oct 17, 2011 at 12:10pmDec '10
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
However, Claire, who can underestimate the importance of EMPEROR OF THE RINO'S. His stately pleasure dome NYC. He protects his lowly subjects from salt and colesteral. Of course the enforcement of laws on OWS he simply ignores. Anarchists and Drug Addicts why what a pleasant crowd surely they wouldn't scream at passers by any explitive out loud. The park is for the taxpayers a humble lot, many of them work for a living of course the OWS does not. We should not bother his Imperial Highness to enforce the laws he has lots lawyers to invent excuses after all thats what they are for.
Jan '11
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
That's awfully Eurocentric of you.
Aug '10
Re: The Ethnography of Central Madagascar: Why Didn't I Think of That?
PS, as another example of a specialist turned generalist that's a little closer to home, I would hardly say that VDH is unqualified to comment on modern defense posture because his original academic work was on the military, economic, and social role of the hoplite in classical Greece.