Socio-ritual structures and modern migration among the Manjak of Guinea Bissau: Ideological reproduction in a context of peripheral capitalism

Abstract

Case study of the position and religious activities of Manjak labour migrants from the administrative divisions of Calequisse and Cai¢ in the Cacheu region, who spend a substantial portion of their lives in urban centers in Senegal and France while maintaining close ritual and therapeutic ties with their area of origin. These ties involve a spectacular expenditure of time and foreign-earned money and bring out clearly the exploitative nature of local gerontocratic power, suggesting that these ritual ties have somehow become crucial in the articulation between capitalism and the local pre-capitalist modes of production. The central question tackled in this article is that of what exactly is being reproduced if the migrants' rituals are considered as cases of ideological reproduction.ASC – Publicaties niet-programma gebonde