How Visual Figures Speak: Narrative Inventions of "The Pastoralist" in East Africa
2002; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 15; Issue: 3-4 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/08949460213910
ISSN1545-5920
Autores Tópico(s)Indigenous Studies and Ecology
ResumoThrough their media images, pastoralists have become "icons" of African traditionalism and unwitting symbols of resistance to the modernist values of development and conservation. Their pictorial fame bears political costs. Popular visual images convey tacit narrative presuppositions that shape public (mis)understanding of pastoral communities, as tacitly pejorative images of pastoralists--most notably of Maasai--proliferate in film, tourist brochures, and advertising, at a time when pastoral communities are faced with political marginalization and dispossession. This article examines the narratives implicit in ethnographic images of pastoralists, images that support the "fulfillment" of pastoral "characters" through policies detrimental to their future.
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