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Apr 3, 2024

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Readings/Videos ● Textbook chapter: Chapter 9: Resolving Conflict in Sociocultural Anthropology: A Problem-Based Approach ● “R. Brian Ferguson discusses ‘Violence: An Anthropology of War” part 1 (4:08 minutes) ● 6:10 - 10:39 ● Egyptians in the southern levan they changed because of pharos and it became violent ● Napoleon yanomami ancestors in stone age. Early 17th century ● “R. Brian Ferguson discusses ‘Violence: An Anthropology of War” part 2 (1:42 minutes) ● “Margaret MacMillan: How War Made Humanity” part 1 (2:11 minutes) ● “Margaret MacMillan: How War Made Humanity” part 2 (2:53 minutes) ● “Margaret MacMillan: How War Made Humanity ” part 3 (3:08 minutes) Learning Outcomes By the end of this lesson, you should be able to: 1. Explain how anthropologists define violence, war, conflict, and peace. 2. Characterize and compare societies described as “peaceful” and “fierce”. 3. Summarize rhetoric that is used to justify collective violence. 4. Identify how states use both ideology and violence to control their populations. 5. Review anthropologists’ approach towards studying violence, conflict, and peace. 6. Explain how the abuses of Indigenous children in Canada constitute genocide. Key Terms Violence

“Is an innate human tendency and that peace is simply the absence of violence” (Robbins and Cummings 2017, 255). Warfare “Can be defined as systematic, organized, and institutionalized fighting between different groups” which started 10,000 years ago (Ferraro and Andreatta 2014, 338). Peace Is not an absence of war, it is a virtue, a state of mind, a disposition for benevolence, confidence, justice (Spinoza in Sponsel and George 2022, ix). Conflict resolution “Is seen in both domestic and international situations. Conflict resolution can signify anything from peer mediation in school systems to peacebuilding efforts in civil wars and arbitration of consumer- retailer disputes” (Davidheiser 2007, 11).

“WAR AND SLAVERY IN SUDAN” In keeping with our tradition of starting each lesson with a short autoethnography, this final week you will read an excerpt from a book War and Slavery in Sudan by Sudanese scholar Jok Madut Jok. Trained in the anthropology of health, he holds a Ph.D. from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). I am a South Sudanese anthropologist who has been studying Sudan all my academic life. I now teach at a university in the United States. My career as a Sudanist, without a doubt, began with the knowledge I acquired from personal experience as a native son. But this knowledge became more specialized after 1993 when I undertook field study in South Sudan for my doctorate at the University of California, Los Angeles. That research project examined the impact of the unresolved North-South civil war on the family, gender relations, and reproductive health in northern Bahr el-Ghazal in southwestern Sudan. Moreover, while I was in Bahr el-Ghazal conducting research, I also worked for a humanitarian relief agency. Having been seriously understudied due to war, which made travel in the region difficult, South Sudan presents an ambitious researcher with the temptation to do it all. Therefore, while I was documenting the interaction between the behaviors and attitudes of militarized youth, on the one hand, and traditional gender relations, on the other, during my first period of fieldwork, my research extended into more issues than I had planned. Such topics as household decision making regarding pregnancy, abortion, sexuality and sexual violence, sexually transmitted diseases, childbirth, care for the young, and other reproductive health issues took the center stage of my dissertation research. Yet, the temptation to document other tragedies such as government militia raiding, displacement, loss of assets, preemptive migration, and the dismal future of the family was far too great to resist. By 1995, about twelve years after the second round of the civil war began, South Sudan had lost a third of its population to war, famine, and displacement to the North or neighboring countries. Suffering abounded and there was an immediate need to understand it. This book chronicles the current wave of slavery in Sudan (…) the current revival began in 1983 with the beginning of the second round of North-South conflict. Northern Sudanese Arabs capture and sell (or exploit in other ways) large numbers of African Sudanese, primarily the Dinka, Nuer, and Nuba of central Sudan.

The problem with writing this book is that its topic is controversial. When one writes from the perspective of one’s own people and when one has a responsibility toward the whole country, there is a certain degree of ambivalence involved. There is no doubt that I will be seen as focusing on the concerns of Southerners, but if I do not focus on the victims of the crisis I am studying, I could also be blamed for trying to marginalize the very people whose agony I am trying to expose. I am conscious of the possibility that my having only worked in the South could bias my views. But I have made an equally conscious attempt to be objective in presentation. While no one writing on Sudan’s tumultuous and tragic history can claim absolute neutrality, I have tried to express the concerns of Southerners without being anti-North. In this lesson, among many other things, we will explore challenges faced by anthropologists conducting research in a war zone. One of them, as Jok points out, is the fact that most topics are understudied, given the difficult and often dangerous access to the field. Another challenge is linked to the fact that war has its own rules, inevitably encroaching upon one’s research. Regardless of one’s research interests, anthropologists must address the impact of war on people’s lives. Furthermore, a considerable number of anthropologists investigating communities ravaged by war often have roots in those very communities. This personal connection poses a challenge as it may result in a lack of adequate distance from the researched topic. While scholars recognize the imperative to exercise caution and not to choose sides, striving to remain as fair and objective as possible to all parties involved in the conflict, this is no small feat. Failing to do so might have long-term negative consequences. Consequently, conducting anthropological research in a war zone carries significant responsibility. IS CONFLICT INEVITABLE? Political anthropology is the field that examines how people handle disputes (Lavenda and Schulz 2020, 189). Its findings suggest that all societies develop strategies to manage conflict if they want to survive (Nanda and Warms 2018, 167). These strategies and their outcomes, as authors of our textbook observe, vary greatly. “In some cases, conflict results in collective violence” (Robbins et al. 2017, 255; Kottak 2022, 118). In other instances, more peaceful forms of conflict resolution are preferred. Before we take a closer look at these different outcomes, we first should understand what conflict and its potential results—peace and violence—mean (Robbins et al. 2017, 255).

