Knowing Ethnicity

Samantha Balaton-Chrimes is an associate professor in politics at Deakin University. She is a political sociologist with sixteen years' experience conducting research on ethnicity, marginalisation and politics in Kenya and other postcolonial societies. Balaton-Chrimes is the author of Ethnicity, Democracy and Citizenship in Africa (2015) and has published more than twenty articles and book chapters.

'Few researchers and fewer policy makers realise that the most serious danger lurking in African states' growing administrative capacity to identify and track their citizens is the development of a permanent architecture of ethnicised citizenship. Sam Balaton-Chimes' Knowing Ethnicity is the best account of why this happened and what is at stake in reproducing it.' Keith Breckenridge, Wits University

• Introduction: cultivated vagueness and ethnic classification in Kenya; 1. Making ethnicity; 2. Mapping ethnic territory; 3. Counting ethnic populations; 4. Registering the ethnic citizen; 5. Recognising ethnic minorities and marginalised communities; Conclusion: ethnic classifications in a digital future; Appendix 1. Ethnic categories in Kenyan censuses; References; Index.