Ethnographical and Genealogical Study of the Inhabitants of the Village of Nkok-Ekié (North Gabon) in Their Migration Since the Pre-Colonial Period up Until the Modern Day

By Monsieur Félicien Assoumou Akue

After attending for many years Diop conferences in USA, Dr Assoumou explains how the origins of
someone are important for anybody.

He begins by telling why he was interested in social sciences even if he is a surgeon. He focuses on his village, and it can be the same examples in many other villages in Africa. He did a research, and found some reasons why people go from one village to another. The organization of the family is explained according to Ntoumou people. Some customs are still applied by people, namely polygamy, the marriage of widow, beliefs, the names of the children.

Finally the genealogy of the village is given in a simple way.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Apr 11, 2012
• ISBN: 9781467001106

Book preview

Contents

PREAMBLE AND INTRODUCTION

PREAMBLE 

Self-analysis 

INTRODUCTION 

FIRST PART 

PART TWO 

THIRD PART 

FOURTH PART 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 

APPENDICES 

APPENDIX 1: 

APPENDIX 2:  

APPENDIX 3: 

APPENDIX 4:  

APPENDIX 5:  

APPENDIX 6:  

APPENDIX 7:  

APPENDIX 8:  

APPENDIX 9:  

PREAMBLE AND INTRODUCTION

PREAMBLE 

Self-analysis 

On the one hand, why would a doctor of medicine be interested in Humanities?

And on the other hand, which humanity could interest an orthopaedic surgeon?

These are the two questions, which we attempt to address in this preamble.

I arrived in France in November 1986 to take up studies initially in visceral surgery and then later in orthopaedic surgery.

It was while working at the hospital in Lens that, during visits to patients, I noticed that they were talking to me about their psycho-social problems.

While the main problem was resolved, i.e. usually a fracture for which they had been hospitalised, I could see a sort of relapse.

For example, a patient admitted for a broken leg is operated on and, theoretically, should leave hospital in about five days. When visited to announce that they were being released, they would say that they did not know where to go, since they were of no fixed abode.

Some colleagues said that they were surgeons and not paid to act as social workers. Then the patient’s general condition would deteriorate. However, as soon as you took steps to act as a care assistant, to find them accommodation on their release, their health started to improve.

This observation led me to pose the question to find out whether beyond the physical dimension, there was a missing human dimension for a surgeon.

This is what caused me to become interested in the humanities, which study man in general in his socio-cultural context. Anthropology, among others, is a social science that takes this approach towards man.

In 2003-2004, I registered in anthropology at Lille 3 with a favourable mark in the third year of a bachelor’s degree in ethnology, completing two sociology modules, thanks to my doctorate in medicine.

I was awarded a bachelor’s degree in ethnology in 2003-2004.

This dissertation could have been defended during the 2004-2005 academic year during my first year of study for a Master 1 but Professor Gaillard Starzmann, the dissertation director, decided otherwise. A decision which I had difficulty in coming to terms with initially but which I was happy to accept later on.

In my opinion, there were two main reasons for the postponement of the defence:

57746.jpg an absence of methodological rigour,

57748.jpg and the absence of a field investigation.

I had written the dissertation and submitted it to the department secretary in 2005 within the time required.

Two secondary reasons explain the postponement:

57750.jpg the absence of consultation with the dissertation director, the absence of a pre-investigation.

57752.jpg Up until then the investigation had remained restricted to the sending of a questionnaire to individuals living in France and belonging to the village of Nkok-Ekié, which is the subject of the study, according to criteria which we define later.

As for consultation, this was limited to submitting the dissertation to the secretary, for her to hand to the dissertation director.

He then told me verbally of the postponement during a subsequent conversation. It was then that I decided, firstly, to take certain theoretical modules in 2004-2005 and then the rest of the Master 1 modules in 2005-2006, which I did.

Then I had a meeting with Professor Gaillard, having previously sent him the manuscript of the dissertation.

During a conversation in his office, he gave me some recommendations and I accepted with better grace the reasons for the postponement of the defence.

I left for a field study in Gabon in July 2006, and again in May 2007 and August 2007.

After talking to my dissertation director, I can honestly say that I understood immediately why it was necessary to modify my questionnaire or at least add investigative elements, since it was necessary to have four ascending generations for the genealogy.

Then I bought two books in Grenoble on:

57754.jpg genealogy (2.4)

57756.jpg on field studies (1.3).

Then I bought two other books, whose titles were:

57758.jpg Boum le grand (5)

57760.jpg Corpus oraux (6).

This was in Grenoble, since in the meantime, I had been appointed a surgeon at the Centre Hospitalier in Bourg St Maurice (Savoie), which is quite close to Grenoble, a university town.

I decided there and then not to contact my dissertation director before I had acquired the necessary documentation and read it.

No one can grow up in ignorance of their past.

Put another way, just as a tree needs roots to grow, a human being needs his own roots, in order to flourish. This work is part of a reflection which I undertook with children of black African parents, either born in France or coming to France when they were very young. These children spent their childhood or study years in France and therefore have, to some extent, a French culture.

The question is: Will they be completely fulfilled as adults if their parents do not connect them early on to their country of origin.

Taking, as an example, the case of black American children, we realise that, in spite of their long-time presence on American soil, the search for their roots is an important driver and we see many people arriving in adulthood, even in the upper echelons of society, still searching for their identity.

This