Dancing Skeletons, Life and Death in West Africa as authored by Katherine Dettwyler is one of the most read ethnography of the modern days. The widely known ethnography has also won the Margaret Mead Award. Notably, Katherine Dettwyler was a biocultural anthropologist on a mission in West Africa, Mali. In her work in the field, she discovered that Malian population especially the children have a myriad of problems and risks. This risks included diseases such cancer, malaria, schistosomiasis HIV/Aids and other health risks like malnutrition accidents and even homicides. Dr. Katherine moved to Mali during her pursuit for a Ph.D., and after acquiring it, she went back to Mali primarily to research malnourishment among the West African children within the country an attempt to understand it impacts the country’s developmental goals. In her quest, Katherine Dettwyler discovered that is the diseases such as malaria is more prevalent in young children. In Bamako alone, Dr. Katherine also identified that a significant number of children all over the state are infected or show symptoms of schistosomiasis and other infections.
Methods and Personal struggles
The book ‘Dancing Skeletons Katherine has expounded and explored several diverse topics within Mali; such are diverse ethnocentrism, child care and nutrition, initial culture shock, overwhelming population management, disability challenges, infant deaths, cancer of female genital mutilation (FGM) the significant roles of women in the patriarchal society. There were also health risks in fieldwork as she also encountered more emotionally wearing veracities. Katherine illustrated how her nutritional and malnutrition research on children within the country were conducted and performed.
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Illustratively, Katherine employed the use of quantitative methods; this method is mostly used by ethnographers basically to complement and enhance qualitative research approaches. In anthropology, qualitative research approach is used comprehensively to portray human manners in its contexts while quantitative research approach seeks to identify prototypes in numerical data that may be used to understand the human behavior. Typical research such as an anthropological nutritional analysis places most of the reliance on collecting and using quantitative approach because it requires an extensive collection of data. Katherine's explored how factors such as culture, economy political and environmental aspects affect and co-relate in terms of human health within Mali and West Africa. In her book, Katherine identified the need and explained that she conducted her nutritional research in Bamako by weighing, testing and measuring her research subjects. The subjects were mostly children that he uses to collect and collate a variety of quantitative data that she analyzed to comprehend the causes and the consequences of malnutrition.
Dancing skeletons title is itself symbolic. The symbolism method captured by this title refers to the children dancing (Dettwyler, 1994). It is rather one of the literary style or method. In the same breath, Katherine also employed the methods of using humor as a method in her writing style as compared to other ethnographers. The use of both humor and tragedy throughout the book portrays and invokes that motivational effect for any reader to look forward to the next chapter and go through the entire book. Katherine uses engaging dialogue from the introductory part of the book towards the end. This method walks the reader through the personalized experience to reality and initial comprehension with emotions, frustration and even amusements in the book.
Comparatively, Katherine in her quest and research in Mali, Bamako faced several personal challenges and struggles regarding the nature of her work. Most of this problems and struggles included the health risks and problems. The HIV/AIDS prevalence, malaria, schistosomiasis and a myriad of other potential infections posed a greater risk through Katherine’s work and research in Bamako and villages like Dogo. Secondly, Katherine also personal struggle related to parenting, it is evident that she had to also tag along with her daughter to Mali despite the risks and challenges involved. Her daughter Miranda, in such an environment, while conducting her work primarily juxtaposition both of them, to the adverse health risks (Dettwyler, 1994). This was evident when Miranda contracted deadly malaria that was almost fatal
Significantly, Katherine also had struggled with the cultural shock with the Malians; this revolved around unwanted cultures such as the female genital mutilation that was much prevalent in several West African countries. In Mali, the people do not believe in providing proper food for the children. “….she’s just a child. She doesn’t need good food. You’ve been working hard all morning, and she’s just been lying around” (Dettwyler, 94). Malians believe that adults should be fed on enough food and children should be fed millet and rice. Education and language barrier was also a struggle for Katherine, the majority of the Mali people in villages like Dogo don’t value education, literacy, sanitation and proper nutrition. Similarly, Katherine had struggled with finding proper housing,
In conclusion, it is notable that chapter 12 captures the thematic title of this book, the dancing skeleton. Overall Katherine attempts to give a comparison between the Malian social economic and cultural aspects with that of a developed nation such as the western countries. In Mali, the phenomenon of giving children a balanced diet is a new trend, and at most, it is taken for granted. Katherine captures well the use of humor, emotions, frustrations, tragedy and personally personalizes the narrations. The essence is to invoke the reader’s emotions and feelings towards the story and the theme.
References
Dettwyler, K. A. (1994). Dancing skeletons: Life and death in West Africa . Illinois: Waveland Press.
