In a communication which I addressed to the members of the Institute last October I informed them that the Bureau had decided that despite the difficulties created by the outbreak of war it was the duty of the Institute to continue as far as possible to promote the study of Africa and its peoples as long as such work could be maintained in accordance with the international character of the Institute. In particular it was felt that the publication of the Journal should be continued. Recent events have greatly altered the situation. Apart from such technical difficulties as shortage of paper, it is clearly impossible now to maintain a sufficient measure of international collaboration for the Journal. It was hoped also that the Institute could continue its series of publications during the war; but, while one book has already been published and it is hoped to complete the publication of others which have already reached an advanced stage, it would be impossible in present conditions to consider any new publications. In these circumstances it has been decided by the British members of the Bureau that the Institute should suspend its activities for the rest of the war. I deeply regret that this course should be unavoidable, and I look forward to the Institute resuming its work, as soon as possible after the war is over, in accordance with the scheme adopted in principle by the Executive Council in June 1939.

Le but de cette étude est de formuler certaines remarques au sujet de la situation réelle ou supposée de la femme indigène dans les collectivités de l'Ouest-africain. Une littérature abondante et variée a été consacrée depuis longtemps à cette thèse qui s'est enrichie récemment de démonstrations nouvelles. Mais, parmi les auteurs qui ont collaboré à ces exposés, nombreux sont encore ceux qui s'accordent pour peindre avec les mêmes expressions, les mêmes traits et les mêmes exemples la condition misérable des Négresses, vendues contre leur gré, tout au moins sans leur consentement, à des maris qui se conduisent à leur égard comme des brutes sauvages, les traitent en esclaves, les font travailler ainsi que des bêtes de somme, les mettent en gage pour payer leurs dettes, les louent et les prostituent afin d'en tirer profit. Le veuvage, observe-t-on, ne libère pas ces créatures misérables, puisque la coutume les oblige à demeurer dans la famille de leur défunt mari, à épouser et servir jusqu'à la mort un parent de ce dernier. Elles sont de plus contraintes de supporter la polygamie et ses conséquences, sans pouvoir réagir contre des habitudes dégradantes, sans nourrir même I'espérance d'améliorer leur sort, n'ayant point, dans leur malheur indicible, la ressource de constituer, comme leurs sœurs d'Europe, des ligues des syndicats de défense, et de se mettre en grève.

The Barolong belong to the Western cluster of the Sotho group of the Bantu-speaking tribes of South Africa. The Western Sotho, who are commonly called the Tswana, are scattered over a considerable portion of South Africa, including the whole of Bechuanaland Protectorate, the portion of the Cape Province known as British Bechuanaland, the western Transvaal and a portion of the Orange Free State. Although the Barolong are to be found mainly in British Bechuanaland, they are in the peculiar position of being strongly represented in all the political divisions of Southern Africa referred to above, for they have important settlements in the Lobatsi district of Bechuanaland Protectorate; in the Lichtenburg district of the Transvaal, and in the Thaba Nchu district of the Orange Free State as well as in the Vryburg and Mafeking districts of British Bechuanaland (Cape Province).

Généralitiés. Aucune société ne peut vivre sans une organisation judiciaire, sans juridictions qui tranchent les différends surgissant entre ses membres et punissent leurs transgressions des règles impératives édictées par ses dirigeants. On trouve de nos jours une confirmation assez curieuse de cette vérité dans la multiplication des tribunaux privés fonctionnant dans toutes ces grandes fédérations sportives qui sont une des manifestations de notre civilisation. Mais cela est vrai aussi pour les populations dites non civilisées, et par exemple pour les indigènes du centre-africain.

The publication of Mr. F. J. Pedler's note on what are called ‘joking relationships’, following on two other papers on the same subject by Professor Henri Labouret and Mademoiselle Denise Paulme, suggests that some general theoretical discussion of the nature of these relationships may be of interest to readers of Africa.

