Introduction

Abstract

The contributions to this volume complement each other in two ways: the four chapters on each country—India, China, and South Korea—bring forth the complex entanglements of their historical, anthropological, and artistic practices with those of Africa. The second approach crosses regional boundaries and allows the reader to discover the specificity of the different practices in each region, drawing thematic or disciplinary lines that could also have structured this book. However, we opted to structure it in terms of the different countries involved, as this might ease the entrance into these complex, interconnected fields. There are four contributions each on Africa–India, Africa–China, and Africa–Korea connections. Besides the regional complexity of multidirectional perceptions and encounters, the reader can also follow thematic lines to discover parallels between the larger areas. The two lines of reading open up a multitude of perspectives for each larger region, but also for similar tendencies and phenomena independently of these regions, and therefore testify to how the relationalities of a connected world can only be grasped in a multidisciplinary way—a process to which this book aims to contribute.