Sow What You Know: The Struggle for Social Reproduction in Rural Sudan

Abstract

Abstract The unity between production and social reproduction is under constant threat of dissolution. The practices by which it is maintained or threatened are the stuff of everyday life, and can be witnessed on the ground. A key practice of social reproduction is the socialization and education of children. This piece presents detailed findings on various practices of social reproduction—the production, exchange, and deployment of environmental knowledge—and points to the transformative potential inherent in the mundane practices of work, play, and learning. The village of Howa in Sudan has been incorporated within a state-sponsored agricultural development project and the content, mode of acquisition and utility of children's environmental knowledge has thereby changed dramatically. In addressing these, my larger research goal is to locate instances of rupture, resistance, or reformulation in the face of socioeconomic and cultural-ecological change imposed externally. The study employs ethnographic met...