The book begins with a reflexive section that places Kedzierska-Manzon in the field, commenting on ethics, aesthetics and human relationships, and introducing the topic of the book: the habitus and imaginaries of Mande hunting practices. She examines hunters' political and ritual power as well as their physical and symbolic violence as actors on a micro and macro social level.
Kedzierska-Manzon's methodology is outlined in the introduction. The book is based on the author's doctoral thesis from 2006 and follows its structure. She conducted fieldwork for a total of fifteen months from 1995 to 2007 in northern Côte d'Ivoire, rural Guinea (Niagasola) and Mali (Narena and Bamako), where she was initiated into the hunters' brotherhood. She firmly places herself in the Mande mindset as a researcher, which will potentially increase the hosts' power in local politics. Theoretically, the research is well grounded in Bourdieu's concept of habitus, Geertz and Turner's perspectives on ritual, and Taussig's understanding of mimesis. The author complements these anthropological perspectives with others from drama and theatre studies (Stanislavski, Barba) to discuss the body. She finally uses Foucault and Scheper-Hughes to discuss the study of violence in the hunters' context.
The book unfolds in three main parts, each preceded by a transitional chapter that focuses on a particular aspect of identity, the imaginary, or the practices of the hunters. Such a structure is not typical, but it enables the main parts of the book to problematize violence and power, habitus, and mastery of the hunters' world. These chapters offer descriptions, which allow the contextualization and comprehension of the topic.
The first part is organized around the concept of violence and power. It is preceded by a description of hunting practices and the traditional image of hunters along with the history and structure of their brotherhood. After that, the author describes modern brotherhoods and their interconnection with the idea of violence in contemporary West Africa. She then presents the socio-political context of hunters' interventions and interrogates the legitimacy and function of the postcolonial state in the area. She also analyses precolonial political imaginaries of the Mande, the traditional Mande social structure, and Mande conceptions, epistemologies, models and interpersonal relationships before addressing the question of symbolic violence expressed in religious beliefs and practices. Kedzierska-Manzon explains that the image of the hunter in popular imaginaries indicates his mediating and liminal position in relation to the bush. Finally, she remarks on ethics, the epistemology of Mande hunters and the attributes of their symbolic power, both social and coercive.
The second part of the book is preceded by a chapter that analyses the relationship between the hunter and his surroundings. She examines hunters' habitus, particularly kinetic schemas: the hunter's way of walking; his extra-masculine attitude in movement; and his body balance. She considers the hunter's perceptions of the environment and ways to detect his game, identify and consider dangers, and orientate himself during his hunting activities. She also comments on hunters' biorhythm and movement, which implicates a number of deprivations (food, sex and sleep). Finally, she proposes a set of hypotheses regarding the mental state associated with hunting practices that influence the effectiveness and emotionality of hunters towards the bush and hunting game (vide mental). She explores representations of hunters in oral history along with descriptions of interactions, real or imaginary, between the hunter and his partners and adversaries: women and hunted game.
Part 3 proposes commonalities between hunt and ritual, two activities of intense experience, both violent and pleasant, that transcend the frame of the ordinary. She does this by considering the traditions of hunters (donsoya), the local religious system (bamanaya), and different approaches to the hunt as ritual: its liminal character, the masculinity of the body, its social function, its non-ordinary spatial frame, and the individual experience on which it relies. She questions hunting practices in the contemporary context, and hypothesizes on the capacity of hunters to manage violence efficiently and to participate in social transformations.
Kedzierska-Manzon deliberately questions the continuity of this traditional model and considers the movements and modern associations of hunters. She explores the progressive disappearance of the hunting habitus that represents the foundation of the legitimacy of hunters as administrators of violence and masters of the occult. Thus, she questions the possibility that hunters in contemporary Africa can maintain their historical roles without also maintaining their roles as ritual experts.
While the bibliography is impressive and a glossary is included, and the book is accompanied by a DVD, the volume lacks an index, which makes navigation difficult. The table of contents is not detailed enough and I found myself going back and forth trying to find sections that I wanted to revisit. The fragmented structure may also be an issue for a more conservative reader, as the transitional chapters disrupt the ethnography both aesthetically and conceptually. Nonetheless, the transitional chapters are informative and well written, consistent with the main chapters of the volume. Kedzierska-Manzon's writing is fluid, with many references from other authors, including Mande experts (Arnoldi, Arseniev, Bird, Camara, Cisse, Conrad, Derive, Hellweg), contemporary thinkers (Descola, Mbembe) and anthropologists (Csordas, Taussig, Viveiros De Castro). The arguments are solid and well presented.
Kedzierska-Manzon has produced an important text that can be used as reference by anyone with an interest in anthropology and African studies more broadly, and it is a welcome addition to the body of studies on West African hunting practices and the Mande.
