About the Book
Evans-Pritchard was perhaps the most influential anthropological scholar of the twentieth century. His extraordinary work in Africa has formed a central foundation to anthropological thought since the 1930s, with generations of anthropologists having read and appreciated his ethnographies of the Azande, Nuer and Sanusi, and his analyses of social structures, belief systems and history. And yet, though so much has been written about his work, a rounded understanding of the person has proved elusive.
This volume covers Evans-Pritchard as a promising student, a young graduate in search of career opportunities, an adventurous cultural explorer, a determined officer in the Second World War, and an ambitious department-building professor
with a global reputation. Against a glittering array of contexts and characters – from Malinowski to Marett to the Maharaj of Kutch; from Oxford poets and pubs to Catholic conversion in war-torn Libya – there emerges a fascinating study of a figure
who was much more than an innovative anthropologist.
A portrait of the man and his time is composed from personal correspondence, archives and familial recollections, contributions from surviving friends and students, and accounts by those, including contemporary African scholars, who continue to
debate and re-evaluate his work in all its complexity. This book is a fitting monument to Evans-Pritchard’s legacy and a landmark in anthropological historiography.
Table of Contents:
Foreword: Evans-Pritchard and the paradoxes of anthropology - Francis Mading Deng
Acknowledgements
I: Introduction
Introduction - André Singer
Autobiographical fragments - Edward Evans-Pritchard
II: Personality and memories
'My Soul there is a Country': E-P in the mirror of poetry - Bruce Ross-Smith
Trickster and mystic: The anthropological persona of E.E Evans-Pritchard - Michael Kenny
The house that E-P built: The Oxford Institute of Social Anthropology in the mid-1950s - Raymond Apthorpe
'A feeling for form and pattern, and a touch of genius': E-P's vision and the Institute 1946-70 - Wendy James
E.E. Evans-Pritchard: A note in memoriam - Roy Willis
A decade of memories: 1961-71 - David Hicks
The man, the society, the conditions: Influences on E. E. Evans-Pritchard's early fieldwork - John Evans-Pritchard
III: Insights through correspondence
A glimpse of Evans-Pritchard through his correspondence with Lowie and Kroeber - Piero Matthey
Evans-Pritchard and Marett: Or how E-P found a job - David Shankland
A letter to E.E. Evans-Pritchard - Lucien Lévy-Bruhl
Correspondence between Evans-Pritchard and Meyer Fortes - Susan Drucker-Brown
Perilous mentoring, fraught friendship: Between Evans-Pritchard and Gluckman - Richard Werbner
Professor Sir Edward Evans-Pritchard's correspondence: Extracts from his surviving letters - Ahmed Al-Shahi
IV: In Africa
Evans-Pritchard as a pioneer of African history - Douglas H. Johnson
The E-P legend: Perspectives from the Sudan - Wendy James
Latakia to Benghazi: E-P and the war years - Deirdre Evans-Pritchard
Types of relationships between men and animals in Nuer Religion - Timothy Jenkins
Thinking outside the box: An exploration of E-P's Azande fieldwork through his supply case - Pierre Lee
Attempted portrait: From cover to context in Evans-Pritchard's Luo photography - Christopher Morton
E.E. Evans-Pritchard: A Japanese Perspective - Eisei Kurimoto
V: Contemporary relevance in Africa
Introduction to Part V: E.E. Evans-Pritchard: Perspectives on his contemporary relevance in Africa - Tim Allen
HIV/AIDS and Evans-Pritchard in Azandeland - Tim Allen
Zande chieftaincy and kingship: Historical memories, future visions and reinstatement of a Zande kingdom - Bruno Braak and John Justin Kenyi
'Anthropology became the magic': Perspectives on Evans-Pritchard from Juba - John Gai Yoh, Melha Ruot Biel and Kim Jal Lieh, compiled by Naomi Pendle
Evans-Pritchard's works on the Nuer and their relevance to contemporary South Sudan - Leben Nelson Moro
Teaching and reading Evans-Pritchard as a Ugandan anthropologist - Grace Akello
Un-scripting African cultures: Historical tensions and contemporary possibilities for anthropology in East Africa - Elizabeth Ngutuku and Auma Okwany
VI: Continuing impact
An interesting misunderstanding? - Harriet D. Lyons and Andrew P. Lyons
Theories of primitive religion - Douglas Davies
E-P's attraction for cognitive anthropology - David B. Kronenfeld
Segmentary lineage systems re(re)considered: The example of the Alevis of Anatolia - David Shankland
Segmentary lineage among the Tiv: Bohannan's work as inspired by Evans-Pritchard - Gary Seaman
Anthropology is friends - Juan Ossio
Comparison as cultural translation: South Asian diasporic coextension and bicentric networks - Ravindra K. Jain
VII: Appendix
A biography and bibliography of E.E. Evans-Pritchard - Tom Beidelman, with additions by André Singer
Contributors
Index
About the Author :
Editor: André Singer is Adjunct Professor of Anthropology at the University of Southern California and Professorial Research Associate at London School of Oriental and African Studies.
Contributors: Juan Ossio Acuña, Grace Akello,Tim Allen, Ahmed Al-Shahi, Raymond Apthorpe, Tom Beidelman, Melha Ruot Biel, Bruno Braak, Douglas Davies, Francis Mading Deng, Susan Drucker-Brown, Deirdre Evans-Pritchard, John Evans-Pritchard, David Hicks, Wendy James, Ravindra K. Jain, Timothy Jenkins, Douglas H. Johnson, Michael Kenny, John Justin Kenyi, David Kronenfeld, Eisei Kurimoto, Pierre Lee, Lucien Lévy-Bruhl, Kim Jal Lieh, Andrew Lyons, Harriet Lyons, Piero Matthey, Leben Nelson Moro, Christopher Morton, Elizabeth Ngutuku, Auma Okwany, Naomi Pendle, Gary Worth Seaman’s, Bruce Ross-Smith, David Shankland,Richard Werbner, Roy Willis, John Gai Yoh.
Review :
No other anthropologist has had Evans-Pritchard’s unique combination of theoretical sophistication and ethnographic skill in a number of very different contexts, and his personal charisma. This volume will be an essential reference for anyone seeking to understand the mercurial man behind the classic monographs.David N. Gellner,Professor of Social Anthropology and Fellow of All Souls, University of Oxford. A deep account of his life and work, lovingly assembled, and containing many nuggets of memory and analysis of a rare kind. Capturing something of a great man in a great period, it is a fascinating read and a fitting tribute to someone who shaped a generation of anthropologists.Alan Macfarlane, Emeritus Professor of Anthropology, King’s College, Cambridge. What emerges in this remarkable volume is a complex character whose attributes cannot be easily and holistically represented, but he vividly comes through in biographical accounts, interpersonal correspondence, recollections of family members, friends, students and colleagues, and, of course, his own scholarship. Ambassador Francis Deng, United Nations Special Representative on Human Rights, and Special Representative for the Prevention of Genocide until 2012. A valuable contribution to the discipline’s history through his time; both locally in Oxford, and globally. Hilary Callan, Director Emerita, Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland.
