Ethnography

Question 1

The Azande

Answer 1

The Azande (plural of "Zande" in the Zande language) are an ethnic group of North Central Africa.
They live primarily in South Sudan, then Anglo-Egyptain Sudan.

Question 2

Sir. Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard

Answer 2

Sir Edward Evan Evans-Pritchard (21 September 1902 – 11 September 1973), known as E. E. Evans-Pritchard, was an English anthropologist who was instrumental in the development of social anthropology.

Question 3

Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic Among the Azande

Answer 3

His first fieldwork began in 1926 with the Azande, a people of the upper Nile, and resulted in both a doctorate (in 1927) and his classic Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic Among the Azande (in 1937).

Question 4

Influence

Answer 4

He was influenced by Malinowski and influenced Mary Douglas. His study of Azande witchcraft (1937) has had a major impact on later debates in anthropology, particularly the rationality debate of the 1960’s and 70’s. He was originally a structural functionalist anthropologist but was influenced by Levi-Strauss’s structuralism later on in his life.

Question 5

Summary

Answer 5

• Witchcraft is believed to be an inherited substance in the belly and has power to perform bad magic on one’s enemies.
• Witches can sometimes be unaware of their powers, and can accidentally strike people to whom the witch wishes no evil.
• There are several rituals connected to protection from and cancelling of witchcraft that are performed almost daily.
• Witchcraft is passed from mothers to daughters and fathers to sons, but nobility are immune.
• Azande may blame witchcraft, just as non-Zande people might blame “bad luck”.
• Oracles are a way of determining the source of the suspected witchcraft, and were for a long time the ultimate legal authority
• e.g. Granary collapse from termites - or witchcraft?

Question 6

Structure-functionalism

Answer 6

Witchcraft serves as social control; keeps people in check as they don’t want to be the target of or accused of witchcraft. More power to the nobility as their oracle overrides all else and are immune from accusation. Belief is not ‘irrational’, this is an ethnocentric view.