Knowledge and Practice in Mayotte

Abstract

This paper summarizes some of the arguments from Lambek (1993) concerning the conjunction of Islam with other practices on the local scene, among Malagasy speakers on the island of Mayotte, Comoro Archipelago. Islam, astrology and spirit possession are treated as forms of knowledge, examining how each is reproduced and circulated and how they are linked in practice. Distinctions between embodied and objectified knowledge, and between diverse relations to knowledge, are made. Tracing the relationships among knowledge, power and morality, a useful distinction is made between phronesis, or ethical judgement, and techne, or technical know-how as forms of practice. An argument is also formulated about incommensurability as a feature internal to culture and not simply of the relationship between cultures.

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