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AEGIS European Conference on African Studies
11 - 14 July 2007
African Studies Centre, Leiden, The Netherlands
In and out of Africa: The Soninké << scattered family >> today
| Panel |
2. Representation of the African Family of the 21st Century
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| Paper ID | 354 |
| Author(s) |
Razy, Elodie
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| Paper |
View paper (PDF)
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| Abstract | In this contribution, I propose that we leave the African continent in order to consider what I suggest calling the Soninké « scattered Family » (which usually appears as « transnational family »/« famille transnationale » in litterature), as a particular figure of contemporary African Family. By the means of an anthropological approach, I will answer to several questions: how do « scattered families » live? How do social relationships work despite geographical distance? How does such a kinship network operate in dailylife? How does it affect children’s and young people’s destiny?
I will first present a brief state of the art of the litterature on transnational family, and particularly african family, in order to outline contributions to the topic as well as gaps. Whereas english and american researchers focused on specific geographical areas i.e. Latin America, Caribbean and Asia, since the 90’s, European -mainly French researchers- focused on North and West Africa since 2000.
The presentation shall lead us to discuss the different choices, options and definitions that underlie the diversity of the vocabulary commonly used in the litterature (transnational family, multilocal family, famille à distance…). I will finally show how « scattered family » relies on a strong kinship network activated by Soninké People. My approach is based on the study of two issues: young children mobility and teenagers forced marriage.
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