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Customary Strangers New Perspectives on Peripatetic Peoples in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia

Joseph C. Berland, ed., Aparna Rao

ISBN: 0-89789-771-4

ISBN-13: 978-0-89789-771-6

DOI:

352 pages

Praeger Publishers

Publication: 3/30/2004

List Price: $110.95 (UK Sterling Price: £76.95)

Availability: In Stock

Media Type: Hardcover

Trim Size: 6 1/8 x 9 1/4

Subjects:

Anthropology » Anthropology (General)

Description: Social scientists have generally remained impervious to a major economic and cultural adaptation—namely, the peripatetic lifestyle—although this adaptation has been an integral part of developments within the socioeconomic and cultural networks that social scientists study. This lack of interest derives perhaps from the ambiguous integration of peripatetics into these networks as well as the often negatively charged constructs -Gypsies, outsiders, or marginal others—imposed on peripatetics by dominant cultures. As peddlers of the strange to borrow a phrase from Clifford Geertz, peripatetics are situated at the fringes of their host societies and many students of the social ecological and behavioral sciences still continue to overlook the roles of peripatetic peoples.

This collection presents the latest in cross-cultural comparative research on the nature of peripatetic peoples. Contributors examine the place of peripatetic peoples in the everyday lives and diverse cognitive maps of client communities. Relying on Georg Simmel's construct of The Stranger, the contributors to this volume suggest that peripatetic peoples are simultaneously outsiders and insiders, but most important, they are entrepreneurial middlemen traders par excellence. All told, the essays provoke vital reassessments of the anthropological focus on the role and status of cultural brokers and go-betweens in political, economic, and social interactions.

Table of Contents:

List of Maps, figures, and tables
Unveiling the Stranger: A New Look at Peripatetic Peoples by Joseph C. Berland and Aparna Rao
"Once upon a Time": Reconciling the Stranger by Michael J. Casimir
The Middle East
Roving Traders among the Bedouin of South Sinai by Emanuel Marx
Biography and Identity in Damascus: A Syrian Nawar Chief by Frank Meyer
Africa
Affiliations of the Stomach: Smith as "Stranger" among the Tuareg by Susan Rasmussen
"They work to eat and they eat to work": M'allemin Blacksmiths and Theoretical Considerations of Classification and Discourse among the Bidan Nobility of Mauritania by Mariella Villasante Cervello
Strangers in Their Wwn Land by Michael de Jongh
Noble Strangers: The Nile Valley Gypsies in the Ethnic Mosaic of Sudan by Bernhard Streck
Singing Smiths and Hunting Ritual Entrepreneurs: Transitions between Forager and Peripatetic Communities in Africa by Michael Bollig
They Travel Together and Fight a Lot by Joseph Berland
Professional Strangers in Urban Pakistan: A Note on Peripatetic Specialists by Jurgen Wasim Frembgen
Strangers and Liminal Beings: Some Thoughts on Peripatetics, Insiders, and Outsiders in Southwest Asia by Aparna Rao
Enduring Strangers: Mughat, Lyuli, and other Peripatetics in the Social Fabric of Central Asia by Shirin Akiner
The Orange Suku Laut: Owners of or Strangers in the Riau Archipelago of Indonesia? by Cynthia Chou
Notes on Contributors
Index

About the Author: JOSEPH C. BERLAND has lived and traveled with peripatetic communities in Southwest Asia for 25% years. He is the author of No Five Fingers Are Alike and is co-editor with Matt T. Salo of a special issue of the journal Nomadic Peoples devoted to peripatetic peoples. Formerly at Northwestern and Oxford Universities, he is now Adjunct Professor of Social Anthropology at Qaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad, Pakistan. He is retired from pedagogical activities and pursues full-time research.

APARNA RAO is Professor at the Institute fur Volkerkunde, Universitat zu Koln, Germany.

LCC Class: 305


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