Jeudi 20 novembre 2008 – 15h-17h : Le savoir à l’épreuve du corps
Coordinateur : Didier Nativel
Coordinateur : Didier Nativel
- Jennifer Cole (Université de Chicago): Participating in Globalization: ‘girls who move’ in Madagascar
- Thomas Fouquet (EHESS, CEAF): Les savoirs en jeu dans la prostitution clandestine à Dakar
- Thomas Fouquet (EHESS, CEAF): Les savoirs en jeu dans la prostitution clandestine à Dakar
Lieu : Paris 7, Site Tolbiac, salle Jean Dresch
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J. Cole a co-dirigé Generations and Globalization: Youth, Age, and Family in the New World Economy, Indiana University Press, 2007.
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Résumés
Résumés
Jennifer Cole :
In an essay examining the sapphire trade in northern Madagascar, Andrew Walsh remarks that during his fieldwork, while he sought to interrogate miners on the local organization of sapphire mining, they in turn sought to ask him about the global aspects of the trade. “Where is Bangkok’, they asked? ‘What are sapphires used for?,” they queried. When Walsh responded that sapphires were used primarily for jewelry, his informants were amazed. “It’s not possible!,” they said. They took his response to indicate that either he was as uninformed as they were, or alternatively, that he was hiding some kind of knowledge from them, knowledge that if acquired, could make them rich. Yet not all actors in Madagascar are as uninformed as these sapphire miners appear to be. In this presentation, I want to examine another group of actors who see themselves, and who indeed often are, expert at acquiring and distributing the knowledge required to become global actors of a particular sort: the young women that Tamatavians refer to as “girls who move” (vehivavy mietsiketsika). Girls who move are a particular instantiation of a much broader set of ideas about how social networks and social knowledge intertwine to make some actors better situated to participate in the global (sexual) economy than others.
My basic argument is that to begin to understand social knowledge in this context – how it is acquired and circulated—we also need to understand local ideas about how people “make history” and learning as the two are inextricably intertwined. Rural east coasters argue that to be a powerful person, one has to have powerful ancestors. This power is made visible through practices of social competition. Whenever someone is doing well, earning money through their rice, coffee or even cloves, it is inevitable that their jealous neighbors will remark on this success. This in turn causes the ancestors to demand a sacrifice of their descendents. However, the sacrifice in turn is a way for a man to perform his power. Thus, paradoxically, at the same time a sacrifice forces a man to spend money on the community, it also reinforces his power because people talk about how wealthy he is. Nowhere is this competitive dynamic more visible than in the adoption of various European practices. Essentially, east coasters say they see a practice, desire it because the European has it, and then copy it. In turn, their neighbors, not to be outdone, decide to copy the practice as well. These ideas continue to operate in urban contexts, but in a different guise. Young people—both young men and women—put enormous effort into “studying” the latest new things. Indeed, while many theories of globalization imply that global change takes place from “above,” created by institutions like the World Bank, it is important to recognize that Madagascar has a long history of incorporating such changes as people seek new ways to “make themselves living.” In contemporary Madagascar, one of the primary ways that young women seek to gain access to foreign resources is by building relations with the French and European men who come to Madagascar in ever increasing numbers. Their ability to do so depends on two kinds of knowledge that are interrelated: knowledge of Western practices, on the one hand, and the knowledge that comes from long-term social network on the other. For these women, knowledge is indeed power, as Foucault observed, but that knowledge is deeply embedded in social, not discursive contexts.
In an essay examining the sapphire trade in northern Madagascar, Andrew Walsh remarks that during his fieldwork, while he sought to interrogate miners on the local organization of sapphire mining, they in turn sought to ask him about the global aspects of the trade. “Where is Bangkok’, they asked? ‘What are sapphires used for?,” they queried. When Walsh responded that sapphires were used primarily for jewelry, his informants were amazed. “It’s not possible!,” they said. They took his response to indicate that either he was as uninformed as they were, or alternatively, that he was hiding some kind of knowledge from them, knowledge that if acquired, could make them rich. Yet not all actors in Madagascar are as uninformed as these sapphire miners appear to be. In this presentation, I want to examine another group of actors who see themselves, and who indeed often are, expert at acquiring and distributing the knowledge required to become global actors of a particular sort: the young women that Tamatavians refer to as “girls who move” (vehivavy mietsiketsika). Girls who move are a particular instantiation of a much broader set of ideas about how social networks and social knowledge intertwine to make some actors better situated to participate in the global (sexual) economy than others.
