Olivier P. Gosselain

• Professor (Full) at Université Libre de Bruxelles

The diverse forms of regional connectivity in the ancient world have recently become an important focus for those interested in the deep history of globalisation. This volume represents a significant contribution to this new trend as it engages thematically with a wide range of connectivities in the later prehistory of the Mediterranean, from the l...

This paper is a charge against ethnoarchaeology. Deliberately provocative, it aims at highlighting the flaws and ideological pitfalls of a sub-discipline whose actual contribution to archaeology remains hardly decipherable. Beside a methodological deficiency and the frequent narrow-mindedness of the research agenda, ethnoarchaeology suffers from tw...

Une vieille navette couverte de purin, un sachet plastique troué contenant quelques fuseaux, un morceau de pagnes ayant servi d’épouvantail, des cendres, des fragments de parois en ciment… Autant d’éléments matériels associés à une ancienne filière technique dans le Dendi (Nord Bénin) : filage du coton, tissage et teinture à l’indigo. C’est à parti...

Popular conceptions of 'technology' tend to associate that term with activities governed by science and involving important 'hardware' content, i.e., tools, devices, machines. Conversely, 'technique' would pertain to more mundane activities; built upon non-reflexive routines and implying more direct forms of engagements with materials. This view ha...

In our “global village,” things and practices are currently diffused over such large areas that few, if any, relationships seem to exist anymore between their spatial distribution and salient cultural boundaries. Global products, such as powder milk, canned fish, or digital watches, are found everywhere, from the fringes of Greenland to the heart o...

Since the publication of ‘Why pots are decorated’ (David et al. 1988), pottery decoration has tended to become a secondary concern for Africanist archaeologists, who now favour other topics such as manufacturing techniques or consumption processes. At the time, the paper spelt the end of an endless debate about style that centred on the question of...

Since 2002, ethnographic enquiries have been carried out in some 350 potting communities from Southern Niger in order to constitute an Atlas of extant potting traditions. Part of the investigation is devoted to the tools used at various levels of the chaîne opératoire, and especially the shaping stage. The aim is both to characterize the structure,...

African Pottery Roulette Past and Present: Techniques, Identification and Distribution considers ethnographic, museological and archaeological approaches to pottery-decorating tools called roulettes, that is to say short lengths of fibre or wood that are rolled over the surface of a vessel for decoration. This book sets out, for the first time, a s...

This section draws upon information from ethnographic examples of roulette fabrication and usage in sub-saharan Africa, to set the initial foundations of a systematic classificatory framework for these tools. The simple and elegant framework adopted here for the categorisation of roulettes is articulated around three key characteristics: the materi...

Depuis 2002, des enquetes ethnographiques ont ete menees dans plus de 350 communautes de potieres et potiers au sud du Niger en vue de constituer un atlas des traditions ceramiques contemporaines. L'un des volets de l'enquete est consacre aux outils dont se servent les artisans aux differents niveaux de la chaine operatoire. Il s'agit non seulement...

Tribulations of a Chinese Saucepan in Niger.Starting from a peculiar pottery vessel displayed during an ethnographic fieldwork in South-Eastern Niger, the authors seek to reconstruct the process through which enamelware manufactured in West Africa and Asia have gradually replaced other items in marriage trousseaux and become the main expression of...

© O.Gosselain Dans l’article precedent (Gosselain et al., ce volume), nous avons retrace la trajectoire d’une categorie particuliere de produits – recipients emailles – au sein des trousseaux de mariage de populations du Sud Niger. Cette etude a fait apparaitre un double phenomene de diffusion, celui des objets et celui de leurs usages. Il s’agit m...

Mande Potters and Leatherworkers: Art and Heritage in West Africa. Barbara E. Frank. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1998. 192 pp.

© O. Gosselain Faire figurer un sticker de mise en garde – meme detourne – sur la couverture d’une publication scientifique ne va pas de soi ; surtout lorsque le sticker en question signale habituellement l’usage de grossieretes et d’images explicites dans les disques de rap et de rock. Que les lecteurs se rassurent (ou dechantent) : pas d’obscenit...

Starting with an example illustrating the complexity and variability of behaviours related to clay selection and process- ing, this paper explores the mechanisms underlying the spatial and temporal variations of technical traditions pertaining to these steps of the manufacturing process. Using a large databank on pottery in sub-Saharan Africa, our...

Archaeological approaches to social boundaries are currently emphasizing the dynamic nature of processes thought which individuals construct, maintain, and negotiate their identity. Although the integration of such concepts has led to a more accurate reconstruction of past social boundaries, it has also revealed a need for more sophisticated ways o...

This paper gives a detailed account of the pottery "chaîne opératoire" among Mambila of Northwest Cameroon. The data were collected during two field seasons - in 1991 and 1992 - as part of a systematic research program on pottery technology in several Bantu and Bantoid populations. Six Mambila potters have been observed and interviewed, whose techn...

This paper gives a detailed account of the pottery "chaine operatoire" among Mambila of Northwest Cameroon. The data were collected during two field seasons - in 1991 and 1992 - as part of a systematic research program on pottery technology in several Bantu and Bantoid populations. Six Mambila potters have been observed and interviewed, whose techn...

Previous studies have illustrated the symbolic prominence of pottery making in sub-Saharan Africa. In many parts of the continent, the craft is explicitly connected to a series of other production activities and parts of the technical process often serve as a metaphor for explaining aspects of the human experience and to structure certain rituals....

Résumé Une étude du système de production de poterie en Pays ndera permet de jeter un regard nouveau sur le statut et l'histoire de cet art du feu dans la région du Faro, Nord-Cameroun. Alors que les traits les plus saillants de l'activité suggèrent l'existence d'une grande homogénéité au sein des groupes qui peuplent les deux rives du fleuve, une...

A phytochemical survey of several plant species used in sub-Saharan Africa for the treatment of pottery, as well as some coating experiments carried out with purified extracts ofBridelia ferruginea stem bark, indicated that procyanidin fractions play a predominant role in the coating properties of the plant extracts. The analysis by high performanc...

In archaeology, the stylistic approach to artefacts is most often restricted to parameters which are considered to be completely free from any non-cultural constraint. This view also prevails in pottery studies where the stylistic parameters traditionally used are limited to those of decoration and morphology. Another common conception is that tech...

In this paper serious doubt is cast on the possibility of using firing temperature identifications in technological interpretations of pottery. The comparison of thermometric data for different types of firing structures reveals a large overlap precluding any attempt at technological differentiation on the sole basis of temperatures. Moreover, resu...