W Rollason
Biographic Data
| ID | 32876 |
|---|---|
| NAME | W Rollason |
| GIVEN NAMES | W |
| FAMILY NAME | Rollason |
| SIGNATURE | ROLLASON W |
| AFFILIATIONS | Brunel University of London |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-5250-8370 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 23 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 34 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 22 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2008 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 4 |
Description, difference and history, in Melanesia, for example
This article is about the relationship between common history and specific cultures. Specifically, it seeks a resolution to the ongoing problem of which of these should be given logical priority in anthropology— that is, which should be given the status of first cause. This problem is exemplified in the 1990s debate between proponents of the so‐called ‘New Melanesian Ethnography’ and those of the ‘New Melanesian History’. Thinking through the Par…
Concorde's Tyres: Disaster, Law, and Ontology
This article explores the Concorde crash of 25 July 2000, seeking to show how law and regulation do crucial ontological work in the maintenance of commercial flight, and likely other aspects of modern techno-social arrangements. I argue that law and regulation cannot be seen as an exteriority, constraining and shaping the production of technology, but should be viewed as a component in the production of a physico-legal reality that a machine embo…
Pacific Futures: Projects, Politics and Interests
The Pacific region presents a huge diversity of cultural forms, which have fuelled some of the most challenging ethnographic work undertaken in the discipline. But this challenge has come at a cost. Culture, often reconfigured as ‘custom’, has often served to trap the people of the Pacific in the past of cultural reproduction, where everything is what it has always been, or worse—outdated, outmoded and destined for modernization. Pacific Futures …
Belonging in Oceania: Movement, Place-Making and Multiple Identifications
Ethnographic case studies explore what it means to “belong” in Oceania, as contributors consider ongoing formations of place, self and community in connection with travelling, internal and international migration. The chapters apply the multi-dimensional concepts of movement, place-making and cultural identifications to explain contemporary life in Oceanic societies. The volume closes by suggesting that constructions of multiple belongings—and, w…
Compliance: Politics, Sociability and the Constitution of Collective Life
What kind of phenomenon is it when ordinary people in the United Kingdom unexpectedly abide by government advice on social distancing in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, even anticipating constraints on their activities? These happenings demand that we engage anthropologically with compliance – acts or activities that conform, submit or adapt to rules or to the demands of others. At present, there is no ‘anthropology of compliance’. Rather, the…
Crisis as resource: Entrepreneurship and motorcycle taxi drivers in Kigali
Crisis has been a common experience in sub-Saharan Africa, at least since the 1980s with disastrous results for countless Africans. Such crises, however, can represent opportunities for entrepreneurship for those prepared to take the often-mortal risks involved, or the imposition of entrepreneurship as a strategy for getting by. In this paper, I explore the case of motorcycle taxi drivers in Kigali, Rwanda’s capital. I argue first that Rwanda is …
The Mistakes That Make People
This paper constitutes a critique of Scott’s theory of everyday resistance, and the use of these concepts in anthropology more generally. Its claim is that theories of power and resistance need to be framed in terms of local ideas about the nature people if they are to account adequately for what happens in social life; any theory of power and resistance not so framed will obscure local interests. I make this claim based on ideas of personhood am…
Life at a Tangent to Law
This article concerns the relationship between motorcycle taxi drivers in Kigali and the legal frameworks that govern their business. While motorcyclists commonly subvert legal processes, or avoid complying with regulations, this should not be understood in terms of their ‘resistance’ to legal orders. To do so would imply that laws are imposed on their social lives from without; however, I show how illegalities help to structure social life by cr…
Youth, presence and agency: The case of Kigali’s motari
This paper concerns young men who drive motorcycle taxis in Kigali, the capital city of Rwanda. Through an ethnographic account of the livelihoods of these motari, it seeks to account for their continued presence in a city whose authorities are openly hostile to their business, yet in which they remain a significant social force. I argue that it is not either by the exercise of ‘agency’ that motari achieve a social presence in Kigali, but through…
Buying a path: Rethinking resistance in Rwanda
