History Memory And Victimhood Among The Kumpal Agw In Northwest Ethiopia

How the past is commemorated and memorialized in a negative way and definesrnidentity of a particular ethnic group as such is one of the least studied and exploredrntopics in social and cultural anthropology. This dissertation studies what appears tornbe a mesmerizing but disempowering relationship between the past and the presentrnamong the Kumpal-Agäw. It does so through qualitative methods of interviews,rnobservation, focused group discussion, case studies and written sources.rnThe Kumpal-Agäw today believe throughout history, and in some respect untilrntoday, their ancestors and they themselves have successively lived under oppressivernrulers. The ancestors of today’s Kumpal used to pay tax in every kind and receivedrnevery form of punishment if they “disobeyed”. Once upon a time, under one of therncruelest rulers, they were asked to give tax of beautiful young daughters. However,rnthey found the demand too harsh to comply with. They took consul among eachrnother to decide on the right course of action. Accordingly, they came up with anrnelaborate plan on how to successfully defy the plan and get away with their action.rnThey decided to kill the tax collectors when they come to their village and to avoidrnretaliation, they would go on exile leaving behind their home and villages. To makernsure that there would be no traitors from their midst who would compromise andrnfrustrate the plan, they entered solemn oath under pain of perpetual curse. At longrnlast the plan was successfully executed. They killed the tax collectors when theyrnarrived to the village to take away the girls as a form of tax, and then the peoplernevacuated the village at once to avoid retaliation. Unfortunately, as they made littlernprogress with the voyage, they found a river bursting to its bank because the exodusrnwas made during a rainy season. Worse, information was leaked and the enemyrnsoldiers were approaching them from behind. Some prayed to the river; and thernriver was kind enough to split into two and allow them to pass safely. Others hadrnabsconded into the bush. Consequently, the absconders were cursed for breakingrnthe oath they took to act in a collective determination. The curse is believed to bernperpetual/eternal passing from generation to generations. Today’s Kumpal believernthemselves to be descendants of the “cursed” absconders. Thus they believe they arerncursed too. They are cursed to be poor and not capable of getting rich. They arerncursed to remain “uneducated” and not capable of education. They are also cursedrnnot to have rulers from their own community and, thus, despite today’s ethnicrnfederalism, they still live under the domination of highlanders. The curse is arncomprehensive one which addresses almost all aspects of the Kumpal life. This storyrnof oppression and curse is interpreted into the everyday life and almost everyrnfailure in life today is attributed to this curse. This memory is also elaboratelyrnreproduced by oral narratives and annual commemorative ritual of Fifi To interpret this collective memory, the dissertation entered into the thrust of thernfollowing theoretical questions. Is this Kumpal memory a myth or something whichrnhas a historical reality? How does “history” make its way into collective memory?rnSince the memory of the Kumpal is the memory of victimhood, how can arncommunity reproduce an identity that undermines itself? The dissertation uses therndynamics of memory approach to explain the relationship between history andrnmemory. I argue that memory among the Kumpal is neither entirely historicallyrnauthentic nor merely a myth. Rather, it contains edifices of the past which evidencernfor some sort of historical validity while it has been reinterpreted through culturalrnsystem of cursing. Within this approach, I have attempted to contribute a “culturalrnmodel” of memory reconstruction. Apart from debates on the relationship betweenrnhistory and memory, the dissertation also entered into the heart of the otherrntheoretical question: how can a community reproduce negative identity, in the casernof the Kumpal, I call, an identity of victimhood? Here also, I hope to have made newrncontribution to the existing discourse of victimhood identity. Social science theoriesrnbelieve that memory is selective; only those “useful” ones are maintained whilernnegative ones are repressed or “forgotten”. I argue otherwise: a memory ofrnvictimhood can even be actively reproduced when it is a moral duty to do so. Hence,rnI formulated a “moral theory” of memory in particular and identity in general.rnThe people, the Kumpal-Agäw, are found in northwest Ethiopia, in particular to thernsouthwest of Lake T’ana. It is one of the splinters of Agäw, an old ethnic group whichrnwas historically dominant in the entire northern half of Ethiopia, but has beenrnbroken apart into today’s different dialectical minority groups. The Kumpal are notrnrepresented in official census (latest one is in 2007), and I, assisted by local experts,rnestimated them to constitute a sheer maximum number of 15,000 people. They arernleast studied; there is no work at all on this group in social sciences and humanities,rnlet alone in anthropology. What I can mention are only a couple of works in the fieldrnof linguistics

Get Full Work

Report copyright infringement or plagiarism