Maurice Delafosse

Fragment of Delafosse's (1904) linguistic map highlighting Nafaanra ('Nafana') in the borderland of Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana.

Maurice Delafosse (December 20, 1870 - November 13, 1926) was a French ethnographer and colonial official who also worked in the field of the languages of Africa. In a review of his daughter's biography of him he was described as "one of the most outstanding French colonial administrators and ethnologists of his time." Delafosse had disagreements with the French government over the administration of French Africa, and, as a result, was "more or less banned from the colonies" for a large part of his life.

Selected publications

• Delafosse, Maurice (1904), Vocabulaires comparatifs de plus de 60 langues ou dialectes parlés à la Côte d'Ivoire et dans les régions limitrophes, Paris: E. Leroux, http://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb30312625k . Also available from the Internet Archive here.
• Delafosse, Maurice (1908), Les frontières de la Côte d'Ivoire, de la Côte d'Or, et du Soudan, Paris: Masson, http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k95348v . Also available from the Open Library.
• Delafosse, Maurice (1912) (in French), Haut-Sénégal-Niger: Le Pays, les Peuples, les Langues; l'Histoire; les Civilizations. 3 Vols, Paris: Émile Larose . Gallica: Volume 1, Le Pays, les Peuples, les Langues; Volume 2, L'Histoire; Volume 3, Les Civilisations.
• Houdas, Octave; Delafosse, Maurice, eds. (1913), Tarikh el-fettach par Mahmoūd Kāti et l'un de ses petit fils (2 Vols.), Paris: Ernest Leroux, http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k5439466q . Volume 1 is the Arabic text, Volume 2 is a translation into French. Reprinted by Maisonneuve in 1964 and 1981. The French text is also available from Aluka but requires a subscription.
• Delafosse, Maurice (1916), "La question de Ghana et la Mission Bonnel de Mézières" (in French), Annuaire et Mémoires du Comité d'Etudes historiques et scientifique de l'AOF: 40–61 
• Delafosse, Maurice (1922) (in French), Les Noires de l'Afrique, Paris: Payot & Cie, http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k104745q . Also available from the Internet Archive here.
• Delafosse, Maurice (1927) (in French), Les Nègres, Paris: Rieder, http://classiques.uqac.ca/classiques/delafosse_maurice/negres/negres.html .

Further reading

• Amselle, Jean-Loup; Sibeud, Emmanuelle, eds. (1998) (in French), Maurice Delafosse : entre orientalisme et ethnographie : l'itinéraire d'un africaniste, 1870-1926, Paris: Maisonneuve and Larose, ISBN 2706813563 
• Cohen, William (1971), Rulers of Empire: the French Colonial Service in Africa, Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, http://www.webafriqa.net/library/rulers_empire/contents.html .
• Delafosse, Louise (1976) (in French), Maurice Delafosse: le Berrichon conquis par l'Afrique, Paris: Société Française d'Histoire d'Outre-mer, ISBN 2859700005 . A biography by his daughter.
• Hazard, Benoît (1998), "Orientalisme et ethnographie chez Maurice Delafosse" (in French), L'Homme 38 (146): 265–268, http://www.persee.fr/web/ouvrages/home/prescript/article/hom_0439-4216_1998_num_38_146_370469 .
• Michel, Marc (1975), "Un programme réformiste en 1919 : Maurice Delafosse et la " politique indigène " en AOF" (in French), Cahiers d'études africaines 15 (58): 313–327, http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/cea_0008-0055_1975_num_15_58_2600 .
• Wooten, Stephen R. (1993), "Colonial Administration and the Ethnography of the Family in the French Soudan", Cahiers d'études africaines 33 (131): 419–446, http://www.persee.fr/web/revues/home/prescript/article/cea_0008-0055_1993_num_33_131_1507 .

External links

List of publications on WebAfrique