Strangers to the city : Urban man in Jos, Nigeria

Strangers to the city : Urban man in Jos, Nigeria

anthropologie, ethnologie, urbanisation, migration urbaine, urbanité, mutation sociale, Jos, Nigeria, Plotnicov Leonard

Extract from the introduction :   The object of this study is to describe and analyze the adjustments individuals make to modern conditions of urban development in a West African community. For most parts of tropical Africa, cities were not part of the traditional cultures, and did not exist until they emerged during colonial times in response to economic stimuli or administrative needs... It was within this general pattern that Jos, the setting for the present study, came into being... Since Jos is a relatively young city, most of the residents were born and raised elsewhere; the cultural milieu of Jos is different from their traditional way of life... Geographically and culturally, almost everyone is a stranger to Jos.   The reactions of these immigrants to the unfamiliar setting and tensions of modern city life raise many questions for scholars interested in processes of modern urbanism or in the conditions of contemporary African social change. For example, in adjusting to modern urban existence, how important is an individual's exposure to such Western institutions as Christian churches, schools, army life, and wage employment? To what extent does prior exposure to urban life - whether traditional or modern - ease the adjustment? Will persons of different traditional African cultures respond differently to modern urban life? How commutted to maintaining an urban existence are the immigrants to the city? And, above all, what consistent patterns in urban adjustments are discernible in the experience of these residents of Jos?   The late Leonard Plotnicov was professor of anthropology at the University of Pittsburgh and editor of the journal Ethnology.  

Leonard Plotnicov

University of Pittsburgh Press

1967

336

Ouvrage

http:// http://digital.library.pitt.edu/cgi-bin/t/text/text-idx?idno=31735057895918;view=toc;c=pittpress