ABSTRACT

First Published in 1992. This is a study of what happened to Kongo society and culture at the turn of the 20th century, when the area was penetrated, brutally violated and colonized by Europeans. This book is the outcome of a project called Society and Culture in Crisis whereby the author found that evolution was a continuous, more or less unbroken process only at the global system level, whereas repeated rises and falls took place at the local level. This study closely looks at the declining development process in the Lower Congo and calls to the effects of colonization on society and culture.

part I|90 pages

Transformation of the social order

chapter 1|44 pages

The factory system

chapter 2|44 pages

Catastrophe and creation

part II|36 pages

Personhood and the dynamics of culture

part III|110 pages

Transformation of the cultural order

chapter 4|53 pages

From religion to magic

chapter 5|28 pages

Witchcraft as imaginary cannibalism

chapter |9 pages

Conclusion