DOMESTICATING DIAMONDS AND DOLLARS - IDENTITY, EXPENDITURE AND SHARING IN SOUTHWESTERN ZAIRE (1984-1997)

This article explores the impact of the recent diamond traffic on both rural and urban life in southwestern Congo-Zaire, in an attempt at a 'multi-sited' ethnography of the circulation of cultural meanings, com modities, money and identities in an increasingly diffuse time-space, in which the standard dichotomies between rural and urban worlds, live d world and system, traditional and modern, or precapitalist and capit alist realities have lost much of their explanatory strength. More spe cifically, the article deals with the widespread phenomenon of the ban a Lunda, 'the children of Lunda', young Congolese urbanites who travel from all over southwestern Zaire to the Angolan province of Lunda Nor te in order to dig or dive for diamonds in the UNITA-controlled territ ories. It investigates the changes brought about by the diamond trade and by the influx of these urban youngsters into the rural border area , as well as the impact of the accompanying monetization, known as 'do llarization', on the daily life of villagers and urbanites in Southwes tern Zaire.