"Cantar per moldre, cantar per no plorar": L'expressió del patiment femení en l'entorn rural Senufo

A les zones rurals senufo de l’Àfrica occidental, les tradicions orals tenen una gran importància en la vida quotidiana. Al voltant de la pedra de molí, a l’ombra dels murs de la seva concessió, les dones comencen a cantar, mentre molen els cereals. Aquesta és una oportunitat perfecta perquè expressin les seves emocions reprimides, per posar en paraules les penes de la pobresa, la desgràcia, les dificultats de la vida domèstica o fins i tot els dolors de dol. Aquest article examina de prop aquest repertori de cançons exclusivament de dones i tracta d’entendre com es beneficien les dones a mesura que alliberen el seu patiment a través de paraules. Paraules clau: dones senufo, cants de moldre, forma i intenció Abstract In West Africa, among the rural Senufo people, oral traditions are at the heart of daily life. Gathered around the millstone, shaded by the walls of their concession, the women break into song as they grind millet and other grains. This is a perfect opportunity for them to express their pent-up emotions, to put into words the sorrows of poverty and misfortune, the difficulties of domestic life or even the pain of bereavement. This article aims to examine more closely this repertoire of exclusively female songs and to attempt to understand how they benefit these women as they release their suffering through words. Key words: Senoufo women, grinding songs, form and intentio

Expression d’une souffrance sociale en milieu rural sénoufo et ethnoéthique

Le groupe nyarafolo, rattaché au peuple sénoufo, est installé en zone de savane au nord de la Côte d’Ivoire. Jusqu’à présent, les travaux anthropologiques sur la société sénoufo ont parlé à son sujet d’un éthos d’endurance, particulièrement repérable dans le processus initiatique et la conception du travail. Cette contribution veut interroger l’existence d’un éthos de souffrance dans cette société en accordant une légitimité aux catégories indigènes et particulièrement aux sources orales. Ce faisant, elle veut également mettre en évidence des problèmes déontologiques qui se posent à tout chercheur dans le cadre d’une réflexion qui cherche à construire un regard anthropologique sur la souffrance. Par le biais de l’analyse de discours de jeunes cultivateurs, elle évoque la nécessité pour la discipline anthropologique de sortir d’une approche purement descriptive et contextuelle de la souffrance afin de s’acheminer vers une ethnoéthique transcendant les particularismes culturels.The Nyarafolo people – a Senufo-related population – lives in the savannah zone in the North of Ivory Coast. Anthropologists focussing on the Senufo people have noticed so far the high value placed on endurance, drawn from the study of their initiation rites and their work ethic. The aim of this study is to question the « ethos of suffering » by acknowledging the legitimacy of the natives’ experience, particularly in their oral tradition. We will also question the research methodology used in the studies dealing with suffering from an anthropological point of view. Through the analysis of young farmers’ discourse, we suggest the necessity for anthropologists to move away from a strictly descriptive and contextual approach of suffering and to consider a study of ethnoethics, beyond cultural particularisms.El grupo nyarafolo, ligado al pueblo Senufo, se encuentra instalado en la zona de la sabana del norte de la Costa de Marfil. Hasta ahora, los trabajos antropológicos sobre la sociedad Senufo han hablado de un éthos de resistencia, sobre todo localizable en el proceso iniciático y en la concepción del trabajo. Esta contribución desea interrogar la existencia de un « ethos del sufrimiento » en dicha sociedad, otorgando legitimidad a las categorías indígenas y en particular a las fuentes orales. Al hacer esto, se desea así mismo plantear los problemas deontológicos que se plantea todo investigador en el marco de una reflexión que trata de construir una visión antropológica del sufrimiento. Utilizando el sesgo del análisis del discurso de jóvenes cultivadores, evoca la necesidad para la disciplina antropológica de abandonar un enfoque puramente descriptivo y contextual del sufrimiento con el fin de dirigirse hacia una etno-ética trascendiendo los particularismos culturales

Stories That Make the Law Free: Literature as a Bridge Between the Law and the Culture in Which It Must Exist

