Games against Nature: An Eco-Cultural History of the Nunu of Equatorial Africa (Studies in Environment and History)

In This Book, Robert Harms Makes An Important Advance Toward Recovering The History Of The People Of The Rain Forest By Telling The Story Of The Nunu, Who Live In And Around Swampy Floodplains Of The Middle Zaire River. Using Concepts Drawn From Game Theory, Professor Harms Explores The Changing Relationship Between Nature And Culture Among The Nunu. Picturing Nunu Society As Animated By A Never-ending Competition Among Lineages And Households, He Traces How The Competition Pushed People Into New Environments, And How Adaption To The New Environment, In Turn, Led To New Forms Of Competition.-- Introduction -- The Antecedents -- The Tactics -- The Strategies -- The Drylands -- The River -- The Core -- The Region -- The Traders -- The Troubles -- The Opportunities -- The Battle -- Conclusion : Nature And Culture. Robert Harms. Includes Bibliographical References (p. [259]-265) And Index. Africa's equatorial rain forests cover an area roughly the size of continental Western Europe, and yet the history of this area remains largely unexplored. Robert Harms makes an important advance in this book toward recovering that history by telling the story of the Nunu, who live in and around the swampy floodplains of the middle Zaire River. A key element in Nunu history has been the small-scale, short-distance migrations that continually led individuals and groups into new micro-environments. When an increasing population impinged upon the limits of available resources in the late eighteenth century, a crisis characterized by drastic change and incessant conflict ensued. The Nunu abandoned their ancestral estates to take up new forms of competition in river towns, causing a conflict of identity which culminated in civil war in the 1960s "In this book, Robert Harms makes an important advance toward recovering the history of the people of the rain forest by telling the story of the Nunu, who live in and around swampy floodplains of the middle Zaire River. Using concepts drawn from game theory, Professor Harms explores the changing relationship between nature and culture among the Nunu. Picturing Nunu society as animated by a never-ending competition among lineages and households, he traces how the competition pushed people into new environments, and how adaption to the new environment, in turn, led to new forms of competition."-- Publisher's website Frontmatter List of Maps (page vi) Preface (page vii) 1. Introduction (page 1) 2. The Antecedents (page 11) 3. The Tactics (page 28) 4. The Strategies (page 57) 5. The Drylands (page 81) 6. The River (page 97) 7. The Core (page 117) 8. The Region (page 135) 9. The Traders (page 157) 10. The Troubles (page 176) 11. The Opportunities (page 199) 12. The Battle (page 218) 13. Conclusion: Nature and Culture (page 243) Abbreviations (page 257) Sources Cited (page 259) Archives (page 266) Index (page 267) TO AN AIR TRAVELER, the equatorial African rain forest looks like a thick, green carpet that stretches to the horizon and beyond.