Masculinity, Morality, and the State in Northern Kenya:The Case of Baringo County's Il Chamus

Since the early 2000s, armed attacks and inter-ethnic violence have increased in parts of northern Kenya's Baringo County. This article examines how the Maa-speaking Il Chamus men respond to the growing insecurity as they draw on long-standing notions of morality and on the Kenyan state. In contrast to tropes of (agro)pastoralist northern Kenya being plagued by inter-ethnic animosity, lawlessness, and absence of governance, Il Chamus men situate inter-ethnic violence and gun ownership in notions of peace, prosperity, and security and engage the Kenyan state in an effort to achieve these values. Analyses of men in precarious conditions as experiencing “waithood” and turning to violence “in search of respect” need to be complemented by attention to emic notions of morality, masculinity, and intergenerational hierarchy, albeit not as simple remnants of “culture” but as points of debate in contemporary contexts of political and ecological insecurity.</p

Masculinity, Morality, and the State in Northern Kenya:The Case of Baringo County's Il Chamus

Since the early 2000s, armed attacks and inter-ethnic violence have increased in parts of northern Kenya's Baringo County. This article examines how the Maa-speaking Il Chamus men respond to the growing insecurity as they draw on long-standing notions of morality and on the Kenyan state. In contrast to tropes of (agro)pastoralist northern Kenya being plagued by inter-ethnic animosity, lawlessness, and absence of governance, Il Chamus men situate inter-ethnic violence and gun ownership in notions of peace, prosperity, and security and engage the Kenyan state in an effort to achieve these values. Analyses of men in precarious conditions as experiencing “waithood” and turning to violence “in search of respect” need to be complemented by attention to emic notions of morality, masculinity, and intergenerational hierarchy, albeit not as simple remnants of “culture” but as points of debate in contemporary contexts of political and ecological insecurity.</p

Masculinity, Morality, and the State in Northern Kenya:The Case of Baringo County's Il Chamus

Since the early 2000s, armed attacks and inter-ethnic violence have increased in parts of northern Kenya's Baringo County. This article examines how the Maa-speaking Il Chamus men respond to the growing insecurity as they draw on long-standing notions of morality and on the Kenyan state. In contrast to tropes of (agro)pastoralist northern Kenya being plagued by inter-ethnic animosity, lawlessness, and absence of governance, Il Chamus men situate inter-ethnic violence and gun ownership in notions of peace, prosperity, and security and engage the Kenyan state in an effort to achieve these values. Analyses of men in precarious conditions as experiencing “waithood” and turning to violence “in search of respect” need to be complemented by attention to emic notions of morality, masculinity, and intergenerational hierarchy, albeit not as simple remnants of “culture” but as points of debate in contemporary contexts of political and ecological insecurity.</p

Masculinity, Morality, and the State in Northern Kenya:The Case of Baringo County's Il Chamus

Since the early 2000s, armed attacks and inter-ethnic violence have increased in parts of northern Kenya's Baringo County. This article examines how the Maa-speaking Il Chamus men respond to the growing insecurity as they draw on long-standing notions of morality and on the Kenyan state. In contrast to tropes of (agro)pastoralist northern Kenya being plagued by inter-ethnic animosity, lawlessness, and absence of governance, Il Chamus men situate inter-ethnic violence and gun ownership in notions of peace, prosperity, and security and engage the Kenyan state in an effort to achieve these values. Analyses of men in precarious conditions as experiencing “waithood” and turning to violence “in search of respect” need to be complemented by attention to emic notions of morality, masculinity, and intergenerational hierarchy, albeit not as simple remnants of “culture” but as points of debate in contemporary contexts of political and ecological insecurity.</p

Masculinity, Morality, and the State in Northern Kenya:The Case of Baringo County's Il Chamus

Since the early 2000s, armed attacks and inter-ethnic violence have increased in parts of northern Kenya's Baringo County. This article examines how the Maa-speaking Il Chamus men respond to the growing insecurity as they draw on long-standing notions of morality and on the Kenyan state. In contrast to tropes of (agro)pastoralist northern Kenya being plagued by inter-ethnic animosity, lawlessness, and absence of governance, Il Chamus men situate inter-ethnic violence and gun ownership in notions of peace, prosperity, and security and engage the Kenyan state in an effort to achieve these values. Analyses of men in precarious conditions as experiencing “waithood” and turning to violence “in search of respect” need to be complemented by attention to emic notions of morality, masculinity, and intergenerational hierarchy, albeit not as simple remnants of “culture” but as points of debate in contemporary contexts of political and ecological insecurity.</p

“The World is Made by Talk”

The article combines an interpretation of female adolescents’ fan practices with an exploration of new forms of “coming together” made possible the creation of local radio stations in urban Mali. To understand girls’ admiration for Malian women singers who, have become acclaimed stars in national and international arenas, the article explores their fan practices by reference to their current predicaments of “postponed becoming” a full-grown member of the adult world. Girls’ fan practices shed light on the historically specific possibilities of mimetic appropriation, such as imagination made possible by new media, but also its limitations in the current era of global capitalism. Their consumption of pop music takes place in new, “intimate” publics that are constituted by listeners’ debates and their experiences of “being touched” by the singer’s voice. Music programs and talk radio programs on local radio create a realm of public and localized intimacy based on a community of common taste.Cet article est consacré à la fois aux pratiques des admiratrices des chanteuses et aux nouvelles formes de « rencontre » rendues possibles par la création des nouvelles stations de radio dans les villes du Mali. De façon à rendre compte de l’admiration des jeunes filles envers les chanteuses maliennes qui sont devenues des vedettes à la fois sur le plan national et international, l’auteur analyse les pratiques des adoratrices de ces dernières en les situant par rapport au problème du report de l’entrée de ces jeunes filles dans l’âge adulte. L’étude des pratiques d’adoration des jeunes filles éclaire sur les spécificités historiquement situées d’appropriation mimétique, telles qu’elles sont rendues possibles par les nouveaux médias, mais également sur leurs limitations à l’époque du capitalisme global. À cet égard, la consommation de musique populaire s’effectue dans le cadre de « publics intimes », c’est-à-dire de discussions d’auditrices centrées sur la façon dont elles ont été touchées par la voix de la chanteuse. Les programmes musicaux de même que les débats radiophoniques créent un domaine d’intimité à la fois privé et public, domaine qui repose sur une communauté de goût partagé

Mediating authority: media technologies and the generation of charismatic appeal in southern Mali

This article offers a close analysis of the media performances of a particularly successful preacher in Mali, Sheikh Cherif Haidara, to study how authority is generated in the interaction between a leader and his followers, and to examine the role of mass mediation in this process. Informed by Weber's reflections on the nature of charismatic authority, the article takes charisma as a form of appeal that is mediated through aesthetic forms, and remediated and 'channelled' by virtue of particular media strategies and formats. By raising questions about the nature of charismatic attraction and by illustrating under what conditions it becomes effective, the article contributes to recent scholarship that addresses the role of the aesthetic in the validation or 'authentication' of religious experience