Expectations of Modernity: Myths and Meanings of Urban Life on the Zambian Copperbelt (Perspectives on Southern Africa) (Volume 57)

For those familiar with the field of anthropology, the topic of modernity is a familiar one, even as expected one. Much ink in the 1980s and 1990s has been dedicated to this hotly debated and contested topic. The reason why modernity is so contested lies in its teleology, its expectation of an end - that the underdeveloped peoples in the Global South will eventually catch up with the western world to become truly modern. Critics then argue that there's no such thing as modernity because it is absurd to assume that all countries march towards the same goals since the very nature of goals is a subjective one.This is the background against which James Ferguson writes his well thought and sensitive ethnography. Rather than validating the finality of the modernity telos (proponents of modernity theory) or dismissing it altogether (critics of modernity) Ferguson focuses on the impact and consequences the very discourse of modernity (one taken on not only by anthropologists but states, corporations and media outlets) has of everyday people.Ferguson begins by acknowledging and deconstructing the discourse of modernity by looking at the history of Zambia from the 1950s onwards. Once hailed as the pearl of Africa due to its copper industry, the sudden drop in commodity prices in the 1970s took its toll on local people who did in fact embark and bought into the discourse of modernity. Workers in the copper fields in Zambia had to deal with the expectation of modernity and the realization that such dreams could no longer be fulfilled.Despite the dramatic economic decline, the discourse of modernity was still there (in Zambia and elsewhere) and it impacted locals in many and profound ways. So the book is both about modernity-making statecraft (with wives of miners being trained into the arts of modern domestic lives), the expectations of retirement (life after work in a modern age) but also the modernity of abjection - where locals develop a sense not only that modernity isn't happening but that modernity in backing in reverse, thus becoming a backwards evolution - and how people think of this reality, how they navigate socially (from the village or the city and viceversa) and how they experience and try to make sense of the many of the pitfalls of their social and economic endeavors.This is an excellent book not only because of its rich theoretical implications but also because of how Ferguson manages to make a very complex topic accessible to the the reader by presenting the history and debates within the field of modernization theory.After reading this book, the buyer should expect:1. To understand the debate around modernization theory (what both supporters and critics have to say about it).2. To understand Ferguson's own take on modernity (which takes a non-liniar, non modernist trajectory)3. To read vivid, often times dramatic ethnographic accounts from the field.4. To be infinitely enriched intellectually around a topic we often talk about without fully understanding what we're saying. :)I strongly recommend this book.

The book was in perfect condition but the book itself was not the most enticing read.

Fergusen, the Chair of Anthropology at Stanford whose book "The Anti-Politics Machine" provides the best academic explaoination of why Basotho love cows takes on Zambian urbanization in this volume. Once one gets past the extremely dense methodological stuff--which takes a while--there's some interesting thoughts on why Zambia, which appeared rich at the time of independence, fell off the map economically and the nature of the transformation (or not) from village dweller to townsperson. He offers some especially interesting insights into the fear that townspeople have of returning to their villages with money in the pocket, including fears of being targeted by witchcraft and physical violence. I tend to think he badly underrates the role of nationalization of the copper mines in Zambia's economic collapse--it's not just that prices went down. If you have a particular interest in Zambia, urbanization, or anthropology, it's a good read, otherwise it's just too dense to be worth it.

I have read many ethnographies in my day, but I can't recall another that has had me at turns astounded by the author's insight, impressed with his prose, saddened by his findings, and laughing out loud at the wry wit of his descriptive voice. I do not normally consider good anthropology "fun" to read, but "EXPECTATIONS OF MODERNITY" bucks the trend. It's well-argued, impassioned, and thoroughly readable.Author Ferguson is concerned with the experience of "modernity" and "development" as lived by residents of Zambia's Copperbelt, who since the 1970s have experienced an unrelenting slide into social and economic marginalization. He works in case studies drawn from individual interview subjects, census data, and textual asides--boxes featuring news clippings from Zambian papers, or brief "People Watching" accounts of the author's street observations with his research assistant. The discussion ranges from meta-narratives of "progress" and "modernization" to an eye-opening analysis of the opposing styles adopted by Zambian urbanites.His conclusion is grim: "For many Zambians... recent history has been experienced not--as the modernization plot led one to expect--as a process of moving forward or joining up with the world, but as a process that has pushed them out of the place in the world that they once occupied." The process of globalization has not connected this corner of Africa (and its inhabitants) to the currents of prosperity traversing the world economy; rather it has disconnected them, throwing them out of the garden of "development." Ferguson stresses that they have not been "left out" of world capitalism; the processes of abjection he describes are integral parts of the system.Even amid the gathering gloom of this analysis, I found myself heartened by the author's occasional humor and by his sympathetic (and self-effacing) accounts of casual encounters in the field. I had not previously had much time for anti-globalization arguments, but Ferguson's disarming approach lowered my skepticism, forcing me to confront the ugly truths of the new world order in a way I had never done before. My hat is off to this man for crafting such a great book.

os trabalhos de James Ferguson são como bons romances, podem ler-se mais do que uma vez e há sempre algo de novo a aprender.este, em especial, é soberbo.

A highly readable and absorbing, as well as challenging book that is not getting dated very fast…..as it so clearly shows, capital, commodities and lives are world-meshed