In this essay, I tell the story of Jean-Baptiste, the president of a motorcycle taxi drivers’ co-operative, and his struggle against the machinations of certain high officials in Kigali City Council. Crucial to this story is the way in which Jean-Baptiste’s attempts to retain his position in the face of powerful opposition pit certain agencies of Rwanda’s party state against others. I use this ethnographic narrative to question the way in which m…
Performance, poverty and urban development: Kigali’s motari and the spectacle city
In this paper I explore tensions and conflicts over poverty reduction and urban development in Kigali, Rwanda’s capital in terms of theories of performativity. On one hand, motorcycle taxis offer large numbers of young men good livelihoods – reflecting the government of Rwanda’s stated commitment to poverty reduction, especially amongst youth; on the other, motorcycle taxi drivers suffer harassment at the hands of city authorities and police, who…
Performance, poverty and urban development: Kigali’s motari and the spectacle city
In this paper I explore tensions and conflicts over poverty reduction and urban development in Kigali, Rwanda’s capital in terms of theories of performativity. On one hand, motorcycle taxis offer large numbers of young men good livelihoods – reflecting the government of Rwanda’s stated commitment to poverty reduction, especially amongst youth; on the other, motorcycle taxi drivers suffer harassment at the hands of city authorities and police, who…
The anthropology of empathy: Experiencing the lives of others in Pacific societies – Edited by Douglas W. Hollan & C. Jason Throop
Were, Graeme: Lines that Connect. Rethinking Pattern and Mind in the Pacific
Anthropos , Seite 315 - 316
Landscapes of relations and belonging: Body, place and politics in Wogeo, Papua New Guinea - By Astrid Anderson
Villagers and the city: Melanesian experiences of Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea - Edited by Michael Goddard
We are playing football: Seeing the game on Panapompom, PNG
This article is about football, played by men from Panapompom in Papua New Guinea's Milne Bay province. Football is problematic not because it is culturally appropriated or modified, but rather because Panapompom desired accurately to reproduce the appearance of the international game. As such it questions conventional frames of reference. An interpretation in terms of culture obscures Panapompom interests in football: its globally recognizable c…
After the cult: Perceptions of other and self in West New Britain (Papua New Guinea) - By Holger Jebens
Working out abjection in the Panapompom bêche‐de‐mer fishery: Race, economic change and the future in Papua New Guinea 1
This is a paper about how men from Panapompom, an island in Milne Bay Province of Papua New Guinea (PNG), understand how they relate to white people and imagine the future. Until recently, men from Panapompom understood themselves to be engaged in a project of ‘development’, in which they would become more and more similar to white people. This was a desirable future. However, changes in the way Panapompom men work for money have resulted in a ve…
Melanesian odysseys: Negotiating the self, narrative and modernity - By Lisette Josephides
Black Skin, White Yacht: Race Opposition in Panapompom Tourist Encounters
Panapompom people from an island community in southeastern Papua New Guinea have regular contact with tourists who visit the island in yachts. These visits are the occasion for political moves for the development of the community by the mobilization of a racial opposition between black local people and white yachters. In this article, I examine the implications of the use of oppositions of this type both for anthropological questions of "authenti…
Ontology - just another word for culture
Counterparts: Clothing, Value and the Sites of Otherness in Panapompom Ethnographic Encounters
This is an Author's Accepted Manuscript of an article published in Anthropological Forum, 18(1), 17-35, \n2008 [copyright Taylor & Francis], available online at: \nhttp://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/00664670701858927
Buying a path: Rethinking resistance in Rwanda
In this essay, I tell the story of Jean-Baptiste, the president of a motorcycle taxi drivers’ co-operative, and his struggle against the machinations of certain high officials in Kigali City Council. Crucial to this story is the way in which Jean-Baptiste’s attempts to retain his position in the face of powerful opposition pit certain agencies of Rwanda’s party state against others. I use this ethnographic narrative to question the way in which m…
We are playing football: Seeing the game on Panapompom, PNG
This article is about football, played by men from Panapompom in Papua New Guinea's Milne Bay province. Football is problematic not because it is culturally appropriated or modified, but rather because Panapompom desired accurately to reproduce the appearance of the international game. As such it questions conventional frames of reference. An interpretation in terms of culture obscures Panapompom interests in football: its globally recognizable c…
Counterparts: Clothing, Value and the Sites of Otherness in Panapompom Ethnographic Encounters
This is an Author's Accepted Manuscript of an article published in Anthropological Forum, 18(1), 17-35, \n2008 [copyright Taylor & Francis], available online at: \nhttp://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/00664670701858927
Performance, poverty and urban development: Kigali’s motari and the spectacle city
