Chalfin Shea Butter Republic

State Power, Global Markets, and the Making of an Indigenous Commodity
Erscheinungsjahr 2004
ISBN: 978-1-135-94466-7
Verlag: CRC Press
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 315 Seiten

Shea butter (butyrospermin parkii) has been produced and sold by rural West African women and circulated on the world market as a raw material for more than a century. Shea butter has been used for cooking, making soap and candles, leatherworking, dying, as a medical and beauty aid, and most significantly, as a substitute for cocoa butter in chocolate production. Now sold in exclusive shops as a high-priced cosmetic and medicinal product, it caters to the desire of cosmopolitan customers worldwide for luxury and exotic self-indulgence. This ethnographic study traces shea from a pre- to post-industrial commodity to provide a deeper understanding of emerging trends in tropical commoditization, consumption, global economic restructuring and rural livelihoods. Also inlcludes seven maps.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Chalfin, Brenda

Fachgebiete

• Sozialwissenschaften Soziologie | Soziale Arbeit Soziologie Allgemein

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Introduction--West African Shea: From Indigenous Commodity to Postindustrial Luxury
The Setting
1. Making Butter: Indigenous Patterns of Commoditization in Northern Ghana
2. Shea and the Colonial State: Commodity Rule in Northern Ghana
3. Market Reform and Economic Citizenship in Northern Ghana: Promoting and Politicizing Shea in the Wake of Liberalization
4. Chocolate Wars and Cosmetic Contests: Shea as a New Global Commodity
5. Remaking Markets and Shape-Shifting States: Privatizing Shea in Northern Ghana
6. Capital and Cooperation: Rural Women and Market Restructuring
Conclusion--Reconstructing Tropical Commodity Regimes: Cosmopolitan Consumption, Postcolonial States, Multinational Capital, and Rural Livelihoods at the Turn of the Millennium