Predominant in a territory which extends roughly 500 miles north from the lower Zambezi and from the eastern shore of Lake Nyasa to the Luangwa Valley, there is a body of Africans who have for their mother tongue some dialect of the language widely known as ‘Chinyanja’. The chi- (or ci- in modern orthography) is the local form of the usual Bantu prefix to the tribal name, designating the language rather than the district or personnel of the tribe, and may be discarded in English usage. Following a now general convention, the language will be referred to here simply as ‘Nyanja’.

There is reason to believe that at one time the greater part of the Gold Coast had one simple type of social organization. Where destruction of this took place the disturbing influences spread from the North southwards. On the coastal plains are some areas which, for various reasons, were barely touched. In these areas the aboriginal type of social organization is preserved, more or less intact, to-day.

The conception of bwanga among the Bemba of Northern Rhodesia is very similar to that recorded by Edwin Smith among the Ila and by C. Doke among the Lamba. In collecting the following material I have, however, followed a slightly different method. The traditional method of studying this subject has been in the main categories of ‘Magic’, ‘Taboo’, ‘Omen’, and so on. While this has proved useful in collecting together many facts under their appropriate heads it has resulted in taking, as it were, a cross-section through native thought. The native does not think in these categories, he observes an object and knows certain facts about it; whether it is edible, fierce, or dangerous, whether if found in a certain way it constitutes an evil omen. The arrangement of my material, therefore, has been according to this latter method, i.e. taking one object at a time and recording as much about it as possible. The two methods are represented diagrammatically on a later page, the traditional method being equivalent to reading the columns vertically: the method here adopted reads them horizontally.

For many years colonial governments in Africa have made occasional use of the services of trained social anthropologists. Sometimes they have employed them directly as ‘Government Anthropologists’, sometimes they have subsidized students in the employ of scientific bodies for particular pieces of research. But it was left for Sir Hubert Young, as Governor of Northern Rhodesia, to set up in 1937 the first institute for systematic sociological research in colonial Africa.

The Sudan falls into two distinct cultural parts: the Arabicspeaking Islamic peoples of the north and the heterogeneous pagan peoples of the south. This note is intended as a short guide to those who, while not themselves specialists, desire to know what ethnological research has been done in the Southern Sudan, where the results of this research are to be found, and the point investigations have reached at the time of writing.

The following short study is not presented with the assumption that it is a complete record and analysis of the omens of the Fanti. It is presented rather with the hope and appeal that some one else who is now living in the Gold Coast Colony will undertake to work out this problem more thoroughly than I have been able to do.

Dans toute l'Afrique noire la littérature orale apparaît très développée; les nombreux récits rapportés des différentes régions ont permis des rapprochements intéressants avec certains contes des autres continents. Récits et contes ont été classés, avec juste raison, par les savants européens en plusieurs groupes. On observe en général les distinctions suivantes: mythes, légendes, récks historiques et contes.

This paper is an attempt to analyse briefly the literature on the Nandi-speaking peoples of Kenya with the object of noting structural similarities and differences between them. In particular the inquiry is directed to discovering whether their political structures conform to the same general type.

Le lendu ou ba dha (ba le dha) est parlé à l'extrême nord-est du Congo belge, sur la crête de séparation des bassins du Nil et du Congo et environs. (Environ entre le 1° et le 2° 15′ Lat. N.; entre le 30° et le 31° Long. E.G.) Le lendu se subdivise en deux groupes linguistiques bien distincts. Le groupe nord comprend les dialectes (très rapprochés les uns des autres) pariés entre le 1° 35′ et le 2° 15′ Lat. N.; et du 30° au 31° Long. E.G. Le groupe sud comprend les dialectes parlés au pays de Géty, avec comme limites approximatives: Lat. N. 1° 35′ à Lat. N. 1° et Long. E.G. 30° à Long. E.G. 30° 30′.