My basic argument is that to begin to understand social knowledge in this context – how it is acquired and circulated—we also need to understand local ideas about how people “make history” and learning as the two are inextricably intertwined. Rural east coasters argue that to be a powerful person, one has to have powerful ancestors. This power is made visible through practices of social competition. Whenever someone is doing well, earning money through their rice, coffee or even cloves, it is inevitable that their jealous neighbors will remark on this success. This in turn causes the ancestors to demand a sacrifice of their descendents. However, the sacrifice in turn is a way for a man to perform his power. Thus, paradoxically, at the same time a sacrifice forces a man to spend money on the community, it also reinforces his power because people talk about how wealthy he is. Nowhere is this competitive dynamic more visible than in the adoption of various European practices. Essentially, east coasters say they see a practice, desire it because the European has it, and then copy it. In turn, their neighbors, not to be outdone, decide to copy the practice as well. These ideas continue to operate in urban contexts, but in a different guise. Young people—both young men and women—put enormous effort into “studying” the latest new things. Indeed, while many theories of globalization imply that global change takes place from “above,” created by institutions like the World Bank, it is important to recognize that Madagascar has a long history of incorporating such changes as people seek new ways to “make themselves living.” In contemporary Madagascar, one of the primary ways that young women seek to gain access to foreign resources is by building relations with the French and European men who come to Madagascar in ever increasing numbers. Their ability to do so depends on two kinds of knowledge that are interrelated: knowledge of Western practices, on the one hand, and the knowledge that comes from long-term social network on the other. For these women, knowledge is indeed power, as Foucault observed, but that knowledge is deeply embedded in social, not discursive contexts.
Thomas Fouquet
En 2001, j’ai entamé une enquête ethnographique dans les milieux festifs noctambules dakarois (boîtes de nuit, bars, restaurants), avec pour objet initial certaines formes de prostitution clandestine et de sexe transactionnel féminins. Au-delà de ce qu’une approche strictement factuelle aurait pu qualifier de « carrières prostitutionnelles » (Cf. H. Becker sur la « carrière déviante »), je me suis avant tout attaché à saisir les dynamiques à l’œuvre dans ces pratiques. Les « filles courant d’air », comme j’ai appelé celles qui ont fait l’objet de mon ethnographie, ne se laissaient assurément pas enfermer dans un quelconque groupe statutaire. Bien au contraire, elles échappaient sans cesse à mes tentatives de catégorisation : à travers un jeu consommé de l’ambigüité et de l’invisibilité, déclinant le temps noctambule sur le mode du mouvement continu (en véritables « courants d’air », donc). Progressivement, j’en suis venu à requalifier ces carrières prostitutionnelles en itinéraires d’apprentissage, au long desquels sont glanés des « savoir-faire » et « savoir-être » mobilisables stratégiquement car valorisables socialement : ce que j’appellerai ici un « savoir social ». Pour ces jeunes femmes, il s’agissait (en toute dernière analyse) de s’approprier des « compétences cosmopolites », lesquelles sont sources de prestige et d’autorité personnelle, mais aussi constitutives d’un capital stratégique dans lequel puiser pour multiplier les occasions de gains tant matériels que symboliques.
C’est à un décryptage de ces « compétences cosmopolites » que je vais me consacrer, suivant deux points.
Je reviendrai d’abord sur ma trajectoire de recherche, et particulièrement sur quelques arguments permettant d’éclairer cette reconsidération des carrières prostitutionnelles, en itinéraires d’apprentissage d’abord, en trajectoires d’extraversion enfin (la détention relative de compétences cosmopolites fonctionnant comme un « levier »). J’aurai alors à réfléchir à la question du corps (féminin et séduisant en l’occurrence) comme instrument de capitalisation matérielle mais aussi symbolique.
Dans un second temps, j’élargirai le spectre en proposant une rapide discussion, d’abord sur les fondements historiques de la valorisation de ces « compétences cosmopolites » dans le Sénégal contemporain, ensuite sur ce que tout cela peut apporter à une réflexion sur la fabrique des savoirs en Afrique en général, et sur ce que peut être un « savoir social » en particulier. J’aurai finalement à démontrer que la « compétence cosmopolite », entendue comme savoir social, tire son efficacité stratégique de ce qu’elle ressort de « rhétoriques universalistes » qui représentent un des legs coloniaux, certes relativement discret, mais néanmoins des plus conséquents. Elle fonctionne finalement comme un argument permettant d’énoncer son appartenance à la « société mondiale ».
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