Magendo: Arbitrage and Ambiguity on an East African Frontier

This article examines the ambiguities of arbitrage, focusing on illegal coffee trade across the Uganda-Kenya border. I show how residents of the borderlands harnessed ordinary tools (gunny sacks, tin cans, and gravity scales) and cultural repertoires (kinship, language, and ritual) to cultivate and capitalize on difference. They reworked territorial jurisdiction, measurement standards, and surface appearances in a form of arbitrage known as magendo. While magendo is an ordinary occurrence at the border, I focus on a particular period in which magendo reached spectacular new levels. The resulting binge economy was characterized by competitive gift-giving and interethnic conviviality, but its excessive margins eventually challenged prevailing notions of moral selfhood, gender relations, and the authority of elder men. Seeing arbitrage not merely as the reserve of high finance but also as a strategy of African frontiers provides a way to connect the anthropology of finance to enduring concerns around the postcolonial politics of borders, gerontocracy, and value. Muhtasari Nakala hii inachunguza utata wa arbitrage. Maandishi yangu yanazingatia biashara wa kahawa mpakani mwa Kenya na Uganda. Katika nakala hii, ninaonyesha jinsi wakazi wa mipakani walitumia zana za kila siku (magunia, madebe, na mizani) na pia mbinu za kitamaduni (ukoo, lugha, na mila) kuzalisha na kukuza tofauti za kisokoni na faida. Aidha wahusika hawa walipinda na kufinyanga dhana kuhusu udhibiti wa mipaka, desturi za kukadiri, na muonekano wa nje kwa kupitia kitendo cha arbitrage: almaarufu kama magendo. Ingawa uchukuzi magendo si taratibu geni kwa uchumi za mipakani, nakala hii inazingatia wakati ambapo uchuuzi wa kahawa ulifikia kilele cha kustaajabisha na kuleta uchumi wa ukwasi. Kwa upande moja msimu huo ulileta urafiki kati ya jamii tofauti na mienendo kama vile mashindano ya kutunukiana zawadi. Kwa upande mwingine, faida za kiajabu ziliibua miangalio mipya kuhusu maswala ya uadilifubinafsi, jinsia katika jamii, na mamlaka ya wazee. Kuelewa arbitrage kama zaidi ya mazoezi ya kifedha, bali pia kama mkakati wa uchumi za mapembezoni, inatupa njia ya kuunganisha anthropolojia ya fedha na masawali ya mipaka baada ya ukoloni, utawala wa wakongwe, na thamani.

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KENYA: TWENDAPI?: RE-READING ABDILATIF ABDALLA'S PAMPHLET FIFTY YEARS AFTER INDEPENDENCE

Africa ◽

10.1017/s0001972015000996 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 86 (1) ◽

pp. 1-32 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Kai Kresse

Keyword(s):

English Translation ◽

Turning Point ◽

Family Members ◽

Political Context ◽

The Political ◽

East African ◽

Political Activist ◽

Work And Life ◽

Postcolonial Politics

ABSTRACTThe pamphletKenya: Twendapi?(Kenya: Where are we heading?) is a text often referred to but rarely read or analysed. Abdilatif Abdalla wrote it as a twenty-two-year-old political activist of the KPU opposition as a critique of the dictatorial tendencies of Jomo Kenyatta and his KANU government in 1968, and consequently suffered three years of isolation in prison. Many (at least on the East African political and literary scene) know aboutKenya: Twendapi?but few seem to have read it – indeed, it seems almost unavailable to read. This contribution toAfrica's Local Intellectuals series provides a summary reconstruction of its main points and arguments, and a contextual discussion of the text. This is combined with the first published English translation (overseen by Abdalla himself) and a reprint of the original Swahili text, an important but almost inaccessible document. The article proceeds with a perspective first on the political context in Kenya at the time – an early turning point in postcolonial politics – and second on the work and life of its author, Abdilatif Abdalla who had been trained as a Swahili poet by elder family members who were poets. As most students of Swahili literature know, Abdalla's collection of poetrySauti ya Dhiki(1973) originated in the prison cell but they know little about the pamphletKenya: Twendapi?, nor the circumstances of its authorship. Part of my wider point for discussion is that Abdalla, as an engaged poet and political activist, can be usefully understood as a local intellectual who transcended the local from early on – topically and through global references and comparisons, but also through his experience in prison and exile. Concerns about Kenyan politics and Swahili literature have remained central to his life. This reflects Abdalla's continued and overarching connectedness to the Swahili-speaking region. Abdalla wrote in Swahili and was deeply familar with local Swahili genres and discursive conventions, language and verbal specifications (of critique, of emotions, of reflections) that use the whole range and depth of Kimvita, the Mombasan dialect of Kiswahili, as a reservoir of expression.

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In the Shadow of Kilimanjaro

In the Field ◽

10.1525/california/9780520289611.003.0012 ◽

2018 ◽

pp. 201-220

Author(s):

George Gmelch ◽

Sharon Bohn Gmelch

Keyword(s):

Developing Country ◽

Gender Relations ◽

Well Being ◽

East African ◽

Power Outages ◽

African City ◽

Mountain Climbing ◽

Mount Kilimanjaro ◽

Sense Of Time ◽

And Gender

This chapter describes the experiences of anthropology students in the East African city of Moshi, Tanzania. Moshi, located on the lower slopes of Mount Kilimanjaro and home to the Chagga people, is a center for mountain climbing and wildlife tourism. The students live with local families and cope with the challenges of life in an developing country--frequent power outages, hazardous traffic, malaria-carrying mosquitos, poverty, and a different sense of time and gender relations—which pose problems for their health, psychological well-being, and research objectives. They adapt and, in the process, reassess some of their own values.

