Congolese Migration to Belgium and Postcolonial Perspectives

Demart, Sarah

doi:10.1163/18725457-12341239

Cited by 26 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 35 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…The violent civil war and the general collapse of state control in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in the 1990s caused a massive migration of Congolese refugees, of which ca. 70,000 are now estimated to live in Belgium, where they form the largest group of Sub-Saharan immigrants (Demart 2013a; Swyngedouw and Swyngedouw 2009). In the 1970s, after the opening of the Congolese student hostel La Maison Africaine , followed by a nightclub, food shops, and galleries around the Chaussé de Wavre , this Ixelles neighborhood received the names Le Petit Congo and Le Petit Matonge de Bruxelles .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Trade in African Medicinal Plants in Matonge-Ixelles, Brussels (Belgium)

Andel

Fundiko

2016

Econ Bot

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

(English)Maintaining cultural identity and preference to treat cultural bound ailments with herbal medicine are motivations for migrants to continue using medicinal plants from their home country after moving to Europe and the USA. As it is generally easier to import exotic food than herbal medicine, migrants often shift to using species that double as food and medicine. This paper focuses on the trade in African medicinal plants in a Congolese neighborhood in Brussels (Belgium). What African medicinal plants are sold in Matonge, where do they come from, and to which extent are they food medicines? Does vendor ethnicity influence the diversity of the herbal medicine sold? We hypothesized that most medicinal plants, traders, and clients in Matonge were of Congolese origin, most plants used medicinally were mainly food crops and that culture-bound illnesses played a prominent role in medicinal plant use. We carried out a market survey in 2014 that involved an inventory of medicinal plants in 19 shops and interviews with 10 clients of African descent, voucher collection and data gathering on vernacular names and uses. We encountered 83 medicinal plant species, of which 71% was primarily used for food. The shredded leaves of Gnetum africanum Welw., Manihot esculenta Crantz, and Ipomoea batatas (L.) Lam were among the most frequently sold vegetables with medicinal uses. Cola nuts, shea butter, Aloe vera (L.) Burm.f., and Mondia whitei (Hook.f.). Skeels were the main non-food medicines sold. Women’s health, aphrodisiacs, and rituals were the most important medicinal applications, but culture-bound ailments did not entirely dominate the plant uses. While most clients in Matonge were Congolese, most vendors and plant species were not. The Pakistanis dominated the food trade, and typical Congolese plants were sometimes replaced by West African species, creating confusion in vernacular names. African-managed shops had significantly more species of medicinal plants in stock than shops managed by Pakistanis. Almost all non-food herbal medicine was sold by Africans. Apart from informal shops, non-food herbal medicine was also sold from private homes and by ambulant vendors, probably to reduce costs and escape taxes and control by the authorities. We expect that in the future, increasing rent, strict regulations, and decreasing investments by the Congolese community will force the medicinal plant trade in Matonge to go even more underground.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s12231-016-9365-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Trade in African Medicinal Plants in Matonge-Ixelles, Brussels (Belgium)

Andel

Fundiko

2016

Econ Bot

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…In her view, the dispersion of data on immigrants of African descent contributes to the 'social invisibility' of black populations in the academic realm and in Belgian society at large. 48 The acuteness of what I would call, for lack of a better term, Belgium's 'Congo trauma' dawned on me when I started spending time in Matongé, the 'Congolese quarter' of Brussels, unofficially named after a market in Kinshasa.…”

Section: Collective Memory and Traumamentioning

confidence: 99%

Visualizing trauma: the Belgian Museum for Central Africa and its discontents

Hoenig¹

2014

Postcolonial Studies

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Fresh debates on the hybrid character of truth and identity undermine the authority of knowledge, and, as a consequence, its production and dissemination through public and thus officially sanctioned institutions. Kratz and Rassool argue that the museum, a flagship institution of knowledge dissemination, is fast becoming a site of narrative contests, producing a 'tug-of-war' that decentres values and expectations of curators and visitors alike. 1 The contestation of truth in competing narratives is the backdrop against which I started my engagement with the question of representation of 'Africa' and Belgian colonial rule in the permanent exhibition of the Royal Museum for Central Africa (RMCA) up to the time of its temporary closure, for renovation, in December 2013. In an attempt to present fresh frames for retrieving memories from collective trauma, the article links discursive formations in the sphere of museology with recent debates on transitional justice, keeping in mind that the notion of 'dialogical truth' emerges from 'interaction, discussion and debate'. 2 The article comes in five sections. It opens with a tour of the permanent exhibition of the RMCA on the eve of its closing, weaving together the existing literature on the museum and my own observations. Next it sheds light on the origins of the museum and resultant controversies over the (mis)representation of colonialism in former colonial institutions. The essay goes on to explain, against the background of research on memory and trauma, how alternate forgetting and remembering of Belgian colonial rule translates into omissions and ambiguities in the permanent exhibition. The article proposes alternative frames for addressing the colonial dimension of Belgium's past and present relationship with Central Africa and eventually asks the question whether new beginnings are possible. In writing the article, I have drawn extensively from my own observations, interactions with museum staff, correspondence with academics and practitioners, and a range of primary and secondary sources many of which I consulted during repeat trips to Brussels for archival research in another contested metropolitan institution, the Royal Library of Belgium. A museum tourThe RMCA is one of 10 federal scientific institutions in Belgium, located in Tervuren, a small municipality on the outskirts of Brussels, the national capital. The first visit I paid to the permanent and temporary exhibitions of the RMCA in the course of this research-more were to follow in the months ahead-fell on a cold sunny day in February 2013. City dwellers visibly enjoyed taking a stroll in the lavish museum grounds, and visitors queued to have a peek at the temporary

show abstract

“…As Demart (2013) and Bosma et al (2012) have claimed, Congolese immigrants in Belgium have received little attention in research. For example, most of the social psychological research that has focused on the representations and consequences of colonialism for present day intergroup relations in Belgium have been dedicated to understanding the Belgians' perspective and experiences (Caby, 2004;Lastrego & Licata, 2010;Licata & Klein, 2010), with the exception of a study conducted by Licata and Klein (2005), in which they analyzed the representations of Belgian colonialism among former colonizers and former colonized participants.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%