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Title: | A Discipline Asserting its Identity and Place: Displacement, Aid and Anthropology in Sudan |
Author: | Assal, Munzoul Abdalla M. |
Year: | 2002 |
Periodical: | Eastern Africa Social Science Research Review (ISSN 1027-1775) |
Volume: | 18 |
Issue: | 1 |
Period: | January |
Pages: | 63-96 |
Language: | English |
Notes: | biblio. refs. |
Geographic terms: | Sudan Northeast Africa |
Subjects: | refugees refugee assistance anthropology Peoples of Africa (Ethnic Groups) Ethnic and Race Relations Urbanization and Migration international relations Economics and Trade Anthropology, Folklore, Culture Development aid Economic and social development displaced persons |
External link: | http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/eastern_africa_social_science_research_review/v018/18.1assal.pdf |
Abstract: | It is unfortunate that most current debates on the relationship between anthropology and development are a reflection of anthropological elitism preoccupied with general dilemmas of anthropology while the real dilemma, that of those who are brutally subjected to misguided development and mass displacement, is compromised. This paper contributes to the debate through a discussion of an empirical social and sociological problem that faces not only anthropologists but also social scientists and development practitioners in Sudan. This problem is the displacement of millions of people from their original homelands to other areas in Sudan and notably to the national capital. Four interrelated issues are discussed, viz. displacement, NGOs, aid and the role and place of anthropology. Endorsing the important role that is to be played by anthropologists in development endeavours, the basic contention of the paper is that while trying to assert itself, anthropology cannot and must not continue to confine itself to the study of the powerless alone, even when those powerless people are the main target of the so-called development projects or humanitarian aid interventions. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. |