Cameroon Grassfields Civilization

by Jean-Pierre Warnier

This book brings and blends together a dozen scholarly articles published by the author since the 1970s. It sketches two different yet related stories: first, that of one of the most ancient and prestigious African civilizations, the antiquity and sophistication of which are becoming more and more prominent as field research unfolds their many facets. Second, the story of the researcher himself, who has had to alter and shift his approach to that civilization as he got to meet Grassfielders, colleagues, friends and scholars who changed his views about the Grassfields kingdoms and their people. This book bears witness to those many encounters. Historical and anthropological research is not only a question of relevant theories and methodologies. It is also a human endeavour made of networks and friendships.

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Reviews

“Jean-Pierre Warnier has spent a career building our knowledge of Cameroon, most particularly of the Grassfields and the kingdom of Mankon. He has also built networks of researchers, across countries and continents, who will assure his legacy, still in the making, will be a beginning and not an end. So much building requires demolition, so this collection can be read not only for its substantive content but also for the long labour of demolishing constrictive disciplinary borders and turning them into expansive intellectual frontiers. The excitement remains palpable, and readers new to Warnier's work will want to start here for a timeline of discoveries, inventions and collaborations. Essential reading.”: Richard Fardon, Head of the Doctoral School, and Professor of West African Anthropology, SOAS University of London