bakwerirama

Book Review - Namondo (Child of the Water Spirits)

Originally Published in Summit Magazine no. 006

Ntemfac A.N. Ofege. Namondo (Child of the Water Spirits). Langaa Publishers. November, 2007. 360 pages (Paperback). Available from Amazon.com ($24.95) and African Books Collective (£19.95)

Ntemfac A.N. Ofege forays into the customs and traditions of the Bakweri people, the often unfathomable dwellers of the lands below the Fako Mountain (Mount Cameroon to put together a story that is beautiful in content, flowing in style, enthralling in meanders, fetching in intrigue and ethereal in plot. The plot of this book is bustling, fascinating and lingering. This page-turner keeps the reader wondering what next.

Book Review: Ewumbue-Monono’s Blueprint for Political Revival in Fako Division

Reviewed by Dibussi Tande

Ewumbue-Monono, Churchill. 2001. Indigenous minorities and the future of good governance in Cameroon: an inquiry into the politics of local governance in the local councils of Fako Division, 1866-2001. Buea, Cameroon: Center for Research on Democracy and Development in Africa. 345 pages (5000 francs CFA).

I had the opportunity this weekend to finally read Churchill Monono’s seminal book, Indigenous minorities and the future of good governance in Cameroon: an inquiry into the politics of local governance in the local councils of Fako Division, 1866-2001. It is, without doubt, the most comprehensive and most detailed book ever written on the political history of Fako division. Not only does it give a detailed chronology of local politics in Fako in the past century - with a detailed list of all councilors in Fako since 1935 - it also tackles head-on, the native-settler problem which has bedeviled ethnic relations and politics in the division for close to a century – a problem which now manifests itself at national level as the Northwest / Southwest problem.

Book Review of "Sophia's Fire": A Fako Sage's Ouevre

Reviewed by Emil I Mondoa, MD

Sango Mbella. Sophia’s Fire. Pittsburgh, PA, G&V Publishing. 2005 (ISBN 0-9768150-0-1)

Sango Mbella is the nomme de plume of a United States-based sage and writer, who seems to prefer a degree of anonymity at this time.  His publisher, who sent me a copy of his work, “Sophia’s Fire” describes him as a writer, scientist and entrepreneur and holder of several US and international patents and that he hails from Ambas Bay. I understand when writers want to be anonymous, and have no desire to unmask the man of mystery nor to question his reason for not wanting to take public credit for a well-written and profound book.
Sophia is the Greek goddess of wisdom, and fire is the symbol of energy. That gives one an idea of the scope of the book, whose purpose is to impart the reader with the wisdom required to succeed on earth.

Bakweri Marginalization

Marginalité volontaire ou imposée ? : le cas des Bakweri (Kpe) du Mont Cameroun

(Voluntary or Forced Marginality? The Case of the Bakweri Population (Kpe) of Mount Cameroon)

Georges Courade

1979

www.bondy.ird.fr/pleins_textes/pleins_textes_4/ sci_hum/02960.pdf

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KINGDOM ON MOUNT CAMEROON

KINGDOM ON MOUNT CAMEROON

Studies in the History of the Cameroon Coast 1500-1970

Edwin Ardener

Shirley Ardener (Ed.), Centre for Cross-Cultural Research on Women, Oxford

" ... collected in a single volume, [these papers] become a rich case study of an African people'srelations with various European agents over more than four centuries." Choice

" ... a true treasure ... challenging example of how history and anthropology can be combined inpractice ... such a combination can offer a deeper understanding of present-day issues andtensions." Africa

The Bakweri people of Mount Cameroon, an active volcano on the coast of West Africa a fewdegrees north of the equator, have had a varied and at times exciting history which has broughtthem into contact, not only with other West African peoples, but with merchants, missionaries,soldiers and administrators form Portugal, Holland, England, Jamaica, Sweden, Germany andmore recently France. Edwin Ardener, the distinguished social anthropologist who spoke theirlanguage, wrote a number of studies on the history and culture of the Bakweri Kingdom. Someof the unpublished writings, and some of the published but now out of print materials are herebrought together for the first time. The book covers the early contacts with the Portuguese andDutch from the sixteenth century, the arrival of the missionaries in the nineteenth century, thedramatic defeat of the first German punitive expedition, the subsequent establishment by theGermans of the plantation system, and the British Trusteeship period until independence in 1961as part of the Federal Republic of Cameroon.

1996. 400 pages, 4 maps., 1 fig., 9 ills, 4 app., bibliog., index
ISBN 1-57181-929-0 hardback $59.95/£40.00

Volume 1, Cameroon Studies

http://www.berghahnbooks.com/titles/Ardener.htm

SWEDISH VENTURES IN CAMEROON, 1833-1923

SWEDISH VENTURES IN CAMEROON, 1833-1923: Trade and Travel, People and Politics

The memoir of Knut Knudson, with supporting material, edited and with commentaries by Shirley Ardener

"Knutson's memoir is very well balanced out with the addition of extracts from the diaries of some of those he refers to , as well as of other contemporary commentators on that region." -Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute

The 1880s were a critical time in Cameroon. A German warship arrived in the Douala estuary and proclaimed Cameroon a protectorate. At that time, two Swedes, Knutson and Waldau, were living on the upper slopes of the Cameroon Mountain. Very little is known about their activities. One, Knutson, wrote a long memoir of his time in Cameroon (1883-1895) which is published here for the first time. It gives fascinating insights into everyday life in Cameroon and into the multifaceted relationships among the various Europeans, and between them and the Africans, at the end of the 19th century; we learn about the Swedes' quarrels first with the Germans and later with the British, over land purchases, thus revealing the origins of long on-going disputes over Bakweri lands. We are given vivid descriptions of Bakweri notables and their, and the Europeans', cultural practices, a rare eye-witness account of the sasswood witchcraft ordeal, and learn about Knutson's friendships with slaves. Together with appended contemporary correspondence, legal opinions, and early (translated) texts, this memoir must be considered as a unique and invaluable primary source for the pre-colonial history of Cameroon.

Contents: Sweden and the Cameroons - Fauna and Flora - Misery and India Rubber - the German Invasion, 1884-1885 - Travel in the Interior, 1885 - The Ancient Races - Adventures on Cameroon Mountains and in Biaffran Swamps - Religion and Customs of the Bakhiviris and Bobbokkos - Slave Trade - Black and White - The Missionaries, the Explorers, and the Men I met at the Cameroons - The Future of the Cameroons.

Appendices Knutson and Waldau's Contracts with the Notables on the Cameroon Mountain - K. Knutson, A Climb of the Big Peak of the Cameroon Mountain - G. Valdau, About the Ba-kwileh People - E. Ardener/E. M. Chilver, English Epitome of Waldau's "A Journey to the Country North of the Cameroon Mountain" - Sir Richard Burton's Visit to Mafanja, 1861-1862 - George Thompson's Stay in Mafanja, 1871-1889 - Stefan (Etienne) and Sczolc (Scholz)-Rogozinski, 1861-1896.

Shirley Ardener teaches at the Center for Cross-Cultural Research on Women, University of Oxford, and is a member of the Centre for Cross-Cultural Research on Women, of which she was also the founding director.

2002, 304 pages 5 maps, 12 ills., bibliog., index
ISBN 1-57181-311-X paperback $29.00/£20.00
ISBN 1-57181-725-5 hardback $29.00/£50.00
LC: 2002018269

Volume 4, Cameroon Studies

http://www.berghahnbooks.com/title.php?rowtag=ArdenerSwedish

Swedish Ventures in Cameroon,

BERGHAHN BOOKS

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