In this paper, I will examine how literature, by telling stories and examining their meaning, allows us to make the law free, by seeing it in its cultural context. I take, as a specific example Barbara Kingsolver\u27s novel, Pigs in Heaven, as it explores the cultural dialectic underlying application of the Indian Child Welfare Act

Marie-Rose Abomo-Maurin (dir.), Littérature orale, genres, fonction et réécriture

Dans cet ouvrage, des auteurs issus d’horizons différents abordent la littérature orale à travers trois angles d’attaque : ses genres et classifications, sa fonction – sociale particulièrement – et sa possible « réécriture ». Des contributions très diversifiées, mais qui ont pour socle commun de s’intéresser principalement à deux zones d’Afrique de l’Ouest et d’Afrique centrale, permettent d’explorer ces trois thématiques. La question des genres relevant de la littérature orale fait en premie..

Plantations sucrières chez les paysans sénoufo de la côte-d'ivoire et du burkina faso

RésuméAu sein des plantations agro-industrielles de la canne à sucre en Afrique de l'Ouest, les experts chargés du développement productiviste occultent souvent le discours critique que tiennent les paysans locaux vis-à-vis du nouveau mode d'exploitation de la terre et de son impact sur l'écosystème. Dans les logiques paysannes anciennes, tout un ensemble de pratiques religieuses était destiné à fixer des limites à une utilisation excessive des ressources naturelles. En affirmant que «le monde est gâté», les cultivateurs traduisent la crise d'un modèle agricole traditionnel et la dissolution des liens sociaux qu'il sous-tendait. Cette expression est le signe de la profonde métamorphose que connaît la société sénoufo qui, si elle a souvent été perçue comme particulièrement fermée, apparaît ici comme un monde en transition.þAbstractExperts in industrial, productivity-oriented sugar-cane plantations in west Africa often overlook the criticism that local peasants make of new methods for working the land and their impact on the ecosystem. In line with traditional farming strategies, religious practices were intended to set limits on overusing natural resources. When declaring, “The world is spoiled”, farmers are referring to the crisis of traditional farming and disintegration of the social bonds underlying this model. Though often seen as very closed, Senufo society is undergoing a transformation.

Échos d’une « guerre amère »

Dans cet article, en retraçant les difficultés rencontrées lors d’une enquête menée au nord de la Côte d’Ivoire, l’auteur interroge le mode de production des données issues de la littérature orale dans un contexte de crise politique. Ce témoignage personnel permet de soulever des questions éthiques inhérentes au travail de l’anthropologue : la légitimité du chercheur dans un contexte de souffrance sociale « extrême », la difficulté d’analyse des discours produits sur un terrain en guerre ou en crise, la nécessaire déontologie permettant de maîtriser les effets de violence symbolique qui se dégagent d’une enquête dans ce contexte spécifique. Loin de s’inscrire dans une posture purement spéculative, cet effort de réflexivité est destiné à nourrir la pratique anthropologique et à la rendre plus consciente des enjeux qu’elle met en œuvre au cœur d’un processus d’enquête sur la littérature orale sur un « terrain miné ».As she retraces the difficulties she encountered during her fieldwork in northern Ivory Coast, the author questions the mode of producing data stemming from oral literature in a context of political crisis. This personal testimonial allows her to raise certain ethical questions inherent to the work of the anthropologist: the legitimacy of a researcher in the context of “extreme” social duress, the difficulty of analyzing discourse produced in a war-torn or crisis-ridden land, the deontology required in order to master the effect of the symbolic violence deriving from research conducted in such a context. Far from being purely speculative, this reflection is destined to nourish the practice of anthropology and to render it more conscious of what is at stake when researching oral literature in a “mined field”

Truth and Consequences: Law, Myth and Metaphor in American Indian Contested Adoption

