Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rcrh6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T18:57:33.025Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Primary Patriotism, Shifting Identity: Hometown Associations in Manyu Division, South-West Cameroon

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 May 2011

Martin Evans
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

People's participation in hometown associations reveals a deep sense of belonging to their home place. It has been argued that promotion of this ‘primary patriotism’ by associations is potentially divisive as it may engender parochialism, increase the focus on autochthony, and enhance ethnicization of the political landscape. Contrasting views, however, do not see hometown associations as necessarily inimical to wider social and political cohesion, but as potential sites for civic engagement and citizenship formation at different levels, reflecting the shifting identity that individuals hold. The article explores these issues among the two main tiers of association in Manyu Division, South-West Province, Cameroon. It briefly describes their history and activities, then considers how the identities mobilizing them are constructed in three interlinked ways: geohistorical and genealogical; neotraditional; and national political. It concludes that while these associations occasionally engage in divisive politics in different spheres, analysis needs to balance this against their other activities and relationships. Most hometown associations continue in their original, social role of mutual support among rural–urban migrants, although their expansion into development at home has had more mixed results. Furthermore, concerns about parochialism are often hard to reconcile with the multiple levels of associational life observed.

La participation populaire dans les associations de ressortissants révèle un sens profond d'appartenance au lieu d'origine. Certains soutiennent que la promotion de ce « patriotisme primaire » par les associations a le potentiel de diviser car susceptible d'engendrer le provincialisme, de renforcer l'attention sur l'autochtonie et d'ethniciser le paysage politique encore davantage. D'autres, en revanche, ne considèrent pas les associations de ressortissants comme nécessairement contraires à la cohésion sociale et politique plus large, mais comme des lieux potentiels d'engagement civique et de formation de la citoyenneté à différents niveaux, reflétant l'identité changeante des personnes. L'article examine ces questions au sein des deux principaux niveaux d'association dans le département camerounais de Manyu, dans la province du Sud-Ouest. Il décrit brièvement leur historique et leurs activités, puis s'intéresse à la construction des identités qui les mobilisent, qui s'articule en trois volets interconnectés : géohistorique et généalogique ; néotraditionnel ; et politique national. Il conclut que, même s'il est vrai que ces associations s'engagent parfois dans des activités politiques qui divisent dans différentes sphères, l'analyse doit mettre cet aspect en balance avec leurs autres activités et relations. La plupart des associations de ressortissants poursuivent leur rôle social initial de soutien mutuel au sein de la population migrante rurale-urbaine, bien que leur rôle étendu de développement dans le lieu d'origine ait eu des résultats mitigés. De plus, les craintes de provincialisme sont difficiles à concilier avec les niveaux de vie associative multiples observés.

Type
Research Articles
Information
Africa , Volume 80 , Issue 3 , August 2010 , pp. 397 - 425
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 2010

