Ethnicity, Inc.

250 Pages·2012·1.82 MB·English

by  John L. Comaroff

CHICAGO STUDIES IN PRACTICES OF MEANING
Edited by Jean Comaroff, Andreas Glaeser, William Sewell, and Lisa Wedeen
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Ethnicity, Inc.
JOHN L. COMAROFF AND JEAN COMAROFF
The University of Chicago Press Chicago and London
JOHN L. COMAROFF is the Harold M. Swift Distinguished Service
Professor of Anthropology at the Uni versity of Chicago, Honorary Pro-
fessor, University of Cape Town, and Research Professor, American Bar
Foundation.
JEAN COMAROFF is the Bernard E. and Ellen C. Sunny Distin-
guished Service Professor of Anthropology at the University of Chicago,
Director, Chicago Center for Contemporary Theory, and Honorary Pro-
fessor, University of Cape Town.
The University of Chicago Press, Chicago 60637
The University of Chicago Press, Ltd., London
© 2009 by The University of Chicago
All rights reserved. Published 2009
Printed in the United States of America
Photographs are by John Comaroff unless otherwise noted.
17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 1 2 3 4 5
ISBN- 13: 978-0-226-11471-2 (cloth)
ISBN- 13: 978-0-226-11472-9 (paper)
ISBN- 10: 0-226-11471-6 (cloth)
ISBN- 10: 0-226-11472-4 (paper)
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Comaroff, John L., 1945–
Ethnicity, Inc. / John L. Comaroff and Jean Comaroff.
p. cm. — (Chicago studies in practices of meaning)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN- 13: 978-0-226-11471-2 (cloth : alk. paper)
ISBN- 13: 978-0-226-11472-9 (pbk. : alk. paper)
ISBN- 10: 0-226-11471-6 (cloth: alk. paper)
ISBN- 10: 0-226-11472-4 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Ethnicity. 2. Ethnicity—
Economic aspects. 3. Ethnicity—Economic aspects—South Africa. I.
Comaroff, Jean. II. Title. III. Series.
GN495.6.C6454 2009
305.8—dc22 2008040972
o The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements
of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—
Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1992.
Contents
1 Prologue 1
2 Three or Four Things about Ethno- futures 6
3 Questions of Theory 22
4 Commodifying Descent, American- style 60
5 A Tale of Two Ethnicities 86
6 Nationality, Inc., Divinity, Inc., and Other Futures 117
7 Conclusion 139
Acknowledgments 151
Notes 153
Bibliography 191
Index 223
Plates to follow p. 74