In this paper I explore tensions and conflicts over poverty reduction and urban development in Kigali, Rwanda’s capital in terms of theories of performativity. On one hand, motorcycle taxis offer large numbers of young men good livelihoods – reflecting the government of Rwanda’s stated commitment to poverty reduction, especially amongst youth; on the other, motorcycle taxi drivers suffer harassment at the hands of city authorities and police, who…
Youth, presence and agency: The case of Kigali’s motari
This paper concerns young men who drive motorcycle taxis in Kigali, the capital city of Rwanda. Through an ethnographic account of the livelihoods of these motari, it seeks to account for their continued presence in a city whose authorities are openly hostile to their business, yet in which they remain a significant social force. I argue that it is not either by the exercise of ‘agency’ that motari achieve a social presence in Kigali, but through…
Compliance: Politics, Sociability and the Constitution of Collective Life
What kind of phenomenon is it when ordinary people in the United Kingdom unexpectedly abide by government advice on social distancing in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, even anticipating constraints on their activities? These happenings demand that we engage anthropologically with compliance – acts or activities that conform, submit or adapt to rules or to the demands of others. At present, there is no ‘anthropology of compliance’. Rather, the…
The anthropology of empathy: Experiencing the lives of others in Pacific societies – Edited by Douglas W. Hollan & C. Jason Throop
Ontology - just another word for culture
Black Skin, White Yacht: Race Opposition in Panapompom Tourist Encounters
Panapompom people from an island community in southeastern Papua New Guinea have regular contact with tourists who visit the island in yachts. These visits are the occasion for political moves for the development of the community by the mobilization of a racial opposition between black local people and white yachters. In this article, I examine the implications of the use of oppositions of this type both for anthropological questions of "authenti…
Ontology - just another word for culture
Counterparts: Clothing, Value and the Sites of Otherness in Panapompom Ethnographic Encounters
This is an Author's Accepted Manuscript of an article published in Anthropological Forum, 18(1), 17-35, \n2008 [copyright Taylor & Francis], available online at: \nhttp://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/00664670701858927
Melanesian odysseys: Negotiating the self, narrative and modernity - By Lisette Josephides
Working out abjection in the Panapompom bêche‐de‐mer fishery: Race, economic change and the future in Papua New Guinea 1
This is a paper about how men from Panapompom, an island in Milne Bay Province of Papua New Guinea (PNG), understand how they relate to white people and imagine the future. Until recently, men from Panapompom understood themselves to be engaged in a project of ‘development’, in which they would become more and more similar to white people. This was a desirable future. However, changes in the way Panapompom men work for money have resulted in a ve…
We are playing football: Seeing the game on Panapompom, PNG
This article is about football, played by men from Panapompom in Papua New Guinea's Milne Bay province. Football is problematic not because it is culturally appropriated or modified, but rather because Panapompom desired accurately to reproduce the appearance of the international game. As such it questions conventional frames of reference. An interpretation in terms of culture obscures Panapompom interests in football: its globally recognizable c…
After the cult: Perceptions of other and self in West New Britain (Papua New Guinea) - By Holger Jebens
The anthropology of empathy: Experiencing the lives of others in Pacific societies – Edited by Douglas W. Hollan & C. Jason Throop
Were, Graeme: Lines that Connect. Rethinking Pattern and Mind in the Pacific
Anthropos , Seite 315 - 316
Landscapes of relations and belonging: Body, place and politics in Wogeo, Papua New Guinea - By Astrid Anderson
Villagers and the city: Melanesian experiences of Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea - Edited by Michael Goddard
Performance, poverty and urban development: Kigali’s motari and the spectacle city
In this paper I explore tensions and conflicts over poverty reduction and urban development in Kigali, Rwanda’s capital in terms of theories of performativity. On one hand, motorcycle taxis offer large numbers of young men good livelihoods – reflecting the government of Rwanda’s stated commitment to poverty reduction, especially amongst youth; on the other, motorcycle taxi drivers suffer harassment at the hands of city authorities and police, who…
Performance, poverty and urban development: Kigali’s motari and the spectacle city
In this paper I explore tensions and conflicts over poverty reduction and urban development in Kigali, Rwanda’s capital in terms of theories of performativity. On one hand, motorcycle taxis offer large numbers of young men good livelihoods – reflecting the government of Rwanda’s stated commitment to poverty reduction, especially amongst youth; on the other, motorcycle taxi drivers suffer harassment at the hands of city authorities and police, who…