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PASTORALISM, PATRIARCHY AND HISTORY: CHANGING GENDER RELATIONS AMONG MAASAI IN TANGANYIKA, 1890–1940

The Journal of African History ◽

10.1017/s0021853798007397 ◽

1999 ◽

Vol 40 (1) ◽

pp. 41-65 ◽

Cited By ~ 38

Author(s):

DOROTHY L. HODGSON

Keyword(s):

Gender Relations ◽

Scholarly Work ◽

Human Beings ◽

East African ◽

Male And Female ◽

Lower Status ◽

The Status ◽

Pastoral Mode ◽

Historical Examination ◽

Mode Of Production

DESPITE the substantial and significant body of scholarly work on changing gender relations among African peoples who are (or were) primarily cultivators, the gender relations of predominantly pastoralist peoples have been, with a few notable exceptions, curiously excluded from historical examination. Instead, despite work which has shown the complexities of trying to determine the ‘status’ of East African pastoralist women, pastoralist gender relations seem to exist outside of history and be immune to change. Earlier anthropological studies that addressed pastoral gender relations applied a synchronic model, analyzing them in terms of either the pastoral mode of production or pastoralist ideology. Harold Schneider, for example, contended that among East African pastoralists, men's control of livestock gave them control of women, who were ‘usually thoroughly subordinated to men and thus unable to establish independent identity as a production force’. In his rich ethnography of Matapato Maasai, Paul Spencer claimed that both male and female Maasai believe in ‘the undisputed right of men to own women as “possessions” ’. Marriage, in his view, was therefore ‘the transfer of a woman as a possession from her father who reared her to her husband who rules her’. Melissa Llewelyn-Davies' study of Loita Maasai women in Kenya corroborated Spencer's findings. Loita Maasai women perceived themselves, and were perceived, as ‘property’, to be bought and sold by men with bridewealth. Llewelyn-Davis argued that ‘elder patriarchs’ used their control of property rights in women, children and livestock to control the production and reproduction of both livestock and human beings. Similarly, in his symbolic analysis of pastoral Maasai ideology, John Galaty contended that Maasai men were the ‘real’ pastoralists, while Maasai women were negatively equated with lower status hunters, providing an ideological explanation for their lower status. Thus, whether they attributed their findings to material or ideological sources (or some combination of the two), few anthropologists questioned the ‘undisputed right’ of contemporary male pastoralists ‘to own women as possessions’.

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Scanning electron microscopy of the integument of schistosoma rodhaini

Proceedings, annual meeting, Electron Microscopy Society of America ◽

10.1017/s042482010014230x ◽

1986 ◽

Vol 44 ◽

pp. 132-133

Author(s):

P. Evers ◽

C. Schutte ◽

C. D. Dettman

Keyword(s):

Electron Microscopy ◽

Scanning Electron Microscopy ◽

Oral Sucker ◽

Adult Male ◽

Dorsal Surface ◽

Ventral Surface ◽

Sensory Receptors ◽

East African ◽

Dorsal Midline ◽

Scanning Electron

S.rodhaini (Brumpt 1931) is a parasite of East African rodents which may possibly hybridize with the human schistosome S. mansoni. The adult male at maturity measures approximately 3mm long and possesses both oral and ventral suckers and a marked gynaecophoric canal. The oral sucker is surrounded by a ring of sensory receptors with a large number of inwardly-pointing spines set into deep sockets occupying the bulk of the ventral surface of the sucker. Numbers of scattered sensory receptors are found on both dorsal and ventral surfaces of the head (Fig. 1) together with two conspicuous rows of receptors situated symmetrically on each side of the midline. One row extends along the dorsal surface of the head midway between the dorsal midline and the lateral margin.

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International Telesupervision: The Clinical Fellowship Experience

Perspectives of the ASHA Special Interest Groups ◽

10.1044/persp2.sig11.73 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 2 (11) ◽

pp. 73-78

Author(s):

David W. Rule ◽

Lisa N. Kelchner

Keyword(s):

Graduate Students ◽

Clinical Supervision ◽

Rural Areas ◽

The United States ◽

Speech Language Pathology ◽

Access To Services ◽

East African ◽

The World ◽

Language Pathology ◽

National Certification

Telepractice technology allows greater access to speech-language pathology services around the world. These technologies extend beyond evaluation and treatment and are shown to be used effectively in clinical supervision including graduate students and clinical fellows. In fact, a clinical fellow from the United States completed the entire supervised clinical fellowship (CF) year internationally at a rural East African hospital, meeting all requirements for state and national certification by employing telesupervision technology. Thus, telesupervision has the potential to be successfully implemented to address a range of needs including supervisory shortages, health disparities worldwide, and access to services in rural areas where speech-language pathology services are not readily available. The telesupervision experience, potential advantages, implications, and possible limitations are discussed. A brief guide for clinical fellows pursuing telesupervision is also provided.

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