In a cup of tea: Commodities and history among Samburu pastoralists in northern Kenya
In this article, I explore the 20th-century history of Samburu pastoralists through the lens of a particular beverage, tea. In classic anthropological analyses, "drug foods" such as tea have been taken as emblematic of the spread of global capitalism. Tea, however, is a rare example of a c...
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Published in | American ethnologist Vol. 30; no. 1; pp. 136 - 155 |
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Main Author | |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
Oxford, UK
Blackwell Publishing Ltd
01.02.2003
American Anthropological Association American Ethnological Society Wiley Subscription Services, Inc |
Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | In this article, I explore the 20th-century history of Samburu pastoralists through the lens of a particular beverage, tea. In classic anthropological analyses, "drug foods" such as tea have been taken as emblematic of the spread of global capitalism. Tea, however, is a rare example of a commodity that Samburu have adopted as a central component of a self-defined "traditional" culture specifically counterposed to change. Tracing historical transformations in practices and meanings associated with tea use, I consider both the processes underlying its acceptance and their import in explicating broader processes through which Samburu agents have negotiated contexts of change. |
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Bibliography: | ark:/67375/WNG-8V2222TX-C istex:A28DEB0C8E036F3C3D9B37BF887B938777E99A9F ArticleID:AMET136 ObjectType-Article-2 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-1 content type line 23 |
ISSN: | 0094-0496 1548-1425 |
DOI: | 10.1525/ae.2003.30.1.136 |