Youth, presence and agency: The case of Kigali’s motari
This paper concerns young men who drive motorcycle taxis in Kigali, the capital city of Rwanda. Through an ethnographic account of the livelihoods of these motari, it seeks to account for their continued presence in a city whose authorities are openly hostile to their business, yet in which they remain a significant social force. I argue that it is not either by the exercise of ‘agency’ that motari achieve a social presence in Kigali, but through…
Buying a path: Rethinking resistance in Rwanda
In this essay, I tell the story of Jean-Baptiste, the president of a motorcycle taxi drivers’ co-operative, and his struggle against the machinations of certain high officials in Kigali City Council. Crucial to this story is the way in which Jean-Baptiste’s attempts to retain his position in the face of powerful opposition pit certain agencies of Rwanda’s party state against others. I use this ethnographic narrative to question the way in which m…
The Mistakes That Make People
This paper constitutes a critique of Scott’s theory of everyday resistance, and the use of these concepts in anthropology more generally. Its claim is that theories of power and resistance need to be framed in terms of local ideas about the nature people if they are to account adequately for what happens in social life; any theory of power and resistance not so framed will obscure local interests. I make this claim based on ideas of personhood am…
Life at a Tangent to Law
This article concerns the relationship between motorcycle taxi drivers in Kigali and the legal frameworks that govern their business. While motorcyclists commonly subvert legal processes, or avoid complying with regulations, this should not be understood in terms of their ‘resistance’ to legal orders. To do so would imply that laws are imposed on their social lives from without; however, I show how illegalities help to structure social life by cr…
Crisis as resource: Entrepreneurship and motorcycle taxi drivers in Kigali
Crisis has been a common experience in sub-Saharan Africa, at least since the 1980s with disastrous results for countless Africans. Such crises, however, can represent opportunities for entrepreneurship for those prepared to take the often-mortal risks involved, or the imposition of entrepreneurship as a strategy for getting by. In this paper, I explore the case of motorcycle taxi drivers in Kigali, Rwanda’s capital. I argue first that Rwanda is …
Compliance: Politics, Sociability and the Constitution of Collective Life
What kind of phenomenon is it when ordinary people in the United Kingdom unexpectedly abide by government advice on social distancing in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, even anticipating constraints on their activities? These happenings demand that we engage anthropologically with compliance – acts or activities that conform, submit or adapt to rules or to the demands of others. At present, there is no ‘anthropology of compliance’. Rather, the…
Pacific Futures: Projects, Politics and Interests
The Pacific region presents a huge diversity of cultural forms, which have fuelled some of the most challenging ethnographic work undertaken in the discipline. But this challenge has come at a cost. Culture, often reconfigured as ‘custom’, has often served to trap the people of the Pacific in the past of cultural reproduction, where everything is what it has always been, or worse—outdated, outmoded and destined for modernization. Pacific Futures …
Belonging in Oceania: Movement, Place-Making and Multiple Identifications
Ethnographic case studies explore what it means to “belong” in Oceania, as contributors consider ongoing formations of place, self and community in connection with travelling, internal and international migration. The chapters apply the multi-dimensional concepts of movement, place-making and cultural identifications to explain contemporary life in Oceanic societies. The volume closes by suggesting that constructions of multiple belongings—and, w…
Concorde's Tyres: Disaster, Law, and Ontology
This article explores the Concorde crash of 25 July 2000, seeking to show how law and regulation do crucial ontological work in the maintenance of commercial flight, and likely other aspects of modern techno-social arrangements. I argue that law and regulation cannot be seen as an exteriority, constraining and shaping the production of technology, but should be viewed as a component in the production of a physico-legal reality that a machine embo…
Description, difference and history, in Melanesia, for example
This article is about the relationship between common history and specific cultures. Specifically, it seeks a resolution to the ongoing problem of which of these should be given logical priority in anthropology— that is, which should be given the status of first cause. This problem is exemplified in the 1990s debate between proponents of the so‐called ‘New Melanesian Ethnography’ and those of the ‘New Melanesian History’. Thinking through the Par…
Sociology (20 works) · Law (14 works) · Political science (14 works) · History (10 works) · Island Studies and Pacific Affairs (10 works) · Politics (10 works) · Anthropological Studies and Insights (9 works) · Law (9 works) · Ethnology (8 works) · Anthropology (7 works)