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Before the integration of Gambella to the Ethiopian kingdom, the region was occupied by five groups, mainly the Anuak and the Nuer. They still live in this region, between Ethiopia and Sudan.
The Nuer were nomads and pastoralists. The ‘grand-father’ of anthropology Evans-Pritchard studied the Nuers in the 1930’s. He showed that Nuer society is a “segmentary”: that means the society is organized by groups of genealogic lineage. Groups makes alliances based on exchanges of cattle… in brief, cattle is one of the most important ressource of the region… and a matter of war!
"Gambella stories" presents words and pictures collected in and about Gambella, a remote place on the Ethiopian border with Southern Sudan. A place entangled with wars, failed dreams of reason and casualities of unproductive globalisation.
"Gambella Stories" is not a proper documentary or an essay but a thoughtful daydream. The disconnection between pictures and texts tries to reflect the disjunction between the apparent quietness of the place and the concealed ongoing dynamics of violence.
The narratives parrallels Conrad's Heart of Darkness sarcasms: going down a river, searching for light in the Heart of Darkness.
Contact: turkairo@gmail.com
All pictures and texts: ©turkairo, 2008 and 2009
Do not use without my authorisation.
Quotations ©Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness, London, Penguin Books, 2000 for the present edition.
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