Mbuti
Controls on Logging and Warfare May Help the Mbuti
Two very different conflicts that have prevented the Mbuti from living safely in their forest homes in the Eastern Congo came to a head during January. Three weeks ago the World Bank admitted—after a fashion—the long-standing error of its ways in fostering the savage devastation of the nation’s forests. Last week the major actors directing […]
Mbuti Bark Cloth Art [magazine article review]
Mbuti men routinely prepare pieces of cloth out of bark, either for local use or for sale to tourists, and the women decorate them with painted designs, some of which are quite interesting. Cathryn M. Cootner, herself a long-time collector of bark cloths and the former curator of textiles at the de Young Museum in […]
The Indigenous People of the Congo and the World Bank
The campaign by the Mbuti and the other indigenous societies of the D.R. Congo against destructive logging that is supported by the World Bank is again gaining attention in the news. The Financial Times reported last Friday it had obtained a copy of a new World Bank document, which is defensive of the Bank’s record […]
Mbuti Press their Case in Washington
The indigenous peoples of eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), including the Mbuti, have taken their forest preservation campaign directly to the headquarters of the World Bank in Washington. Supported by the Rainforest Foundation and Greenpeace, the leaders of three indigenous organizations in the DRC flew to Washington last week to attend the annual meeting […]
World Bank Report May Help the Mbuti
An internal investigative panel within the World Bank has just prepared a stinging indictment of the industrial logging the Bank is supporting in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The damning report prepared by the bank’s Inspection Panel, due to be discussed shortly by the board of the Bank, was leaked on Wednesday last week to […]
Elections, Indigenous Peoples, and Networking in Brazzaville
During its recent national elections, the government of the Republic of Congo marginalized and exploited the nation’s minority indigenous societies, including the Mbuti, according to some observers. Human rights activists charge that the government did not prepare the indigenous people for the voting. A man from one of the indigenous groups (also referred to as […]
Blogging the Mbuti
Nearly 50 Mbuti men and women head into the Ituri Forest each day to gather leaves as food for a breeding population of 15 okapis. The conditions of their employment at the Okapi Wildlife Reserve in the D.R. Congo, their village lives, and their work conditions are being described in an ongoing series of blog […]
Mbuti Appeal for their Rights
A recent international conference on indigenous (Pygmy) rights in Central Africa issued a call “for an immediate stop to practices that generate the destruction of our ways of life…” Indigenous delegates from Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Republic of Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, Gabon, Rwanda, and Uganda met in Impfondo, a city in Republic […]
The Health of Indigenous Societies in Africa [journal article review]
Many Pygmy societies of Central Africa, as well as the San in Southern Africa, suffer more than other people in their countries from health problems. A recent article in the prestigious medical journal The Lancet describes the health challenges of the two indigenous African cultures. Defining “indigenous” in the context of Africa is often a […]
Mbuti Exhibit Opens at Harvard
Christie McDonald, who edited a book on the American artist Anne Eisner and her paintings of the Mbuti, has helped produce an exhibition of Eisner’s works that opened on Monday at Harvard’s Houghton Library. The book, and a still earlier journal article by Eisner, have both been reviewed in this website. The news release from […]
