This paper is to untangle the strategies of accumulating vocational skills and developing career from the perspectives of young students in TVET (Technical and Vocational Education and Training) institutions in Kumasi, Ghana. The analysis is based on the questionnaire with 494 students who learn in the automobile-related courses (auto-mechanics, electricals, auto-body, and welding) in four TVET institutions; Vocational Training Institute (VTI), Technical Institute (TI), Senior Technical High School (STHS), and Polytechnics.

The Government of Ghana has undergone a major reform of TVET system since the middle of the 2000s, which shift the emphasis from theoretical learning to practical experience in the industries to develop ‘relevant’ competencies. Regardless of such system reform, students' expectations and strategies for future career haven't much changed. Then, what kind of factors influence the choices made by the youths in formulating skills for work? Without treating schools as given paths for the youths to learn, this paper analyze the learners' career development choices treating the school as one of various options, along with apprenticeship and other work-based modes of learning. The paper demonstrates that the paths chosen by the youths are not linear but multiple in which learners move between the workplace and the school few times.

This is an ethnographical study examining animal-human relationships along the Niger River, focusing on the group hunt of a hippopotamus by Sorko “fishermen” in 2006. Hippopotamus hunting has a long history, even recorded in the 14^th-century travelogue of Ibn Battuta. The Sorko were known as professional hippopotamus hunters, but many have turned to farming with minimal fishing since its official ban by the French colonial authority.

The 2006 hunt took place after a fatal hippopotamus incident Departmental officials dispatched many hunters from the capital, but it was ultimately the harpoon of a local Sorko, not the guns of these hunters, that brought down the prey. The harpoon was understood as a magical substance with its own name, will, and personality, piercing the target body in response to the Sorko’s calls. In other words, the Sorko transformed from fishermen to magical mediums.

How did the Sorko transform? This article discusses the social affect of “fear” arising from the hippopotamus, a mammal with unparalleled diving abilities and physically embodying the river as an uncontrollable natural force. It examines how the indirectness and multiplicity of the relationships between animal, human, and things in hippopotamus hunting mitigate this affect.

Sizable studies have discussed to date supporting environments for Artisanal and Small-scale Mining (ASM) in mineral-rich African nations. The past studies however have not clarified to an extensive manner how ASM operates on the ground. To understand ASM in depth, this article aims to examine how main actors perceive each other in ASM sites. To this end, the article analyzes mutual perception between the main actors, including mining license holders, pit holders, and diggers, on the basis of the data collected through a field survey in artisanal and small-scale gold mining sites of Geita, Tanzania.

The results of analysis show an association between length of living in a mining village and strength of recognition toward the other actors. It also reveals influence of the length of living in a mining village over transformation of mutual relationship between the three actors.

With the worldwide concept of global governance, corruption now tends to be regarded as “cancer” that we should eliminate. On the other hand, not a few researchers have tried to discuss this issue from other perspectives than economy. Reviewing the literature of such research, this essay attempts to highlight complexity and politics that the very concept of corruption encompasses, and suggests future research areas of the author.

It classifies the literature into three: 1) the cultural and normative perspective, in which they rethink about the concept of corruption from the standpoint of culture or value systems specific to African countries; 2) the everyday perspective, in which they locate and observe people's practices of corruption within their daily lives; 3) the postcolonial perspective, in which global anti-corruption policy or discourses and frameworks of corruption we have themselves are critically reconsidered. Through this reviewing, this essay proposes another image of the concept of corruption that essentially embraces politics and value judgments, mainly about boundaries between public and private, and about often controversial relationships between law and morality. The dynamism of “public” concept, how people there confront and change such a controversial concept, is the future research area of the author.

This research aims to explore how land use pattern has changed, paying special attention to the expansion of land enclosing practice among the pastoral Datoga of northern Tanzania. Pastoral peoples in East Africa have grazed their livestock in communal rangeland, but recently they are increasingly enclosing rangeland to utilize it privately. Previous studies pointed out that expansion of farmlands and nature reserves, as well as growth of human and livestock population, caused rangeland scarcity which led to the enclosure of common land. That is, land enclosure is deeply tied to various social issues with which pastoral peoples are facing today.

This research focuses on the Eyasi lakeshore area in northern Tanzania. Local Datoga started to settle down in this area after they lost their rangeland because of the expansion of farmland and conflicts with neighboring ethnic groups. Subsequently, human and livestock population grew in this area, and people started to enclose communal rangeland, aiming to secure foraging land for their calves. This study analyzed satellite images of 2005 and 2013 of this area, in combination with field researches conducted in 2013 and 2014. It found that the number of households which own enclosed land have increased, and gross area of enclosed land grew 1.8 times in these 8 years. How private land enclosure is regulated by the local community will be a future issue to be addressed.