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Tears of Rain: Ethnicity and History in Central Western Zambia -- book offer |
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ONCE UNAFFORDABLE (£45), NOW AVAILABLE PRACTICALLY FREE OF CHARGE:
By special arrangement with the publishers, Kegan Paul International, London/Boston, we are able to make you a very special offer of an internationally acclaimed contribution to African Studies and to oral-historical method for the study of the pre-literate past
TEARS OF RAIN
Ethnicity and History in Central Western Zambia
Wim van Binsbergen
HARDBACK EDITION!
published in 1992 by Kegan Paul
International Limited
PO Box 256, London WC1B 3SW, United Kingdom
Binsbergen, Wim van
London [etc.]: Kegan Paul International, 1992.— (Monographs from the African Studies Centre, Leiden).—With index, bibliography, illustrations, tables, 495 pp.
ISBN 90-5448-014-9
An exclusively Zambian, low-price paperback edition was published in 1994 by arrangement with the original publishers (Kegan Paul International), the African Studies Centre (Leiden) and the Zabian Education Publishing House; it is now out of print
TEARS OF RAIN. This study of the Nkoya people in central western Zambia examines the fascinating ways in which ethnicity both creates and feeds upon, ethno-history. It also assesses the possibility of reconstructing objective historical processes in that region since the sixteenth century A.D. The work sheds an unexpected light on the southern periphery of the Lunda political culture, on the nature of political relations in the eastern periphery of Barotseland in the nineteenth century, the role of gender relations in state formation, the redefinition of African political leadership in the context of the colonial and post-colonial state, and the impact of colonial, Christian and academic conceptualisations regarding popular modes of history in Africa.
Above all, this is a book about that fundamental act of scholarship — reading. Specifically, the reading of works of literate ethno-history which form an increasingly important category of sources for modern African historiography. Tears of Rain is largely based upon one such source the extensive and brilliant Likota lya Bankoya. In his analysis, van Binsbergen addresses himself to the questions of how the reading of such sources is to be informed by anthropological theory, by oral and documentary sources from the region, and by techniques of close reading and linguistic analysis seldom applied in Africanist social-science discourse.
for bio-bibliographical details on the author, see vitae and list of publications in this Website
APPRAISALS FROM THE INTERNATIONAL AUTHORITATIVE JOURNALS IN THIS FIELD:
‘van Binsbergen has something fundamental to say to historians and anthropologists in general, and not just to those who are specialised in Central Africa. To the latter, however, this work is both manna from heaven and a succulent bone for future contention... May his example be followed!’ (Jan Vansina, Anthropos)
‘a model contribution to our understanding of African ethnicity and history’ (Robert Papstein, Journal of African History)
‘this is an extraordinary and beautiful book -- a monument to ‘‘an irresponsibly large number of years’’ (p. xvii) of detailed and painstaking scholarship’ (James Ferguson, Africa)
SPECIAL OFFER
The publishers, Kegan Paul International, London/Boston, have cleared their stocks, and by special arrangement with them we are able to make you a very special offer:
Tears of Rain is now being given away free
however, in order to cover the costs of administration and postage we have to charge you Dfl 25.-- (US$ 14.--; Euro 12.--) for each copy
Kindly order this book from:
the Publications Officer
Mr Karl Dorrepaal
African Studies Centre
P.O. Box 9555
2300 RB Leiden
THE NETHERLANDS
tel: 00-31-71-5273372
fax: 00-31-71-5273344
e-mail: dorrepaal@fsw.leidenuniv.nl
or contact the author personally at: vabin@multiweb.nl
Table of contents
Preface and acknowledgements
Part I. Tears Of Rain: Ethnicity And History In Central Western Zambia 1
Chapter 1. The contemporary point of departure: The Nkoya-speaking people and their chiefs, p. 3
- 1.1. The Nkoya
- 1.2. Nkoya subgroups and the recent process of their ethnic convergence
- 1.3. The major Nkoya chiefs and their political environment today
Chapter 2. The LIKOTA LYA BANKOYA manuscript, p. 53
- 2.1 History of the Likota lya Bankoya manuscript
- 2.2 Likota lya Bankoya as belonging to a genre of
- 2.3. Reconstructing the original manuscript
- 2.4. Editing the reconstructed manuscript
- 2.5. Problems of translation
Chapter 3. Historical criticism of LIKOTA LYA BANKOYA, p. 99
- 3.1. The apologetic intention of Likota lya Bankoya
- 3.2. The quest for authority
- 3.3. Shimunika s possible biases
- 3.4. The ultimate test: the confrontation of Likota lya Bankoya with unprocessed oral data from central western Zambia
- 3.5. Likota lya Bankoya as literature and as myth
Chapter 4. State formation in central western Zambia as depicted in LIKOTA LYA BANKOYA, p. 155
- 4.1. The pre-state situation
- 4.2. The emergence of the institution of Wene
- 4.3. The emergence of states
- 4.4. Male usurpation of Wene
- 4.5. Changes in local branches of production under male initiative
Chapter 5. State and society in nineteenth-century central western Zambia: Regalia legal aspects, ideology and gender, p. 197
- 5.1. Regalia: A male prerogative?
- 5.2. Some legal aspects of Nkoya states
- 5.3. Towards a male ideological perspective
- 5.4 The changing kinship roles of women
- 5.5. Contested patrilineal succession of the Kahare kingship around 1900: Shamamano, Kambotwe and Timuna
- 5.6. Another look at the seniority contest between the Kahare and Mutondo titles
Chapter 6. LIKOTA LYA BANKOYA as cosmology and as history Aspects of Nkoya symbolism and its transformations, p. 239
- 6.1. Theoretical and methodological orientation
- 6.2. Identifying Likota lya Bankoya’s symbolic structure
- 6.3. Identifying transformations in Likota lya Bankoya
- 6.4. From transformations to history
- 6.5. Beyond Religious Change in Zambia: The religious transformation of women’s political power
- 6.6. Conclusion: history out of myth
Part II. Likota lya Bankoya: Edited Nkoya Text 269
Part III. The History Of The Nkoya People English Translation 349
Part IV. Reference Material 419
Appendix 1. A description of the constituent parts of the LIKOTA LYA BANKOYA manuscript
Appendix 2. Variants of the LIKOTA LYA BANKOYA manuscript
Appendix 3. Genealogies constructed on the basis of the text of LIKOTA LYA BANKOYA
Appendix 4. List of published texts in the Nkoya language
Appendix 5. List of oral sources
Appendix 6. List of archival sources and district files consulted
Appendix 7. Zinkena in western Zambia in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries
References cited
Author index
Subject index
SPECIAL OFFER
The publishers, Kegan Paul International, London/Boston, have cleared their stocks, and by special arrangement with them we are able to make you a special offer:
Tears of Rain is now being given away free
however, in order to cover the costs of administration and postage we have to charge you Dfl 25.-- (US$ 14.--; Euro 12.--) for each copy
Kindly order this book from:
the Publications Officer
Mr Karl Dorrepaal
African Studies Centre
P.O. Box 9555
2300 RB Leiden
THE NETHERLANDS
tel: 00-31-71-5273372
fax: 00-31-71-5273344
or contact the author personally
page last modified: 18-03-02