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THE DYNAMICS OF FIELDWORK AMONG THE TALENSI: MEYER FORTES IN NORTHERN GHANA, 1934–7

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 October 2013

Abstract

This article examines the encounter between the social anthropologist Meyer Fortes and his wife Sonia, on the one hand, and the Talensi people of northern Ghana, on the other, in the years 1934–7. Based in large part on the Forteses’ extensive corpus of recently archived field notes, diaries and other papers, it argues that the quotidian dynamics of that encounter were in many ways quite different from those of Talensi social life as enshrined in Meyer's famous published monographs. Far from entering a timeless world of enduring clanship and kinship, the Forteses grappled with a society struggling to come to terms with the forces of colonial change. The focus is on the couple's shifting relationship with two dominant figures in the local political landscape in the 1930s: Tongrana Nambiong, the leading Talensi chief and their host in the settlement of Tongo, and Golibdaana Tengol, a wealthy ritual entrepreneur who dominated access on the part of ‘stranger’ pilgrims to the principal oracular shrine in the adjacent Tong Hills. These two bitter rivals were, by local standards, commanding figures – yet both emerge as psychologically complex characters riddled with anxiety, unease and self-doubt. The ethnographic archive is thereby shown to offer the possibility of a more intimate history of the interior lives of non-literate African peoples on remote colonial frontiers who often passed under the radar of the state and its documentary regime.

Résumé

Cet article examine la rencontre entre l'anthropologue social Meyer Fortes et sa femme Sonia, d'une part, et les Talensi du Nord du Ghana, d'autre part, de 1934 à 1937. S'appuyant largement sur l'important corpus de notes de terrain, journaux et autres documents récemment archivés des Fortes, il soutient que la dynamique quotidienne de cette rencontre était à bien des égards très différente de celle de la vie sociale des Talensi consacrée par les célèbres monographies publiées de Meyer. Loins de pénétrer dans un monde intemporel de clans et de parentés, les Fortes découvraient une société s'accommodant difficilement des forces du changement colonial. L'accent est mis sur la relation changeante du couple avec deux personnages dominants du paysage politique local des années 1930 : Tongrana Nambiong, principal chef talensi et hôte des Fortes à Tongo, et Golibdaana Tengol, riche entrepreneur rituel qui maîtrisait l'accès au principal sanctuaire oraculaire de la région voisine des Tong Hills par les pèlerins « étrangers ». Ces deux grands rivaux étaient à l’échelle locale des personnes imposantes qui apparaissent pourtant comme des personnages psychologiquement complexes en proie à l'anxiété, au malaise et au doute. L'article montre par là-même que les archives ethnographiques offrent la possibilité d'une histoire plus intime de l'existence intérieure de peuples africains analphabètes sur des frontières coloniales reculées qui échappaient souvent à l'attention de l’État et à son régime documentaire.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 2013 

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