Brill publications

Sabine Marschall (2010)
Landscape of Memory: Commemorative monuments, memorials and public statuary in post-apartheid South-Africa

Publication year: 2010
Series: Afrika-Studiecentrum Series, 15
ISBN-13 (i)The ISBN (International Standard Book Number) has been changed from 10 to 13 digits on 1 January 2007: 978 90 04 17856 4
ISBN-10: 90 04 17856 2
Cover: Paperback
Number of pages: xiv, 410 pp.
List price: € 42.00 / US$ 66.00

Under the aegis of the post-apartheid government, much emphasis has been placed on the transformation and democratisation of the heritage sector in South Africa since 1994. The emergent new landscape of memory relies heavily on commemorative monuments, memorials and statues aimed at reconciliation, nation-building and the creation of a shared public history. But not everyone identifies with these new symbolic markers and their associated interpretation of the past. Drawing on a number of theoretical perspectives, this book critically investigates the flourishing monument phenomenon in South-Africa, the political discourses that fuel it; its impact on identity formation, its potential benefits, and most importantly its ambivalences and contradictions.

Netsayi Noris Mudege(2007)
An Ethnography of Knowledge: The Production of Knowledge in Mupfurudzi Resettlement Scheme, Zimbabwe

Publication year: 2007
Afrika-Studiecentrum Series, 11
ISBN-13: 978 90 04 16168 9
ISBN-10: 90 04 16168 6
Cover: Paperback
Number of pages: xii, 240 pp. 
List price: € 42.00 / US$ 62.00

This book contributes to academic debates on knowledge. A resettlement area with people resettling from different agro-ecological regions with different knowledge and approaches to agriculture and farming provinces provides a fascinating area to investigate how knowledge is produced and socialised. The fact that the resettlement scheme became a melting pot of different knowledge makes the term ‘local’ problematic yet farmers still use and produce knowledge that is considered ‘local’. Of interest is how the gender dynamics, politics, power, conflicts, resistance, religious beliefs and government policies impact on farming knowledge and on farming in general. This book unravels how local knowledge makes use of scientifically based state organised interventions. The book is of interest to policy makers and anyone involved in development studies.

Netsayi Noris Mudege, PhD (2005) in Social Sciences, Wageningen University and Research Centre, works at the African Population and Health Research Center in Nairobi where she is also a post-doctoral fellow. She has lectured at the University of Zimbabwe in the Department of Sociology and at the Women’s University in Africa, Zimbabwe.

Publication year: 2007
Afrika-Studiecentrum Series, 11
ISBN-13: 978 90 04 16168 9
ISBN-10: 90 04 16168 6
Cover: Paperback
Number of pages: xii, 240 pp. 
List price: € 42.00 / US$ 62.00

Paul Hebinck, Peter Lent (eds.) (2007)
Livelihoods and Landscapes: The People of Guquka and Koloni and their Resources

Publication year: 2007
Series: Afrika-Studiecentrum Series, 9
ISBN-13 (i)The ISBN (International Standard Book Number) has been changed from 10 to 13 digits on 1 January 2007: 978 90 04 16169 6
ISBN-10: 90 04 16169 4
Cover: Paperback
Number of pages: xiv, 408 pp. 
List price: € 42.00 / US$ 62.00

Drawing on original data, secondary literature, aerial photographs and archives, this book analyzes changes in the use of the landscape and the nature of rural livelihoods in two South African villages. Taking an interdisciplinary approach on how livelihoods and landscapes in the Eastern Cape link the text provides a comprehensive study of the patterns of land use over time. Three separate chapters focus on cropping and cultivation practices, livestock and foraging as well as the gathering of wild plants. The book gives a vivid picture of the social dynamics and the interaction between ‘urban’ and ‘rural’. It depicts the steady deterioration in agricultural production and the corresponding increase in dependence on social grants and wages. Despite this trend remnants of a peasantry do exist.

Sandra Evers, Marja Spierenburg and Harry Wels (eds.) (2005)
Competing Jurisdictions: Settling Land Claims in Africa

Publication year: 2005
Series: Afrika-Studiecentrum Series, 6
ISBN-13 (i)The ISBN (International Standard Book Number) has been changed from 10 to 13 digits on 1 January 2007: 978 90 04 14780 5
ISBN-10: 90 04 14780 2
Cover: Paperback
Number of pages: viii, 364 pp. 
List price: € 42.00 / US$ 62.00

This book is about the politicking and strife over land between various stakeholders on the African continent, including Madagascar. It is about attempts to control land tenure ‘from above’ and about local manoeuvring between the central government, the local government and grassroots level institutions.

Sandra Evers, Ph.D. in Anthropology, University of Amsterdam, is Assistant Professor at the Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology at VU University Amsterdam. She specialises in South West Indian Ocean Studies, with a particular focus on Madagascar and the Seychelles.

Marja Spierenburg, Ph.D. in Anthropology, University of Amsterdam, is Assistant Professor at the Department of Culture, Organisation and Management at VU University Amsterdam and has published before on natural resource management and spirit possession.

Harry Wels, Ph.D. in Organisational Anthropology, VU University Amsterdam, is Associate Professor at the Department of Culture, Organisation and Management at VU University Amsterdam and has broadly published on issues of organisational co-operation in southern Africa.

Publication year: 2005
Series: Afrika-Studiecentrum Series, 6
ISBN-13 (i)The ISBN (International Standard Book Number) has been changed from 10 to 13 digits on 1 January 2007: 978 90 04 14780 5
ISBN-10: 90 04 14780 2
Cover: Paperback
Number of pages: viii, 364 pp. 
List price: € 42.00 / US$ 62.00

Marja J. Spierenburg (2004)
Strangers, Spirits, and Land Reforms: Conflicts about Land in Dande, Northern Zimbabwe

Publication year: 2004
Series: Afrika-Studiecentrum Series, 3
ISBN-13 (i)The ISBN (International Standard Book Number) has been changed from 10 to 13 digits on 1 January 2007: 978 90 04 13957 2
ISBN-10: 90 04 13957 5
Cover: Paperback
Number of pages: xii, 260 pp. 4 illus.
List price: € 42.00 / US$ 62.00

This book describes efforts by the Zimbabwean government to enforce land reforms on African farmers in northern Zimbabwe. These efforts compounded rather than alleviated the problem of land scarcity for black small-scale farmers, a problem government now allegedly seeks to redress through invasions of white-owned farms. The book describes the similarities between the post-Independence land reforms and those attempted by the Rhodesian regime.
The land reforms in Dande rendered a considerable number of farmers officially landless. The book describes the resulting internal conflicts over land within the communities in Dande as well as the more concerted forms of resistance of these communities vis-a-vis the state. Attention is also given to the role the spirit mediums of the royal ancestors (Mhondoro) played in this resistance.