Le pouvoir et sa transmission chez les beti : Contribution à une anthropologie des savoirs,des savoir-faire et de s savoir-être

Abstract

This Doctorate/Ph.D is entitled "Power and its transmission among the Beti : contribution to an Anthropology of knowledge, know-how and interpersonal skills". Based on the popular adage that "all power is torn away", a pre-survey carried out in beti socioculture shows that magical-religious power cannot be torn away.The formulation of the problem prompted the elaboration of the following questioning: What are the cultural foundations of beti power? What are the manifestations of power among the Beti? How is power transmitted in this socio-culture? What meaning can we give to the practice of power in the Beti cultural environment? The hypotheses which have been retained in terms of provisional answers to these questions are respectively the following: The power in the cultural conception beti is based on a mathematical architecture borrowed from the cosmos by mimicry, from which it draws its essence and its laws of applicability. Power manifests itself under the aspects of knowledge, speech or matter in which it is sedimented and through which it is operationalized, depending on the circumstance and the relationship to time. The transmission of power obeys a set of predispositions linked to the vocation and charisma of the purchaser, predispositions which allow him to internalize the knowledge and skills of the initiatory system which doubts him, and to acquire value from it. know-how with experience in subsequent practice. The meaning of the power practiced among the Beti is in line with the cultural endogenous symbolism. The hypothesis verification procedure was carried out from documentary research on the one hand, and field research on the other hand; therefore, the qualitative approach was chosen for the collection and analysis of field data. In the light of the typology of the data that we collected (oral data, iconographic data and mathematical data), we respectively matched the following analyzes: content analysis, iconographic analysis and mathematical analysis. The interpretation of the data requisitioned a theoretical framework which was formalized by borrowing from Ethnomethodology, Ethnoperspective and the Principles of African Epistemology, elements of intelligibility making it possible to account for the meaning of power in Beti. At the end of these different investigation sequences, the research led to the following results: Power in the Beti cultural universe is based on a dualist system, wich represent substancial nature of power which one possesses and acts on the phenomena (Ngùl, Edzóe and Evú), and the mechanisms of actualization of this latent potential which takes place by means of the mathematical operations of activation, addition, subtraction, multiplication or division, carried out around the number 9 (á vale, á vú, á bonɛ, á boulә̀, a bán, á Nnúd, á viaŋlan). The modalities of place, time and circumstance then define the operating means for the manifestation and for the transmission of power in this cultural universe, a power that is built in accordance with collective thought in the cosmic order, synonymous with fundamental duality.