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| Title: | Ancestral incests and postcolonial subjectivities in the Karembola (Madagascar) |
| Author: | Middleton, Karen |
| Book title: | Postcolonial subjectivities in Africa |
| Year: | 2002 |
| Pages: | 191-224 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic term: | Madagascar |
| Subjects: | attitudes Karembola incest |
| Abstract: | During the 1980s and 1990s, Karembola villagers of southern Madagascar were deeply preoccupied with incest. This chapter explores the significance of contemporary incest discourses and practices for Karembola subjectivity. It suggests that incest is a 'master symbol' for Karembola subjectivity, not because it opposes local cultural values of solidarity and sharing in a clear-cut way to contrasting modes of reproduction, or, alternatively, because it indicates the breakdown of 'traditional' behavioural codes; rather, the power of Karembola incest discourses and practices as a way of imagining contemporary predicaments lies in the indeterminate value they assign to kinship. The value controversies they express are incapable of final resolution because Karembola can never decide how best to make themselves live. Experience shows that the outcome of any option is unpredictable. Ancestral custom can render the tabooed union fertile, but equally the 'unknown', 'unseen' taboo deriving from ancestral times can render the apparently fertile union sterile. The multiple, uncertain potentialities of incestuous practice express both the power and centredness that stem from being enmeshed in a deep web of connectedness, and the disadvantage and impotency that stem from peripherality to other social worlds. Bibliogr., notes, ref. [ASC Leiden abstract] |
