Forests of Belonging (e-book) (used book) | bookbook.eu

Description

Forests of Belonging examines the history and ongoing transformation of ethnic and social relationships among four distinct communities - Bangando, Baka, Bakwéle, and Mbomam - in the Lobéké forest region of southeastern Cameroon. Researchers and practitioners alike typically view these groups as distinct, and divide them into the opposed categories "hunter-gatherer" and "farmer," or "pygmy" and "villager." But far from conforming to simplified, dichotomous classifications, these diverse communities engage in manifold social, ecological, and political relationships, and identify self and other in multiple and shifting ways.

Basing her analysis on more than two years of ethnographic field research, Stephanie Rupp focuses on the Bangando community, a group that has been targeted, and sometimes vilified, by development, conservation, and missionary activities, but about whom little is known. Through rich descriptive detail, she illustrates the complexity of social ties among groups and individuals, and their connections with the natural world. Rupp demonstrates that social and ethnoecological relations in equatorial African forests are nuanced, contested, and shifting, and that the intricacy of these links must be considered in the design and implementation of aid policies and strategies for conservation and development.