This article considers the effects of the operations of myth and metaphor on law through a comparison of a United States Supreme Court decision and a novel that deal with the contested trans-racial adoption of an American Indian child. It argues that the United States founding myth of Manifest Destiny—of the divinely ordained fate of the continent to host a (white) Christian state—is determinative of the way in which legal decisions regarding American Indians are made. The myth of Manifest Destiny contains a metaphor of vanished American Indians, such that contemporary American Indians are rendered nearly invisible and whose existence is not easily absorbed into the working of the American legal system. The American Indian Child Welfare Act provides protections against assimilation for indigenous families and community, thus working at cross-purposes to the ultimate aim of Manifest Destiny. What happens in those instances when legal provisions and interpretation run counter to Manifest Destiny? Through the consideration of the situation of a contested adoption, this article reveals the heavy influence of Manifest Destiny in the Supreme Court decision, which is counter to the vision of a pluralistic culture envisioned in both the novel and the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA) itself. The consequences of legal resistance to ICWA for American Indian communities and as to the operation of the legal system itself are discussed

The implementation and first insights of the French-speaking Swiss programme for monitoring self-harm.

Self-harm is a major risk factor for suicide but remains poorly documented. No data on self-harm in French-speaking Switzerland exist. To address this deficiency, the Swiss Federal Office of Public Health commissioned a specific self-harm monitoring programme. We present and discuss its implementation and first findings. Every patient aged 18–65 years presenting for self-harm to the emergency departments of the Lausanne and Neuchâtel general hospitals were included in the monitoring programme over a 10-month period (December 2016 to September 2017). Clinicians collected anonymous sociodemographic and clinical data. The sample included 490 patients (54.9% female and 45.1% male) for 554 episodes of self-harm, showing a higher proportion of patients aged 18–34 (49.2%) than older age groups (35–49, 33.7% and 50–65, 17.1%). Patients were mostly single (56.1%) and in problematic socioeconomic situations (65.7%). Self-poisoning was the most commonly used method (58.2%) and was preferred by women (71% of females and 42.5% of males, Fisher’s exact test, p <0.001) and the majority of patients (53.3%) had experienced at least one previous episode of self-harm. The self-harm rate was 220 per 100,000 inhabitants in Lausanne and 140 in Neuchâtel. Suicidal intent was clear for 50.6% of the overall sample, unclear for 25.1% and absent for 24.3%. It differed significantly between sites (χ2(2) = 9.068, p = 0.011) as Lausanne reported more incidents of unclear intent (27.7% versus 17.4% in Neuchâtel) and Neuchâtel more incidents with absence of intent (33.1% versus 21.3% in Lausanne). In Lausanne, patients more frequently resorted to methods such as jumping from a height (11.4%) and hanging (9%) than in Neuchâtel (1.6% and 4.9%, Fisher’s exact test, p = 0.006). Our results are globally consistent with previous research on self-harm. We found significant inter-site differences in methods, suicidal intent and self-harm rates. Our findings highlight the importance of implementing local self-harm monitoring to identify specific at-risk groups and develop targeted preventive intervention

Psychosocial interventions for self-harm in adults

Background: Self-harm (SH; intentional self-poisoning or self-injury) is common, often repeated, and associated with suicide. This is an update of a broader Cochrane review first published in 1998, previously updated in 1999, and now split into three separate reviews. This review focuses on psychosocial interventions in adults who engage in self-harm. Objectives: To assess the effects of specific psychosocial treatments versus treatment as usual, enhanced usual care or other forms of psychological therapy, in adults following SH. Search methods: The Cochrane Depression, Anxiety and Neurosis Group (CCDAN) trials coordinator searched the CCDAN Clinical Trials Register (to 29 April 2015). This register includes relevant randomised controlled trials (RCTs) from: the Cochrane Library (all years), MEDLINE (1950 to date), EMBASE (1974 to date), and PsycINFO (1967 to date). Selection criteria: We included RCTs comparing psychosocial treatments with treatment as usual (TAU), enhanced usual care (EUC) or alternative treatments in adults with a recent (within six months) episode of SH resulting in presentation to clinical services. Data collection and analysis: We used Cochrane's standard methodological procedures