Cultural Anthropology

Head of section : Danielle de Lame

Overall objective

• Anthropological approach to social dynamics over time, including cultural products which are the vectors of these dynamics and the meanings which the actors ascribed thereto.
• Rural and urban studies including local development and political systems, gender relations. This is the aim of the ‘bottom-up’ knowledge approach that is the speciality of the Section.
  

Scientific staff

• Danielle de Lame, Head of Section and project leader
  - Social and cultural sciences, specialized in rural Rwanda
  - Work on anthropology of  urban cultures
  - Work on social changes linked to unequal contacts, including development problems
• Cristiana Panella, attaché under mandate
  - Social sciences, specialized in Mali
  - Anthropological approach of informal and illegal networking (African art market)
  - Cultural heritage and local populations
  - Mining activities in rural areas (social economical aspects and systems of representation)
  

Research activities

• Continuation of previous work on Rwanda, work in progress on Nairobi, research on popular urban cultures (Kenya, South Africa, Congo), training and publication on the gender and development problem, training in research methods in the field of social anthropology.
  D. de Lame
  

Projects

• Afrique des villes, Afriques d’aujourd’hui
  (Cities, Africas of Today)
  Study of the popular urban cultures of Nairobi, Lubumbashi, Cape Town and Johannesburg, in particular with a view to a publication and, in the longer term, an exhibition.
  Head of project : D. de Lame
  Funded by : Directorate General for Development Cooperation (DGDC)
  Partner institutes :
  - National Museums of Kenya
  - Musée national de Lubumbashi
• Rwandan bibliography
  Update in the form of a non-annotated bibliography of the Bibliographical Encyclopaedia of Rwanda, published by M. d’Hertefelt and D. de Lame of the RMCA in 1987. 
  Publication director : D. de Lame
  Funded by : Federal Science Policy (2000-2003)
• Mali - Sud (2004-2007)
  Anthropological wing of the project 'Mali-Sud' (archaeological and anthropological research in the valley of the Sankarani, Mali) studying social economical activities and systems of representation on the south bank of the river Sankarani.
  The coming years (2004-2007) foresee in the continuation of field research in Mali, and in publishing a co-edited monograph (scientific collaboration between the RMCA and the 'Institut italien pour l'Afrique et l'Orient' in Rome, Italy)
  Head of project : Samou Camara, Doctor in Prehistory and Anthropology (Rome, Italy)
  Funding : Italian Ministery of Foreign Affairs, 'Institut italien pour l'Afrique et l'Orient' (Rome, Italy) , RMCA.
  Partner Institutes :
   - Institut des Sciences Humaines du Mali (Bamako)
   - Centre national de la Recherche technique et scientifique (Bamako)