The 'Great War' had a major impact on Africa and that is visible in the post stamps used in the various postal territories in Africa. This paper discusses the postal offices, postal services, and... Show moreThe 'Great War' had a major impact on Africa and that is visible in the post stamps used in the various postal territories in Africa. This paper discusses the postal offices, postal services, and stamps used in the German colony Kamerun during the early twentieth century. For the postal history of the First World War in the German colonies Togo, Deutsch-Sdwestafrika (SWA) and Deutsch-Ostafrika/German East Africa (GEA), see the ASC working papers 116, 118 and 119. Show less
The author concentrates on virtuality, which he has come to regard as one of the key concepts for characterizing and understanding the forms of globalization in Africa. Chapters 1 and 2 define... Show moreThe author concentrates on virtuality, which he has come to regard as one of the key concepts for characterizing and understanding the forms of globalization in Africa. Chapters 1 and 2 define virtuality and globalization and provisionally indicate their theoretical relationship. The problematic heritage of an anthropological tradition obsessed with locality provides the analytical framework within which virtuality makes an inspiring topic, as argued in Ch. 3. Ch. 4 offers a transition from theory to empirical case studies by examining the problem of meaning in the African urban environment. Ch. 5 evokes an ethnographic situation (urban puberty rites in present-day Zambia) that illustrates particular forms of virtuality as part of the globalization process. Ch. 6 applies the emerging insights into virtuality and the virtual village to Ren‚ Devisch's notion of villagization as a major process of societal transformation in the Zairian capital, Kinshasa. Ch. 7 explores the applicability of the same concepts to recent patterns of witchcraft and healing as studied, at the national level in Cameroon and Malawi, by Peter Geschiere and Matthew Schoffeleers respectively. The author's own earlier work on the Kazanga festival as an instance of virtuality in the rural context of western central Zambia is summarized in Ch. 8, after which a conclusion rounds off the argument. Show less
