West, Harry G. 1966-

PERSONAL:

Born February 23, 1966. Education: University of Virginia, Charlottesville, B.A.; University of Wisconsin, Madison, M.A., Ph.D.

ADDRESSES:

Home—London, England. Office—School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, Thornhaugh St., Russell Sq., London WC1H0 XG, England. E-mail—hw16@soas.ac.uk.

CAREER:

Writer and educator. University of London, London, England, lecturer in social anthropology and chair of the School of Oriental and African Studies' Food Studies Center. Conducted anthropological research in Mueda, Mozambique, 1991-2005.

WRITINGS:

(Editor, with Gregory W. Myers) Proceedings do Workshop Internacional Sobre a Política da Terra em Africa: Maputo, 18-20 de Fevereiro de 1992, República de Moçambique (Maputo, Mozambique), 1992.

(Editor, with Gregory W. Myers) Land Tenure Security and State Farm Divestiture in Mozambique: Case Studies in Nhamatanda, Manica, and Montepuez Districts, Land Tenure Center (Madison, WI), 1993.

(Editor, with Kenneth W. Thompson) Conflict and Its Resolution in Contemporary Africa, University Press of America (Lanham, MD), 1997.

(Editor, with Todd Sanders) Transparency and Conspiracy: Ethnographies of Suspicion in the New World Order, Duke University Press (Durham, NC), 2003.

Kupilikula: Governance and the Invisible Realm in Mozambique, University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL), 2005.

(Editor, with Tracy J. Luedke) Borders and Healers: Brokering Therapeutic Resources in Southeast Africa, Indiana University Press (Bloomington, IN), 2006.

Ethnographic Sorcery, University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL), 2007.

Contributor of essays and articles to periodicals, including Political and Legal Anthropology Review, Journal of Modern African Studies, African Studies Review, American Ethnologist, and Anthropological Quarterly.

SIDELIGHTS:

Social anthropologist Harry G. West, born February 23, 1966, received his bachelor's degree in political and social thought from the University of Virginia and his master of arts, as well as his Ph.D., in anthropology from the University of Wisconsin in Madison. West spent time researching the effects of colonialism, war, and social reconstruction in the Mueda district of Mozambique from 1991 to 2005, and he has taught courses, such as the "Anthropology of Food" and "Societies and Cultures of Southern Africa," for the University of London. He has contributed many articles and essays to scholarly publications, including the Political and Legal Anthropology Review, Journal of Modern African Studies, African Studies Review, American Ethnologist, and Anthropological Quarterly. West has written and edited several volumes regarding modern anthropological issues in Africa, including: Proceedings do Workshop Internacional Sobre a Política da Terra em Africa: Maputo, 18-20 de Fevereiro de 1992, Land Tenure Security and State Farm Divestiture in Mozambique: Case Studies in Nhamatanda, Manica, and Montepuez Districts, Conflict and Its Resolution in Contemporary Africa, Transparency and Conspiracy: Ethnographies of Suspicion in the New World Order, Kupilikula: Governance and the Invisible Realm in Mozambique, Borders and Healers: Brokering Therapeutic Resources in Southeast Africa, and Ethnographic Sorcery.

Transparency and Conspiracy, edited by West and Todd Sanders, contains a compilation of nine ethnographic essays, each documenting societal issues emerging from the conflict between modernity and tradition. The text includes discussions regarding globalization, politics, wealth, and religion in a post-Cold War world. West's contribution, titled "‘Who Rules Us Now’? Identity Tokens, Sorcery, and Other Metaphors in the 1994 Mozambican Elections," examines Muedan identity and their reactions to modern political changes, like the voting process, in the context of post-colonialism. William Biebuyck's review for Utopian Studies stated: "Scholars and students interested in the emergence, social significance, and cultural variation of conspiracy narratives in the post cold war era will find this compilation a welcome addition to the otherwise thin literature on the subject. In addition to the rich ethnographies presented, this collection offers the potential beginnings for a new research paradigm that utilizes conspiracy narratives as a legitimate research pathway for understanding globalization." Furthermore, Biebuyck maintained that "the bulk of the essays in this volume present a potential path-breaking model for social scientists to use in uncovering the complex realities that bring culture and global structures to become mutually constitutive." In examining specific situational accounts of various cultures' assimilation of modern practices, "the editors argue that … rich ethnography demonstrates how profound suspicion rather than trust is a characteristic of modernity," according to Paul Clough's essay for the Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute.

