domestic labor intensity and the Incorporation of Malian peasant farmers into localized descent groups

Few inferences about the dynamics of crop production in a Malian peasant community can be drawn without giving parallel consideration to the dynamics of farming group reproduction. Data on the farming inputs and outputs of domestic groups in one village reveal little until each group is located in the kinship and marriage networks. A Sahlins curve of domestic labor intensity is plotted for one farming season in that village to highlight the influence of descent relationships on production. This example bears on the larger question of the extent to which the economics of peasant farming, characteristically dependent on extradomestic coalitions, can be pursued on the basis of household‐level production data. It also offers a generalizable explanation for the remarkable persistence of patrilineal affiliations in contemporary West Africa. [Mali, Bambara, savanna agriculture, West African peasants, patrilineal descent]Few inferences about the dynamics of crop production in a Malian peasant community can be drawn without giving parallel consideration to the dynamics of farming group reproduction. Data on the farming inputs and outputs of domestic groups in one village reveal little until each group is located in the kinship and marriage networks. A Sahlins curve of domestic labor intensity is plotted for one farming season in that village to highlight the influence of descent relationships on production. This example bears on the larger question of the extent to which the economics of peasant farming, characteristically dependent on extradomestic coalitions, can be pursued on the basis of household‐level production data. It also offers a generalizable explanation for the remarkable persistence of patrilineal affiliations in contemporary West Africa. [Mali, Bambara, savanna agriculture, West African peasants, patrilineal descent]