ONE
Prologue
Something strange is happening to the thing we call “eth-
nicity,” the t aken-f or-g ranted species of collective subjectiv-
ity that lies at the intersection of identity and culture. Our
ethno- episteme—the sum of ethno-c onsciousness, ethno-
p olitics, e thno-p ractice, and the terms in which we appre-
hend them—appears to be morphing into exactly the op-
posite of what the orthodox social sciences would once have
had us believe. Or rather, the opposites. Ethnicity is, has always
been, both one thing and many, the same yet infi nitely di-
verse. It is not just that there is a lot of it about these days, a
lot of ethnic awareness, ethnic assertion, ethnic sentiment,
e thno-t alk; this despite the fact that it was supposed to wither
away with the rise of modernity, with disenchantment, and
with the incursion of the market. What is at issue is more its
quality than its quantity, more its disposition than its demog-
raphy. While it is increasingly the stuff of existential passion,
of the self-c onscious fashioning of meaningful, morally an-
chored selfhood, ethnicity is also becoming more corporate,
more commodifi ed, more implicated than ever before in the
economics of everyday life. To this doubling—to the inscrip-
tion of things ethnic, simultaneously, in affect and interest,
emotion and utility—is added yet another. Cultural identity,
in the here-a nd-n ow, represents itself ever more as two things
at once: the object of choice and self- construction, typically
through the act of consumption, and the manifest product of
biology, genetics, human essence.
Herewith a few initial clues to what we are talking about,
a few texts from different fronts opening up in the domain
of cultural difference.
1
Ethnicity, Inc.
CHAPTER ONE
The North Catalan Economy: The Inspiration of Identity
The “identity” sector of the North Catalonian1 economy represents a new open-
mindedness [that] will see an expansion based on the culture of the region . . . as an
alternative to globalisation.
The “identity” economy signifi es a return to the formerly popular products which
were abandoned in the 20th Century . . . The rediscovery of the natural potentials of
the land, the advantage of ancestral experience and the added value of “identity” as
a synonym of quality represents a welcome possibility in a region missing a produc-
tive economy . . . The “identity” economy . . . induces an obvious closeness [among
Catalonians] . . .
The Catalan identity is a collective sentiment, a vision of the communal world, a
language, a culture, a lifestyle . . . Becoming less local, [it] can now rediscover itself
and fi nd new forms of expression.
The Catalan social reality demonstrates its power of integration and its modernity,
and thus it assures the survival of a culture threatened but living.
CATALOGNE-NORD HOME PAGE2
Note the reference to the “identity economy.” Under its sign, several in-
imical things are conjoined: ‘ancestral experience’ is linked to ‘open-
mindedness,’ ‘closeness’ to becoming ‘less local,’ ‘modernity’ to ‘cultural
survival,’ ‘natural potentials’ to the ‘rediscovery’ of ‘collective sentiment.’
The objectifi cation of identity, in short, appears here to have produced a
new sensibility, an explicitly new awareness of its essence, its affective,
material, and expressive potential. In the process, North Catalonian eth-
nicity is both commodifi ed, made into the basis of value- added corporate
collectivity, and claimed as the basis of shared emotion, shared lifestyle,
shared imaginings for the future.
Two Angles on the Amazon, Peru
Frame 1: Welcome to the Land and Life- Ways of the Shipibo
Experience the Shipibo3 Way of Life for yourself in the heart of the Amazon Basin with
our Peru Eco-T ourism adventure! Learn how to make Shipibo ceramic artwork, go
spear fi shing in the Amazon river and much, much more.
Find ancient Shipibo remedies for various illness ranging from the common cold
to cancer and receive visionary consultation from licensed Shipibo Shamans.
Meet New Friends.
Chat with a Shipibo in Peru via Email, Instant Message, or Phone.
SHIPIBO HOME PAGE4
2
PROLOGUE
FRAME 2: On Tourism and Traditional Healing
Mateo Arevalo, 43, was born into a family of traditional healers, or curanderos, in the
Shipibo community of San Francisco de Yarinacocha in Peru . . . While Arevalo’s fore-
fathers put [their] knowledge to local use, generally treating their neighbors on a pro
bono basis, Arevalo is proud to apply it to a wider audience . . . He now leads posh
retreats in jungle lodges for foreigners, and hosts shamanism students in his home for
three- or six- month courses.
“I am an innovator, adding to my ancestral knowledge,” he explains. “We, the
Shipibos, are like any other human community—we need to grow and change. We
can’t just stay the same so that the tourists can stare at the naked Indians in feath-
ers and anthropologists can treat us like a living museum.” . . . Ayahuasca ceremonies
[ayahuasca is a powerful hallucinogen used in shamanic practices—JLC/J C] can be pur-
chased in most major tourist destinations in Peru, and numerous jungle lodges now
offer ceremonies or retreats, the latter costing in the neighborhood of $700–$ 1,500 a
week. RACHEL PROCTOR, CULTURAL SURVIVAL, 2001
Once more, tradition is offered in alienable form, here as indigenous
knowledge that inheres in Shipibo identity: ‘ceramics,’ ‘remedies for ill-
nesses’ both trivial and dire, ‘licensed shamanism,’ even a ‘way of life.’ In
this case, though, cultural products and practices are directed explicitly
at consumers of the exotic, of spiritual reclamation, of jungle adventure.
Their transaction conjures a curious mix of the intimate and the remote
(‘chat with a Shipibo . . . via Email’); it bespeaks the close distance charac-
teristic of mass- mediated difference where the promise of self- discovery is
the fl ip side of self- estrangement.5 Once more, as well, the ‘ancestral’ ap-
pears as a creative source of innovation, a view at odds with conventional
understandings of “culture” as “heritage” or “custom.” Culture, now, is
also intellectual property, displaced from the ‘museum’ and the ‘anthro-
pological’ gaze, no longer ‘naked’ nor available to just anyone pro bono.
Kenyan Chronicles, 2005
The First: Letter from the Field
An interesting development on the Ethnicity, Inc. front here: the defunct GEMA—
Gikuyu, Embu, Meru Association—is being reconstituted. Since the new president is
Gikuyu, they seem to feel that it is time to assert their interests again. What is interest-
ing is that there is now a fi nancial wing that will be involved in “venture capital,” . . .
turning tribe into corporation. The new GEMA is called MEGA.
ROB BLUNT, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO, 8 AUGUST 2005
3