The thesis investigates the condition of slave descendants among the southern
Betsileo of Madagascar. Unlike previous research, which has focused on the
dependency of those slave descendants who stayed as share-croppers on their former
masters’ land and on the discrimination against slave descent migrants, the present
study focuses on a group of slave descendants, the Berosaiña, who own their land and
have acquired autonomy and wealth. Based on fieldwork in a rural area south of
Ambalavao, the thesis presents an ethnographic study of the ambivalent relations
between the Berosaiña and their neighbours of free descent. It shows that the
Berosaiña’s knowledge of local history and of their ancestor’s role in the region’s
settlement is one of their key stakes in local politics, while the free descendants’
refusal to marry them is the most serious obstacle to their integration. A close study of
slave descendants’ genealogies and of local marriage practices suggests that, although
a few ‘unilateral’ marriages occurred, no ‘bilateral’ marriage between commoner
descendants and the Berosaiña ever took place. After suggesting an explanation for
the avoidance of marriage with the Berosaiña, the thesis proceeds by showing that the
category ‘slaves’ is essentialized by commoner descendants. The essentialist construal
of ‘slaves’, it is argued, is likely to have become entrenched only in the aftermath of
the abolition of slavery, because the circumstances in which it occurred prevented a
large number of freed slaves to be ritually cleansed and because a number of
established cultural practices made it difficult for freed slaves to marry free people.
Finally, the thesis analyses the peculiar predicament of the Berosaiña in light of the
strict marriage avoidance observed by commoner descendants and of commoner
descendants’ highly essentialized views about ‘slaves’