This article is about a young farmer named Linga and his encounter with a water spirit in Oubangui-Chari (present-day Central African Republic) in 1930. It is also about the telling and re-telling of Linga’s encounter as the story was transcribed into Banda, translated into French, and rewritten as an ethnographic folktale. Responsible for these transformations were two Banda interpreters and a colonial administrator from the Caribbean. In the last two decades, historians of colonialism have turned increasingly to interpreters and other intermediaries. Often missing from this scholarship, however, are analyses of the granular details—of how colonial intermediaries used transcription, translation, and other methods to create new words, texts, and ideas. Linguistic anthropologists refer to such interventions as “entextualization,” the process by which fragments of discourse are extracted from their immediate settings and rendered into detached texts. Drawing on this scholarship, I argue that tracing the granular processes of entextualization opens up new vantage points from which to study the role of colonial intermediaries in the production of knowledge. The article also illuminates a methodology for mapping otherwise invisible constellations of language, meaning, and colonial power.

No abstract

This introduction elaborates the aims of the Special Issue, African Refuge | Refuge africain, which are: considering African refuge seeking over the span of a century; moving beyond the classifications that orient annual reporting on refugee statistics; delving into the politics of refuge seeking; and blurring distinctions between refuge seekers and hosts, exiles and humanitarians. The research presented in this issue demonstrates that, whether in the past or in the present, Africa's uprooted are not a problem to be solved. Considered with a broader historical scope, they are people who withdraw from a place they once called home because of circumstances they faced there. Refuge seeking is not a policy category, a legal classification or an international protocol. Rather, it is the practice of defying uniform aid prescriptions engaged by those for whom it is too problematic to remain at home. RÉSUMÉCette introduction expose les objectifs du numéro spécial, African Refuge | Refuge africain, qui sont les suivants : l'examen de la recherche de refuge en Afrique sur une période d'un siècle ; le dépassement des classifications qui orientent les rapports annuels sur les statistiques relatives aux réfugiés ; l'exploration approfondie de la politique de recherche de refuge ; et le brouillage des distinctions entre les demandeurs d'asile et les hôtes, les exilés et les humanitaires. La recherche présentée dans ce numéro démontre que, dans le passé comme dans le présent, les déracinés de l'Afrique ne sont pas un problème à résoudre. Pris en considération dans une perspective historique plus large, ce sont des personnes qui se retirent d'un lieu qu'elles appelaient autrefois leur foyer, en raison de circonstances qu'elles y rencontraient. La recherche de refuge n'est pas une catégorie politique, une classification juridique ou un protocole international. Il s'agit plutôt de la pratique consistant à défier les prescriptions uniformes en matière d'aide engagées par ceux pour qui il est trop problématique de rester chez eux.

No abstract

This article examines a back-to-Africa movement from early twentieth-century Cuba. The leader, William George Emanuel, arrived in Cuba from Antigua in 1894, and over the next several years, he worked to unite the cabildos de nación and sociedades de color on the island. After independence in 1898, Emanuel and his followers rejected Cuban citizenship and began petitioning Britain, the United States, Belgium, and the Gold Coast for land grants in West and Central Africa. Each petition, however, told a different story. Emanuel skillfully tailored his appeals according to his audience, variously claiming that he and his followers were “British,” “African,” “Congolese,” or “Mina,” among other identities. Anticipating the rise of Marcus Garvey by over a decade, Emanuel's campaign reveals an overlooked pan-Africanist strand in the typical narrative for this period of Cuban history. Drawing mainly on the petitions themselves, the article analyzes how Emanuel blended the languages of empire, nation, race, and ethnicity to create a dynamic pan-African identity. More generally, the article demonstrates how marginalized groups have long negotiated the boundaries of identity in the pursuit of belonging.