The Center for Global Peace & Conflict Studies presents:

“Having People, Having Heart: Charity, Sustainability, and the Problem of Dependence in Buganda”
with China Rose Scherz, Graduate Student, Department of Anthropology, History, and Social Medicine, University of California at San Francisco

Monday, March 8, 2010
12:00-1:30 p.m.
Social Science Tower, Room 777

Abstract
As sustainability and community-ownership have emerged as guiding principles for international development, many faith-based non-governmental organizations in Uganda have moved away from providing charitable “handouts” and have instead attempted to foster sustainable community-based institutions. Despite the popularity of these ideas among members of the local and international development communities, Baganda villagers experience these shifts not as acts of empowerment, but as suspect refusals to redistribute wealth. Based on her 2007-2008 ethnographic research on contemporary interactions between sustainable development, indigenous Kiganda ethics of patronage and mutima (heart), and older forms of Christian charity, Scherz offers a reading of this conflict that works to unsettle what are often assumed to be foregone conclusions about the ethics and effects of dependency in the post-colonial world.

Light refreshments will be provided. Please RSVP by Wednesday, March 3rd to Jayne Lee, jayne.lee@uci.edu or 949-824-1640.

Funding provided by the President's Dissertation Year Fellowship Program, Peace Gift, Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation (IGCC) of the University of California, and the Vice Chancellor for Office of Research (OR) at UCI.

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