Art,Artists' Associations,and the State in Norway

Conservation of indigenous heritage is closely associated with the political and social position of the indigenous people in society. In order to understand the ongoing debate and changing perspectives on indigenous heritage, study of the growth of American Indian communities and their relationships with the U.S. government is crucial. Therefore, this article examines the federal policies and programs and the political dynamics presented in conserving indigenous heritage by reviewing Indian policy developments within the past two decades. American Indians did not possess ownership of their own cultural heritage and could not participate in the administration and formation of legal protection for heritage conservation. Policy changes have been influenced by the evolving roles of American Indian communities; this article explains how tribes finally became a partner in heritage conservation efforts.     

Gender differences in the dispersal of children in northern Sweden and the northern USA in 1850

In the course of time families disperse and kin relationships change. In this study gender differences in spatial dispersion of adult children from their fathers were investigated in two areas of the world in 1850: the Skellefteå region in northern Sweden and the northern part of the USA, both largely rural populations. The results from the Skellefteå region where data on both genders were available were used to estimate gender differences among a native born population in the northern USA where women were often not followed in the sources after marriage. Most adult children resided in the same place as their fathers, but the distances separating relatives were greater in the USA. However, the proportion of adult sons living in the same locality as their fathers was the same in both. More daughters than sons were located elsewhere in Skellefteå and probably also in the USA. Although sisters in Skellefteå joined each other in places separate from their parents, men lived in patrilineal clusters to a greater extent than women due, in part, to patrilineal inheritance and virilocal marriages. Various reasons for these patterns are discussed and their implications for kin networks discussed.     

Sharing the benefits of biodiversity the Kani TBGRI deal in Kerala,India

Abstract

The United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) concluded at the Earth Summit in 1992, mandates that where utilisation of the knowledge, innovations and practices of local and indigenous communities leads to benefits, such benefits shall be equitably shared with the holders of such knowledge, innovations and practices. The study analyses some of the issues that have emerged in the context of a ‘benefit sharing exercise’ attempted by the Tropical Botanic Garden and Research Institute (TBGRI), a research institute based in Kerala, with the Kani tribals of Kerala, pursuant to the development of a pharmaceutical drug, based on the knowledge, information and natural resources that the Kanis have nurtured over many years.

As the case study illustrates, the debate on benefit sharing in the absence of other fundamental rights such as the rights to land, access to the resource and adequate governance structures becomes a limited and myopic exercise. A ‘fair and equitable benefit sharing mechanism’ would therefore call for certain basic pre‐conditions that will be discussed in the course of the study.     

Who is this we that gives the gift? Native American Political Theory and The Western Tradition

Abstract

The allocation of self-determination rights to minority groups is a highly charged issue around the world, but the difficulties are particularly acute in the case of indigenous peoples within the white settler states. While liberal multiculturalism offers a ‘solution’ to this ‘problem of diversity’ through a system of differentiated citizenship rights, this comes only at the expense of excluding dissenting voices from the intercultural dialogue. Through an engagement with the multi-faceted critique of liberal multiculturalism advanced by Native American political theory, the limits of the recognition paradigm are identified, and the possibilities offered by a reconstructed Proudhonian federalism are described.     

African indigenous ecology control and sustainable community livelihood in southern African history

Abstract

Based on sources for African Indigenous Ecology Control and Sustainable Community Livelihood in Southern African history this article argues that political independence in the Southern African region has altered the historiography of the region and the African continent as a whole. Black Africans are now looking to the past for inspiration to constitute the foundations of sustainable livelihoods using their own indigenous knowledge systems (IKS) and resources. The indicatives of the African Renaissance also demand that we draw on the significance of the control by pre-colonial African communities of their ecosystems. Existing testimonies show prosperity among pre-colonial African communities in the region. The argument is that, in order to restore the historical achievements of Africans in the region, IKS should form a constitutive part of education.     

Ubuntu. The missing link in the rights discourse in post-apartheid transformation in South Africa

ABSTRACT

A human rights discourse has been central to both the anti-apartheid struggle of South Africa and the country's post-apartheid transformation. But in the drive to extend constitutionally mandated social and economic rights to all South Africans, the approach has had shortcomings. The current neo-liberal economic policy framework constrains policy choices and, in some instances, restricts fair adjudication of rights by the courts. The revival of notions of African Renaissance and indigenous ethnophilosophies, notably ubuntu, which shares the primacy of human dignity of a rights discourse, offers new perspectives. This article looks at the limitations of the human rights discourse and at how ubuntu, as a principled basis for judicial decision making, can contribute to the evolution of the rights discourse in South Africa and lead towards greater realisation of constitutional rights for all.     

The role of mathematics and scientific thought in Africa: A Renaissance perspective

ABSTRACT

This article examines the centrality of mathematics and scientific thought in the sociocultural, human and intellectual development of a sampling of African societies. Evidence is presented which refutes the theory that Africans had no ‘intelligible sense of numeracy’ before contact with the West, and demonstrates that the propagation of this myth was part of the larger colonial project to marginalise and ‘other-ise’ African knowledge systems. Tracing Africa's early contributions to mathematics and scientific thought forces a shift from the standard Western-based approach to pedagogy in this field. It renders a subject that is perceived and presented as alien to African culture, more accessible to African learners. And ultimately, acknowledging the long history of mathematics and scientific thought in Africa is a step in foregrounding African epistemologies in knowledge production, human and social development and towards the realisation of the African Renaissance.     

Knowledge free and ‘unfree’: Epistemic tensions in plant knowledge at the Cape in the 17th and 18 th centuries1

ABSTRACT

This article utilises the same epistemic objects, particular indigenous medicinal plants of the Cape region, to explore the gamut of epistemologies in contested, dynamic tension in the early Cape Colony: That of the frontiersman, the Khoikhoi, the Sonqua or Sankwe, and the slave. Drawing on a transdisciplinary set of literatures, the article puts Africana studies, the study of indigenous knowledge systems, and social studies of science and technology in wider conversation with each other, and argues for the adoption of an epistemic openness, methodologies which ‘braid’ seemingly separate strands of social history and differing knowledge practices, and cross-border collaboration among scholars of African and African diasporic knowledges. The findings and interpretation suggest new ways to view the ‘multiplexity’ of early indigenous southern African botanical, therapeutic and ecological knowledges, as well as the necessity for rethinking both the construction of colonial sciences and contemporary concerns about indigenous knowledge, biosciences and their 21^st century interaction.     

Ethnic Origins and the Disposition of Delinquents in Israel

Theoretical considerations lead to the hypothesis that the dispositions of juvenile cases affecting Oriental Jews will be harsher than those affecting European Jews in Israel. Further, that Arab juveniles will be dealt with more harshly than will either European or Oriental Jews. Analysis of official delinquency data reveals that this is the tendency. However, the authoritarian structure of the Arab community rather than prejudice explains the difference in handling Jewish or Arabic cases.