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Amaazee, V. B. (1990) ‘The “Igbo scare” in the British Cameroons, c. 1945–61’, Journal of African History 31 (2): 281–93.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anderson, B. (1991) Imagined Communities: reflections on the origins and spread of nationalism. London: Verso.Google Scholar
de Jong, F. (1997) ‘The production of translocality: initiation in the sacred grove in South Senegal’, Focaal 30/31: 61–83.Google Scholar
de Jong, F. (1999) ‘Trajectories of a mask performance: the case of the Senegalese kumpo’, Cahier d'études africaines 39 (153): 49–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Englund, H. (2004) ‘Introduction: recognizing identities, imagining alternatives’ in Englund, H. and Nyamnjoh, F. B. (eds), Rights and the Politics of Recognition in Africa. London: Zed Books.Google Scholar
Fisiy, C. and Goheen, M. (1998) ‘Power and the quest for recognition: neotraditional titles among the new elite in Nso, Cameroon’, Africa 68 (3): 383–402.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fonchingong, C. C. (2005) ‘Exploring the politics of identity and ethnicity in state reconstruction in Cameroon’, Social Identities 11 (4): 363–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Foucher, V. (2002) ‘Les “évolués”, la migration, l'école: pour une nouvelle interprétation de la naissance du nationalisme casamançais’ in Diop, M. C. (ed.), Le Sénégal contemporain. Paris: Karthala.Google Scholar
Geschiere, P. (2004) ‘Ecology, belonging and xenophobia: the 1994 forest law in Cameroon and the issue of “community”’ in Englund, H. and Nyamnjoh, F. B. (eds), Rights and the Politics of Recognition in Africa. London: Zed Books.Google Scholar
Geschiere, P. and Gugler, J. (1998) ‘The urban-rural connection: changing issues of belonging and identification’, Africa 68 (3): 309–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gugler, J. (1991) ‘Life in a dual system revisited: urban-rural ties in Enugu, Nigeria, 1961–87’, World Development 19 (5): 399–409.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gugler, J. (2002) ‘The son of the hawk does not remain abroad: the urban-rural connection in Africa’, African Studies Review 45 (1): 21–41.Google Scholar
Hagberg, S. (2004) ‘Ethnic identification in voluntary associations: the politics of development and culture in Burkina Faso’ in Englund, H. and Nyamnjoh, F. B. (eds), Rights and the Politics of Recognition in Africa. London: Zed Books.Google Scholar
Hickey, S. (2004) ‘“Hometown associations” as social movements for citizenship: a case study from north-west Cameroon’. Revised version of paper presented at 47th Annual Meeting of the African Studies Association, New Orleans LA, 11–14 November 2004.Google Scholar
Ishemo, S. (2002) ‘From Africa to Cuba: an historical analysis of the Sociedad Secreta Abakuá (Ñañiguismo)’, Review of African Political Economy 29 (92): 253–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Konings, P. (1993) Labour Resistance in Cameroon: managerial strategies and labour resistance in the agro-industrial plantations of the Cameroon Development Corporation. Leiden: Afrika-Studiecentrum; London: James Currey.Google Scholar
Konings, P. and Nyamnjoh, F. B. (2003) Negotiating an Anglophone Identity: a study of the politics of recognition and representation in Cameroon. Leiden: Brill.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lambert, M. C. (2002) Longing for Exile: migration and the making of a translocal community in Senegal, West Africa. Portsmouth NH: Heinemann.Google Scholar
Mbuagbaw, T. E. (1998) Kenyang Lexicon. Mamfe: Society for Kenyang Literature; Yaoundé: Cameroon Association for Bible Translation and Literacy.Google Scholar
MECA-Yaoundé (1996) ‘Manyu Elements Cultural Association MECA-Yaoundé: Constitution'. Mimeo.Google Scholar
Mercer, C., Page, B. and Evans, M. (2008) Development and the African Diaspora: place and the politics of home. London: Zed Books.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Michels, S. (2004) Imagined Power Contested: Germans and Africans in the Upper Cross River Area of Cameroon, 1887–1915. London: Lit Verlag.Google Scholar
Mohan, G. (2006) ‘Embedded cosmopolitanism and the politics of obligation: the Ghanaian diaspora and development’, Environment and Planning A 38 (5): 867–83.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mohan, G. and S. Hickey (2004) ‘Relocating participation within a radical politics of development: critical modernism and citizenship’ in Hickey, S. and Mohan, G. (eds), Participation: from tyranny to transformation. London: Zed Books.Google Scholar
Niger-Thomas, M. (2000) ‘Buying Futures’: the upsurge of female entrepreneurship: crossing the formal and informal divide in southwest Cameroon. Leiden: CNWS, Leiden University.Google Scholar
Nkwi, P. N. (1997) ‘Rethinking the role of elites in rural development: a case study from Cameroon’, Journal of Contemporary African Studies 15 (1): 67–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ntai Egbe Areng Elements Cultural Association Yaoundé (n.d.) ‘Ntai Egbe Areng rules and regulations: Yaoundé branch’. Mimeo.Google Scholar
Nyamnjoh, F. B. (1999) ‘Cameroon: a country united by ethnic ambition and difference’, African Affairs 98 (390): 101–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nyamnjoh, F. B. (2005) ‘Images of Nyongo amongst Bamenda Grassfielders in Whiteman Kontri’, Citizenship Studies 9 (3): 241–69.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nyamnjoh, F. B. (2006) Insiders and Outsiders: citizenship and xenophobia in contemporary Southern Africa. London: Zed Books.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nyamnjoh, F. B. (2007) ‘“Ever diminishing circles”: the paradoxes of belonging in Botswana’ in de la Cadena, M. and Starn, O. (eds), Indigenous Experience Today. Oxford: Berg.Google Scholar
Nyamnjoh, F. B. and Rowlands, M. (1998) ‘Elite associations and the politics of belonging in Cameroon’, Africa 68 (3): 320–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Page, B. (2000) ‘“A Priceless Commodity”: the production of water in Anglophone Cameroon 1916–1999'. DPhil thesis, University of Oxford.Google Scholar
Page, B. (2003) ‘Communities as the agents of commodification: the Kumbo Water Authority in Northwest Cameroon’, Geoforum 34 (4): 483–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Page, B. (2007) ‘Slow going: the mortuary, modernity and the home-town association in Bali-Nyonga, Cameroon’, Africa 77 (3): 419–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Potts, D. (2000a) ‘Urban unemployment and migrants in Africa: evidence from Harare 1985–1994’, Development and Change 31 (4): 879–910.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Potts, D. (2000b) ‘Worker-peasants and farmer-housewives in Africa: the debate about “committed” farmers, access to land and agricultural production’, Journal of Southern African Studies 26 (4): 807–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Potts, D. (2005) ‘Urban growth and urban economies in Eastern and Southern Africa: trends and prospects’ in Bryceson, D. F. and Potts, D. (eds), African Urban Economies: viability, vitality or vitiation? Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Röschenthaler, U. (2004) ‘Transacting obasinjom: the dissemination of a cult agency in the Cross River area’, Africa 74 (2): 241–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruel, M. J. (1956) ‘Banyang secret societies’, Man 56 (January): 8–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruel, M. J. (1962) ‘Banyang settlements, Part II: change of settlement and later developments’, Man 62 (August): 115–19.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruel, M. J. (1964) ‘The modern adaptation of associations among the Banyang of the West Cameroon’, Southwestern Journal of Anthropology 20 (1): 1–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ruel, M. J. (1969) Leopards and Leaders: constitutional politics among a Cross River people. London: Tavistock.Google Scholar
Trager, L. (1998) ‘Home-town linkages and local development in southwestern Nigeria: whose agenda? What impact?’, Africa 68 (3): 360–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
van den Bersselaar, D. (2005) ‘Imagining home: migration and the Igbo village in colonial Nigeria’, Journal of African History 46 (1): 51–73.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Vertovec, S. and R. Cohen (2002) ‘Introduction: conceiving cosmopolitanism’ in Vertovec, S. and Cohen, R. (eds), Conceiving Cosmopolitanism: theory, context, and practice. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar