Book Review on "Turnbull Ethno Colin Turnbull's Ethnography"

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Turnbull Ethno

Colin Turnbull's Ethnography of the Mbuti

Based on the pretense that clinical and laboratory observations are often distorted by the false nature of the setting, field observation promotes the notion that to consider the subject's behavior in a natural setting will be likelier to yield meaningful information. In particular, there are specific observational opportunities that may only be experienced in this natural setting and cannot otherwise be effectively recreated in a more empirically driven or controlled setting. To this extent, our research identifies the ethnography as "a branch of cultural anthropology." (Garson, 1) The indicates that in some regard, the social behaviors exhibited by subjects are in their own degree manifested by the controlled parameters of the group selected for observation. Thus, in considering the application of such elements as chronology, key events and issues, it must be noted that human behavior as a social characteristic is generally that which is being measured.

This helps us to understand the centrality of chronology, for one, which dictates that through the duration of an ethnography, the sequence in which behaviors are exhibited is a crucial aspect of qualitative analysis. Here, we can begin to detect patterns of behavior as well as the graduating evolution of social interactions, sometimes even between the observer and the subject. These are features that become apparent with a consideration of Colin Turnbull's The Mbuti Pygmies: Change and Adaptation, an anthropological study of the remote tribal group inhabiting the Congo in isolation from modern cultural. The ethnography demonstrates both the valu

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e of this mode of observation and the potential harm in this same approach, denoting the opportunity to gain great insight into a way of life but also threatening to corrupt it through invasion and exploitation. As the second book in a set of ethnographies, this text helps to demonstrate Turnbull's long-standing commitment to immersion with the Mbuti and the resulting research.

Critical Analysis

The Congo is one of Africa's most troubling paradoxes. Rich in culture and resource and nonetheless embattled by economic, ethnic and political strife, its history is driven in large part by the dichotomy of its struggles. In the balance, there are fast-fading windows into the history of mankind like the Mbuti tribes inhabiting the Iruti jungles. Renowned British anthropologist Colin Turnbull would spend significant portions of his career immersed in the lives and habitations of these tribes both during the 1965 composition of his groundbreaking and widely read The Forest People and the 1983 sequel The Mbuti Pygmies: Change and Adaptation. The latter of these works is subject to review here for its interest in the long-term impact on these peoples of the encroachment of modernity. The benevolent perspective that has been Turnbull's in his historical characterization of the Mbuti people comes through in Change and Adaptation, which is a work distinguished for its sensitive demonstration of the simultaneously destructive and interdependent relationship between the Mbuti tribes and their village-bound neighbors.

The content of the text provides something of a departure from the ethnography style that has been Turnbull's and so many other investigative anthropologists. Here, the focus on the pygmy people making up the tribes is interested primarily in evaluating the impact on the Mbuti of their interaction with the modernized world. Such is to say that study of this people is now well past the possibility of non-intervention and passive observation suggested by the ethnography. In this text, and the research attendant thereto, there is a clear understanding of this work as an aggressive assessment of the crimes of modernity and encroachment against an ancient culture of great value and beauty. It is therefore transcending of the purpose represented in the first of Turnbull's works on the Mbuti, intending upon more than simply describing and even evaluating the people. Instead, its interest is on evaluating the lives of the Mbuti within the context of the challenges facing them in an increasingly deconstructing nation, region and even forest landscape. In all of these, the author describes a dire scenario in which interest must be largely dedicated to ensuring the survival of the Mbuti against the will of ethnic discrimination.

The small stature and extraordinary athletic prowess which are described in various informally anecdotal details by Turnbull relate our consideration of the anthropological subject to an array of academic considerations. Particularly, the concept of natural adaptation causes us to consider the unique physical orientation of the pygmy tribes, who are describes as remarkably agile, quick and where necessary, lethal. This latter aspect of the Mbuti identity is one to which the author subjects a great deal of consideration, as it tells us a great deal about the character traits of the people. Namely, there is a fierce disinterest in violence within the nomadic culture, even to the extent that hunting is regarded in Mbuti lore as a necessary evil for which all Mbuti must constantly be held accountable. The outcome, we may surmise, is the array of physical skills and strengths that seem to accommodate the Mbuti more to direct combat with an antelope than to bringing blows upon his fellow. The physical evolution of the Mbuti which has delivered them to their anatomical disposition may have a great deal to do with the needs foisted upon them by centuries of life uninterrupted in the jungles.

However, with an intercession with both the white man in the form of European colonizers and, more commonly today, the villagers settling in established communities surrounding and increasingly penetrating the forest, an anthropological process of acculturation has begun to occur. It is here that the interdependent needs or desires of the tribesmen and the village dwellers have come to intercede with one another. Most particularly, Turnbull describes the development of trade between the pygmies and the village dwellers, constituted of the former's interest in acquiring such commodities as the agricultural goods which are yielded by more established community growing operations and the latter's desire to obtain the meats, furs and vegetation accessible only in the formidable forests of the Congo. The process is having some seriously deleterious effects on the Mbuti, who have also been exposed to much ethnic mistreatment and subjugation by the villagers, who see the naive and uneducated tribal people as a source of cheap labor.

Another anthropological phenomenon distinguishing the Mbuti is their orientation toward children, who are considered members of the tribe. We might refer to this sociological disposition as relative to hereditary hierarchy. Contrary to many more developed cultures, Turnbull shows evidence of children taking on many of the responsibilities and rights as do adults. This is an aspect of the Mbuti culture which has remained even as it has come into contact with cultures more driven by sharp distinctions between minor and senior entitlements. This ageist perspective is not perceptible in the Mbuti, who instead appear to value to the virility and ebullience of youth. It is here that we see evidence of a culture not just preserved by a history of isolation but also largely molded by the impact of the environment containing it.

Though the ethnography does provide the opportunity for more natural subject behavior as a function of the diminished impact of experimental control conditions, there is a counterpoint to this opportunity in the susceptibility of such studies to unwanted variables. Indeed, the ethnography is a research approach which may be uniquely vulnerable to the inclinations of the observer. A fundamental danger in the reliance upon qualitative data such as that gathered through direct interaction between researchers and subjects is the potential for subjectively and prejudicially-based perceptions within the researcher to distort the findings of a study.

The story which Turnbull tells of the Mbuti shows them to be a people worthy of consideration and even admiration for their preservation of a simple but reasonably balanced… READ MORE

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Quoted Instructions for "Turnbull Ethno Colin Turnbull's Ethnography" Assignment:

“

Introduction to Anthropology

Book Review Essay of a Selected Ethnography

Aims

The aims of this assessment are several. The first is to introduce you to ethnographic writing. The review is thus based on reading and producing a summary of an ethnographic monograph in its entirety. The second aim of the book review is to test your ability to engage critically with ethnography. Hence, the book review essay is not simply a book report. Rather, it requires you to both to an***** and evaluate the ethnographic content, interpretations and key ideas raised and addressed in the book. A list of classic and contemporary ethnographies is attached. If you wish to select an alternative ethnography for your book review essay, you may do so, but only in consultation with either the lecturer or module tutor.

General Notes on length, format and deadlines.

*****¢ The book review essay should be 2000 words. Essays that are over the assigned length will be subject to a 5% penalty on the grade given.

*****¢ The deadline for the submission of your book review essays is Tuesday, 12.00 p.m., 19 January, 2010. Please read the accompanying Essay Submission and Mitigating Circumstances policy in the Department of Social Science for details on late submission.

*****¢ In addition to the electronic copy submit to Turnitin, you must submit two (2) hardcopies of your essay. Essays should be typed or word-processed using 12pt font and printed with a black typeface. Except for footnotes, the text should be double-spaced throughout. Pages should be numbered at the foot of the page.

*****¢ Plagiarism may be punished by the award of a mark of zero for the work concerned. For further details on *****˜the use of unfair means*****, please consult your student handbooks or the University web-site. It is your responsibility to ensure that you are aware of the guidelines and regulations concerning plagiarism. Please refer to the separate instructions on the use of Turnitin.

*****¢ There is a formal requirement for each module that you complete all assessments set. Failure to complete any assessment can only be authorised in cases where there are extenuating circumstances of a medical or personal nature. In these cases documentary evidence will be required. Failure to complete any assessment without authorisation will lead to the right to resit the non-completed assessment being withheld.

Some notes and guidelines for producing your book review essay.

1. Before beginning to read, do the following:

*****¢ Look over the title - what does it suggest?

*****¢ Read the Preface and/or Introduction - these provide important information on the author's purpose in writing the book and will help you to determine whether the work accomplished its objectives.

*****¢ Scan the Table of Contents - this tells you how the book is organised and will aid in determining the author's main ideas and how they are developed - chronologically, topically, etc.

2. Read the Text

*****¢ Record impressions as you read and note effective passages for quoting.

*****¢ Ask questions of narration, audience, organisation, argumentation, representation, selectivity, typicality, agenda, style, bias, context, and accuracy, as described in the section, "Things to Look for When Critically Analysing Ethnographic Accounts".

3. Write the Book Review

Remember that there is a distinction between a book report and a critical review. A book report summarises the book's contents. A critical review is a scholarly and evaluative analysis of the book, not merely an account of its contents. This assignment requires both a summary of the book and your analysis of it. Though the summary and analysis need not be separated out into two distinct sections of your essay, you may find it helpful to work in this way. The following are some guidelines as to the kind of things that each might include.

Part I. Things to include in a summary.

*****¢ The author's name and the title of the book, e.g.

Turnbull, C. 1962. The Forest People: a study of the Pygmies of the Congo.

New York: Simon and Schuster.

*****¢ The main question(s) that the author sets out to answer and/or the author's thesis, or primary assertion.

*****¢ The ethnographic data that the author uses to convince the reader that his or

her thesis is correct

Note: your skill as a reader is demonstrated by your ability to pick out the main point that the author is trying to make. Note that in giving a summary of a book, you are NOT simply to go through the book chapter by chapter. Rather, you are to tell the reader, "in a nutshell," what the book is about.

Part 2. A critical analysis of the book

*****¢ Here, you must offer an assessment of the book's major strengths and/or weaknesses. In other words, do you agree with how the author chose to write this ethnography? Make sure to justify your arguments with concrete examples from the book.

*****¢ Be original and reflective *****” what kinds of questions did you think about when reading the book.

Hint: When reading the book, make "scratch notes" of things that automatically occur to you. After finishing the book, return to your notes and go back over particular parts of the book to "flesh out" your ideas and offer a more thorough analysis. If no critical ideas strike you, then refer to the list handed out in class, entitled "Things to Look for When Critically Analysing Ethnographic Accounts". However, avoid writing a paper that hastily plods through the accompanying list and offers no original ideas or no sense of what YOU thought of the book!

*****¢ Conclude your review with one or two summary paragraphs stating your overall impression of the book. What is your ultimate judgement of the style, format, contents, and value of this book? Has the book challenged you intellectually, increasing your knowledge, raising new questions, and/or presenting the material in a novel, even provocative manner? Or does the author simply rehash something that everyone already knows? Would you recommend this book to other students?

Citations

In writing your book review, you will need to refer to specific portions of the book to illustrate your statements and conclusions. It is not, however, advisable to quote extensively from it. Whenever you are tempted to quote directly, stop and make an attempt to summarise the author's arguments in your own words. If you do choose to use direct quotations (sometimes the author states things so beautifully or so horribly that you can not resist quoting), you MUST avoid plagiarism by citing the source and the page number of the quotation. Citations should be placed in the text (they should not be put into footnotes or endnotes), and should be formatted as follows: (Turnbull 1962: 22).

Examples of Book Reviews

To see some examples of scholarly book reviews in the discipline of anthropology, go to the journals section of the Library. Most major anthropology journals will have a book review section.

Things to Look for When Critically Analysing Ethnographic Accounts

The following are intended only as a starting point and guide, not as a kind of shopping list of things you must look for.

Narration

--Who narrates?

--What voice is employed (1st person, 3rd person)?

--What verb tense is employed (past or present?)

--How does the anthropologist convince you of his/her "ethnographic authority"?

Audience

--For whom has this book or article been written: Collegial Readers? Social Science Readers? General Readers?

Organisation

--Is the piece organised chronologically, thematically, as a story or novel, or is it a random montage?

--If it is organised thematically, how, specifically, are the themes linked together?

--Do you think the author made the best choice in how to organise the chapters and/or sections or are there alternative ways that would have been better?

(Hint: for a good overview of a book's organisation, look at the Table of Contents; for a good overview of an article's organisation, scan the section headings)

Argumentation

--What arguments does the author make?

--Are these arguments supported by adequate ethnographic data?

--Are these arguments convincing?

--Are these arguments similar to larger theoretical or political arguments that you have heard?

--Do these arguments reveal a distinct theoretical approach of the anthropologist?

Style

--Does the author have a distinctive "style" that stands out from the style of other anthropologist you have read?

--Would you characterise the author as a good or bad *****?

--How would you characterise the narrator's tone? Is it formal or informal? Artistic or scientific? Interesting or dull? --Theoretical or descriptive? Witty or humourless?

--Does the author have a tendency to use certain kinds of words (advanced vocabulary? jargon? foreign words? descriptive adjectives? qualifiers?)

Validity

--Does the author's writing style convince you of his/her believability?

--What, specifically, makes you confident in or sceptical of, this ethnographic account?

--Is there anything that seems phoney or superficial about this ethnographic account?

--Do you think the author purposefully and conscientiously wrote like this in order to enhance the believability of this account?

Representation

--Are readers told how the people being studied react to being the subjects of anthropological research?

--Are the people under study portrayed as individuals, with distinct names and personalities, or as a group of anonymous natives?

--What word does the anthropologist use to refer to the people with whom (s)he worked (informant? collaborator?)

--Do you hear the "voices" (direct quotes and opinions) of the native people?

--Does the book perpetuate common stereotypes of non-Western peoples as noble savages, depraved savages, exotic primitives?

--Have the informants participated in any way in the creation of the final ethnography or film?

Selectivity

--What places, events, and people are selected for inclusion in the piece and why did the author focus on these things?

--What things might have been left out?

*Problems of miscommunication or non-acceptance

*Evidence of social change and modernity?

--Does the author mention the activities that (s)he engaged in, or the feelings that (s)he experienced, during the course of fieldwork?

--Does the author include descriptions of the context, emotional feelings, and events surrounding the discussions with local people?

Typicality

--How representative is this ethnographic account of ordinary, everyday life?

--How representative is the ethnographic account of the majority of people in the culture?

Agenda

--Does the author appear to have a political, ideological, or romantic agenda in producing this kind of ethnographic account?

--Is this account prescriptive or descriptive? (A prescriptive account is one in which the author gives practical advise on how agencies or individuals should intervene to solve particular social problems. It can be compared to a descriptive account)

Bias

--Does the author seem unconsciously biased by his or her political and/or class position?

--Does the author show any gender bias?

--Does the anthropologist exhibit any ethnocentrism?

--Does the author show a bias against the West?

Accuracy

--Is there any factual basis for doubting the accuracy of this ethnographic account? (You can argue this point if you have anthropological experience working with the same people, or if you have read other ethnographic accounts that cast doubt on the arguments made in this book.)

Selected Ethnography

Africa

Bloch, M. (1986) From blessing to violence : history and ideology in the circumcision ritual of the Merina of Madagascar. Cambridge : Cambridge University Press,

Caplan, P. (1997) African voices, African lives : personal narratives from a Swahili village. London: Routledge.

Evans- Pritchard, E. (1940) The Nuer (G652 N9 E9)

Evans- Pritchard, E. (1937) Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic GN 652 A9 E9

Lienhardt, G. (1961) Divinity and Experience (BL 2480 D5L7)

Richards, A. (1956) Chisungu

Douglas, M. (1963) The Lele of the Kasai (GN 654 D7)

Turnbull, C.M (1965) Wayward Servants: The Two Worlds of the African Pygmies

Parkin, D. (1972) Palms, Wines and Witnesses (GN 657 K3 P2)

Kuper, H. (1986) The Swazi (GN 657 SP K9)

Lewis, I.M. (1971) Ecstatic Religion

Abu-Lughod, Lila, (1986) Veiled Sentiments: Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society

Turnbull Colin Macmillan (1961)The forest people. London : Cape.

*****

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