Becoming the other, being oneself : constructing identities in a connected world / by Iain Walker.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Walker, Iain (Iain Bruce)

Contributor:

ProQuest ebook central.

Frances Baylinson Rosenbluth Fund.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Comorians--Cultural assimilation.

Comorians.

Comorians--Ethnic identity.

Ethnicity.

Assimilation (Sociology).

Grande Comore (Comoros)--Civilization.

Grande Comore (Comoros).

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xv, 285 pages) : illustrations, maps

Place of Publication:

Newcastle upon Tyne : Cambridge Scholars, [2010]

System Details:

text file

Summary:

The island of Ngazidja lies at the southern end of the monsoon wind system and its inhabitants, the Wangazidja, have participated in the trading networks of the Indian Ocean for two millennia. The enduring contacts between the Wangazidja and thentrading partners have subjected them to a variety of social and cultural influences-from the Swahili coast,. from the African hinterland, from the Arabian peninsula, from Indonesia and, more recently, from Europe. This book looks at the strategies called into play by Wangazidja in negotiating this encounter with the outside world; it discusses how they incorporate this variety of influences into their own social and cultural modes of practice while all the time remaining (in the words of one observer) "authentic." Drawing on the work of thinkers such as Theodor Adorno, René Girard and Michael Taussig, the author develops the theoretical concept of mimesis in an analysis of these transformations, increasingly relevant in the contemporary context of globalization, showing how firmly anchored social structures are able to incorporate what seem to be practices imitative of the Other. Book jacket.

Contents:

Chapter 1 The Global and the Local: Identity, Hybridity and Mimesis 1

Chapter 2 The Historical Basis for Diversity or Mythical Histories and Historical Myths 36

Chapter 3 Spaces in a Local World 77

Chapter 4 Age and theAada 124

Chapter 5 Mimetic Strategies: Core and Periphery, Passive and Active 164

Chapter 6 Consolidating Identity through Mimesis 202.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, MI Available via World Wide Web.

Description based on print version record.

Local Notes:

Acquired for the Penn Libraries with assistance from the Frances Baylinson Rosenbluth Fund.

ISBN:

9781527551237

1527551237

Publisher Number:

99987140667

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license.