Carola Lentz wins ASA’s 2014 Herskovits Award

GSA is happy to bask in the reflected glory of Carola Lentz’s win of the prestigious Melville J. Herskovits Award (2014) for her book Land, Mobility and Belonging in West Africa (Indiana University Press).

The Herkovits prize is awarded to the author of outstanding original scholarly work published on Africa in the previous year.

The ASA Board of Directors will sponsor an ‘Author Meets Critic’ panel on Carola’s book during the 58 Annual Meeting from 19-22 November 2015 in San Diego, CA.  (Session XII-I-1 on Sat, 21 Nov from 4:00-5:45 pm).

Lentz, Land, Mobility and BelongingAbout the book:   Focusing on an area of the savannah in northern Ghana and southwestern Burkina Faso, Land, Mobility, and Belonging in West Africa explores how rural populations have secured, contested, and negotiated access to land and how they have organized their communities despite being constantly on the move as farmers or migrant laborers. Carola Lentz seeks to understand how those who claim native status hold sway over others who are perceived to have come later. As conflicts over land, agriculture, and labor have multiplied in Africa, Lentz shows how politics and power play decisive roles in determining access to scarce resources and in changing notions of who belongs and who is a stranger.  [http://www.iupress.indiana.edu/product_info.php?products_id=806843]

Read reviews of the book here.

Carola Lentz is Professor of Social Anthropology in the Department of Anthropology and African Studies at Johannes Gutenberg University, and a long-time member of GSA.

Carola Lentz[picture right] In recognition of her research and publications on the Nandom Traditional Area and her longstanding  support for the Kakube Festival, Carola Lentz was awarded the title of Maalu Naa (Development Chief) by Nandom Naa Dr. Puoure Puobe Imoro Chiir VII, the Paramount Chief of Nandom, Upper West Region, in December 2013.