Violence and Peace Violence “is a category in between peaceful disputing, and major planned warfare and fighting” (Robbins et al. 2017, 256). Peace is commonly defined as the absence of violence. Thus, because it is often thought of negatively as the lack of war or aggression, we might have a limited understanding of how we can attain it. In other words, our attention is often directed towards preventing war, rather than figuring out what conditions could help us to sustain peace (Sponsel and Gregor 2022, ix). To cite Canadian anthropologist, Roger Lohmann, “peace is a group activity, carried on by members of one community toward members of another community, in which the primary purpose is to maintain mutual benefit by successfully deploying means for enhancing political relations and preventing violence, by either directing contacts with goodwill or avoiding one another with an attitude of peace” (in Robbins et al. 2017, 256). The Question of Human Nature The ongoing debate over whether human nature is inherently violent or peaceful spans centuries. A very pessimistic view was put forth by Thomas Hobbes, asserting that human beings are inherently prone to aggression to the extent that without a controlling state, they will harm others (Robbins et al. 2017, 263). The views of this 16th-century English philosopher were in alignment with a popular Christian belief of the time regarding the “innate depravity” of people (Sponsel and Gregor 2022, xii). Another similar opinion on this topic was formulated by the founder of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud, who argued that “aggression is part of their [human] instinctive endowment” (Sponsel and Gregor 2022, x). Given the fact that the period in which this Austrian neurologist lived was characterized by wars, it is not surprising that his views were so grim. Much has changed in the past century. Although anthropologists recognize that “collective violence is nearly universally sanctioned” (Robbins et al. 2017, 256), the prevailing belief among them is that the root causes of violence lie in social, historical, cultural, material, and ecological conditions (Nanda and Warms 2018, 172) rather than in an innate aggressive tendency (Robbins et al. 2017, 256). Furthermore, some

argue that compelling historical evidence supports the claim that humans are capable of building peaceful societies. Peaceful Societies Anthropologists agree that peaceful societies are uncommon. Some “’enclaved societies’, such as the Hutterites or the Amish, which cultivate a distinct culture and live within a larger society” are recognized as such (Knox Dentan in Sponsel and Gregor 2022, 70). The members of these communities oppose violence on religious grounds (Robbins et al. 2017, 260). Consequently, in 350 years, there has been no instance of a Hutterite killing anyone (Knox Dentan in Sponsel and Gregor 2022, 70). According to anthropologist Thomas Gregor, peaceful societies are hard to come by, but they are most likely to be found among some hunter-gatherers, for example the Hadza of Tanzania, the Arapesh of New Guinea, the Zapotec Indians of Mexico, the Inuit, the Ju/’hoansi, the Semai of Malaysia, and the Xinguano of the Amazon (Sutton 2021, 81; Sponsel and Gregor 2022, xii; Ferraro and Andreatta 2014, 338; Robbins et al. 2017, 261). There are several reasons for the reluctance of foragers to engage in prolonged warfare. First, they lack ownership of land, eliminating one major reason for war—territorial disputes. Second, as small-scale communities, most members are related, decreasing the motivation to harm potential family members. Moreover, the unpredictable food supply of hunters and gatherers makes engagement in extended combat physically risky. Finally, the absence of centralized authority that is required for orchestrating and funding prolonged conflict further lowers the likelihood of their occurrence (Ferraro and Andreatta 2014, 338; Robbins et al. 2017, 263). How do peaceful societies maintain balance? As the authors of our textbook observe, they develop bias against violence by appreciating nonaggressive conduct, by establishing interdependence among individuals and groups, and “by engaging in collective behaviours that promote harmony” (Robbins et al. 2017, 263). Furthermore, they prevent conflicts over resources by placing a strong emphasis on sharing and cooperation, with the Inuit providing a notable example of this strategy (Kottak 2022, 118). And finally, foragers minimize violence through ceremonies (Robbins et al. 2017, 262). Maintaining balance, nonetheless, does not equate with successfully managing conflict. What do these societies do to effectively handle disputes? Ethnographic records show that numerous strategies have been developed to manage conflict, with various forms of social control emerging as key tools to achieve this goal (Lavenda and Schulz 2020, 189; Kottak 2002, 118). Political anthropologists define social control as “fields of the social system (beliefs, practices, and institutions) that are most actively involved in the maintenance of any norms and the

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