West's Kupilikula provides an insight into the relationship that exists between community, religion, and politics in Mozambique's Mueda region. This ethnography includes information regarding Muedan religious beliefs and practices, religious reactions to political history, particularly the effects of the slave trade and colonial efforts, and the adaptations and evolution in their belief system as affected by modernity. David McDermott Hughes observed, "West organizes Kupilikula as a series of encounters with alleged sorcerers and their alleged victims. Rather than advancing in article-length strides, his argument unfolds in the course of 28 vignettes" and that "students will find West's style engaging and the book extremely readable," in his essay for the Anthropological Quarterly. West records conversations with Muedan sorcerers and parallels this data with events surrounding the privatization of industry and the decentralization of the government that occurred in Mozambique in the early 1990s. Hughes stated, "With verve and insight, West conveys the atmosphere of suspicion, doubt, and ambiguity prevailing on the Mueda plateau," and noted, "implicitly, Kupilikula raises the age-old, colonial question regarding witchcraft: is it bad, good, or tolerable? In his recounting of Muedan history, West suggests a policy of tolerance." Moreover, Stephen Lubkemann, in an article for the International Journal of African Historical Studies, commented that Kupilikula "is a nuanced and intriguingly crafted ethnohistorical account of how uwavi (sorcery) has endured for over a century as the predominant local discourse." The text "carefully traces the continuities and changes in uwavi throughout the most significant political-economic dispensations that have reshaped social existence on the Muedan plateau," claimed Lubkemann.

Likewise, Borders and Healers concentrates on the African peoples' merging of politics and religion. West both edited and wrote for the volume, and International Journal of African Historical Studies reviewer Melissa Graboyes found that he "presents very interesting case studies of healers in northern Mozambique" and "probes the blurry line between who is a traditional healer rather than a modern healer and what constitutes indigenous knowledge as opposed to modern knowledge." Graboyes concluded that the "book will surely find readership among anthropologists who focus on southeast Africa" and that "they will appreciate this regional study, which provides both themes and variations on the subject of healers and borders."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Africa Today, September 22, 2007, Bill Derman, review of Kupilikula: Governance and the Invisible Realm in Mozambique, p. 130.

American Historical Review, February 1, 2007, review of Borders and Healers: Brokering Therapeutic Resources in Southeast Africa, p. 321.

Anthropological Quarterly, November 1, 2005, David McDermott Hughes, "Of Sorcery and State," p. 1001.

Canadian Journal of History, December 22, 2006, Magnus P.S. Persson, review of Kupilikula, p. 606.

Choice, December 1, 2003, review of Transparency and Conspiracy: Ethnographies of Suspicion in the New World Order, p. 785; December 1, 2003, L.O. Imade, review of Transparency and Conspiracy, p. 785; July 1, 2006, V.J. Baker, review of Kupilikula, p. 2038.

Current Anthropology, February 1, 2005, Debbora Battaglia, "The Ambiguity of Transparency," p. 153.

International Affairs, March 1, 2006, Patrick Chabal, review of Kupilikula, p. 403.

International Journal of African Historical Studies, January 1, 2007, Melissa Graboyes, review of Borders and Healers, p. 154; March 22, 2007, Stephen Lubkemann, review of Kupilikula, p. 303.

Journal of African History, November 1, 2006, Jeanne Marie Penvenne, "Power and Governance in Northern Mozambique," p. 512.

Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, December 1, 2004, Paul Clough, review of Transparency and Conspiracy, p. 935.

Utopian Studies, March 22, 2003, William Biebuyck, review of Transparency and Conspiracy, p. 223.

ONLINE

University of London School of Oriental and African Studies Web site,http://www.soas.ac.uk/ (May 12, 2008), faculty profile.