Ethnography
Of Benin
Malavika Mantripragada
Angel Yu
Ethnography – A Recap
• The branch of cultural anthropology
that deals with the scientific
description of specific human cultures
• Aspect of cultural anthropology
concerned with the descriptive
documentation of living cultures
Benin – An Overview
• Situated in West
Africa
• Nigeria to east
• Niger + Burkina Faso
to north
• Togo to the west
• Capital city = Porto
Novo
• Stretches 700 km
from Bight of Benin
to Niger River
Benin – Stats
• Population in 2007: 8,078,314
• 0-14 years: 43.9% (male
1,788,248/female 1,754,940)
• 15-64 years: 53.7% (male
2,138,649/female 2,203,291)
• 65 years and over: 2.4% (male
77,844/female 115,342)
• Growth rate: est. 2.674%
Major Infectious Diseases
• Food or waterborne diseases: bacterial and
protozoan diarrhea, hepatitis A, and typhoid
fever
• Vector borne diseases: malaria, yellow fever,
and others are high risks in some locations
• Respiratory diseases
• All of these with very high risks
Religions - Animism
• Main religion = Animism (a.k.a.
Voodooism)
– Originated in Benin
– Practiced by 60% of population
– Recognized as national religion
• Voodoo ceremonies = colorful events
– Involve feverish drumming
– highly charged dancing
– Preformed by fetish priests
Religions – Beliefs and
Fetishes deformed babies, breech babies,
• Belief that
and one of two newborn twins are sorcerers
• Fetishes = protective object
– embodiment of a powerful spirit
– protect believers
• Voodooism + Fetishism still widely practiced
• Only priests communicate with
voodoos/spirits
• Belief that if you do bad and you kneel
down to urinate, the ground will attack you
and leave a pimple on your body.
Religions – Others
• Missionaries brought Roman
Catholicism
– Practiced by 25% of population
– Majority live in south
• Islam is also practiced
– 20% of population is Muslim
– Live mainly in north
Languages - Overview
• Official language = French
• Bariba, Fon, Yoruba (Native
languages) also widely spoken
• Native languages primarily used in
school
Languages - Orthography
• Generally transcribed with a separate
letter for each speech sound
• Mid-vowels written é è, ô, o in French
are written in
Beninese languages
• Consonants written ng and sh or ch in
English are written ŋ and c
• Digraphs used for labial-velar consonants
kp and gb, as in the name of the Fon
language Fon gbe
Economy
• Is underdeveloped and dependent on
subsistence agriculture, cotton production,
and regional trade
• Inflation subsidized over past several years
• plans to attract more foreign investment
• facilitate the development of new food
processing systems and agricultural products
• encourage new information and
communication technology