Urban Dreams

Claudia Roth (1955-2012) taught and conducted anthropological research at the Universities of Zurich, Bern, and Lucerne. She served on the board of the Swiss Society for African Studies (SGAS/SSEA) and was a member of the International Mande Studies Association (MANSA). Urban Dreams is the first collection of her work to appear in English.Willemijn de Jong is Professor at the Department of Social Anthropology and Cultural Studies, University of Zurich.Manfred Perlik is Professor the Universities of Bern (Centre for Development and Environment) and Grenoble-Alpes (UMR Pacte).Noemi Steuer is a researcher at the Center for African Studies, University of Basel.Heinzpeter Znoj is Professor at the Institute for Social Anthropology, University of Bern.

"This is a very timely project and an excellent way to bring out the larger contribution of Claudia Roth to Africanist anthropology. Roth's work is of very high quality and extremely original, especially regarding her focus on intergenerational relations, gender dynamics within the household, matters of love and marriage, and the problems of urban life with little income or job security." * Mahir Saul, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

• Introduction: Claudia Roth's Work on Bobo-Dioulasso in Burkina FasoPART I: ETHNOGRAPHY AND REFLEXIVITYChapter 1. Culture Shock, Power and Knowledge: Negotiating Boundaries in Ethnographic FieldworkPART II: NEGOTIATING LOVE AND MARRIAGEChapter 2. Beware When the Women of Bobo Dress Up!: An Ethnographic ContributionChapter 3. "What is Love?": Changing Matrimony in Bobo-Dioulasso - a Case StudyChapter 4. Social Security and Gender: Marital Crisis as a Mirror of the Economic CrisisPART III: ELDERLY PARENTS AND THEIR CHILDREN: SHARING OR LIVING IN POVERTYChapter 5. Blood Ties as a Social Network: The African Extended Family as an Economic AssociationChapter 6. The Invisible Impoverishment of the Elderly in Bobo-Dioulasso, Burkina FasoChapter 7. "Shameful!": The Inverted Intergenerational Contract in Bobo-Dioulasso, Burkina FasoChapter 8. The Strength of Badenya Ties: Siblings and Social Security in Old Age - the Case of Urban Burkina FasoPART IV: YOUTH: DREAMS AND HARDSHIPSChapter 9. Tea and Dreams: Men's Generational Conflict in Bobo-DioulassoChapter 10. Between Dreams of Grandeur and Pragmatism: Young People in Urban Burkina FasoList of DonatorsList of Roth's PublicationsBibliography