Klima and Geschiere compared: market and community
A 600-850 word critical response comparing Alan Klima's and Peter Geschiere's frameworks for the encounter between high relationship and high market economies, in Gudeman's terms. This guide separates the framework comparison from the ethnographic one, and explains why both authors reject the tradition-versus-modernity reading most responses reach for.
Editorial process
Last reviewed · August 6, 2026
The prompt's object is the encounter, not the two countries
Read the prompt for its object and it is not witchcraft, and not Buddhism. The shared subject is named in the middle of the sentence: the encounter between what Gudeman calls high relationship and high market economies. Klima and Geschiere are the two cases; Gudeman supplies the frame you are being asked to think in. Responses that compare Thai ritual with Cameroonian witchcraft as ethnographic content — one country does this, the other does that — have compared the cases and left the assigned question untouched.
There is also a trap sitting in the obvious reading, and it catches most first drafts. The instinctive frame for both books is tradition confronting modernity: old spiritual practice meeting new market forces. Both authors are arguing *against* exactly that. Geschiere's title is **The Modernity of Witchcraft**, and his thesis is that contemporary witchcraft is a response to modern conditions rather than a residue surviving from before them — which is why the occult attaches itself to new money, new commodities and new political office rather than avoiding them. Klima reads mass ritual and funeral gambling as a response to capital flight and mediated violence, both thoroughly contemporary. An essay built on tradition-versus-modernity does not disagree with these two books; it fails to notice what either is claiming. Checking this costs nothing: the claim is on the cover of one of them.
Once that is cleared away the genuine comparison becomes available, and it is directional. In Geschiere's material the occult runs as a levelling force: accusation falls on the person who accumulated, so witchcraft discourse operates as a sanction against pulling ahead of the group. That is the community realm disciplining the market realm, and it makes accumulation dangerous rather than admirable. In Klima's material the movement runs the other way — merit, gambling and exchange with the dead are ways of engaging market forces rather than punishing them, and the ritual and the money are not on opposite sides. So one book shows the two realms in conflict and the other shows them interpenetrating. That is a comparison of frameworks, which is what was asked for, and it can be stated in a single sentence before any evidence arrives.
Gudeman's vocabulary is what lets you say this precisely instead of approximately. His model puts economy in two realms, community and market, with value distributed across a base, social relationships, trade and accumulation. Those last two are the ones under pressure in both readings. Naming which domain each author's material stresses — accumulation for Geschiere, exchange and trade for Klima — converts an impression that they differ into a statement of how. And the citation instruction confirms Gudeman is a set reading rather than background: the required in-text form uses him as an example.
The format constraints are unusually specific and are worth obeying literally, because they are doing work. Six hundred to eight hundred and fifty words is tight for two authors plus a frame, which is exactly why the brief bans introductions and conclusions — a paragraph announcing what you will argue and a paragraph restating it would consume perhaps a fifth of the budget and add no analysis. Start on the comparison in the first sentence. The citation format is equally blunt: author and page, no bibliography, so there is no space to spend on apparatus either. And the instruction not to summarise is the one most often violated by students who know the readings well, because knowing them well makes recounting them feel like demonstrating command. It reads as the opposite. The brief is explicit that the readings should be used rather than reported.
What the prompt says | What most responses do | What the prompt is asking for |
|---|---|---|
The encounter between two realms | Compare Thailand with Cameroon | Compare how each author models the encounter |
Frameworks and arguments | Summarise each book's content | Two things: the model, and the claim made with it |
What Gudeman calls... | Mention Gudeman once | Use his realms and domains as the analytic vocabulary |
Specific evidence in both readings | General characterisation | Named cases, cited by author and page |
No intro or conclusion | Write both anyway | Open on the comparison, spend the budget on analysis |
Likely learning objectives
Inferred from the brief — check these against your own rubric.
- 01Distinguish a comparison of analytic frameworks from a comparison of ethnographic cases.
- 02Recognise an argument that rejects the tradition-versus-modernity framing.
- 03Apply a third author's model as the vocabulary for comparing two others.
- 04Write to a tight word budget by removing the conventional framing paragraphs.
Read the full question
Review every instruction before using the planning guidance that follows.
What the 600-850 word response must contain
- 01A response of no fewer than 600 and no more than 850 words.
- 02A comparison and contrast of Klima's and Geschiere's frameworks.
- 03A comparison and contrast of their arguments about the encounter between the two economies.
- 04Specific evidence drawn from both readings rather than general characterisation.
- 05In-text citations in the required short form, for example (Gudeman: 21).
- 06No introduction or conclusion paragraph.
- 07No works cited or bibliography.
From Gudeman's realms to a contrast that survives testing
State the axis of comparison in the opening sentence
Name the encounter between the two realms as the shared object of both readings.
Set out Gudeman's realms and domains briefly
Establish the vocabulary — community and market, base, relationships, trade, accumulation.
Geschiere: the occult as a sanction on accumulation
Show accusation falling on those who pull ahead, with specific Cameroonian evidence.
Klima: ritual as engagement with market forces
Show merit, gambling and exchange with the dead operating alongside capital rather than against it.
Name the directional contrast
One framework has the realms in conflict, the other has them interpenetrating.
Test the contrast against a case that complicates it
Find material in either reading that cuts against your own comparison and say what it costs.
The three readings behind the comparison
These are authoritative starting points, not a ready-made bibliography. A qualified reviewer must confirm that each source fits the assignment and supports the claim beside which it is cited.
Nothing here is cleared for citation until you have read it.
- 01
The Funeral Casino
Princeton University Press · 2002
Klima's book, full title *The Funeral Casino: Meditation, Massacre, and Exchange with the Dead in Thailand*. The publisher's own statement of the argument — funeral gambling and meditation on death read against mediated violence and a media-financial complex. Useful for checking that your account of his framework matches what the book claims to do.
- 02
The Anthropology of Economy: Community, Market, and Culture
Wiley-Blackwell · 2001
Gudeman's two realms and four value domains — base, social relationships, trade and accumulation. This is the vocabulary the prompt is asking you to compare within, so it is worth confirming the terms rather than paraphrasing them from memory.
- 03
The modernity of witchcraft : politics and the occult in postcolonial Africa
University Press of Virginia (Internet Archive) · 1997
Geschiere's book itself. The title alone settles the most common misreading, and the Maka material in southern Cameroon is where the specific evidence for the accumulation argument comes from.
Before submitting the critical response
Common mistakes
- Comparing Thailand and Cameroon as places instead of comparing the two frameworks.
- Framing both books as tradition meeting modernity, which is the reading both authors reject.
- Treating Geschiere's witchcraft as a survival from the past rather than a modern response.
- Mentioning Gudeman once instead of using his realms and domains as the analytic frame.
- Summarising the readings, which the brief explicitly rules out.
- Writing an introduction and conclusion despite the instruction not to.
- Adding a bibliography when the brief says none is needed.
- Over-quoting, when the brief asks for paraphrase with quotations reserved for emphasis.
Submission checklist
- The response is between 600 and 850 words.
- The first sentence begins the comparison rather than announcing it.
- Both frameworks are described as models, not just as findings.
- The tradition-versus-modernity reading is avoided or explicitly rejected.
- Gudeman's realms or value domains are used to structure the comparison.
- Specific named evidence from both readings appears, cited as (Author: page).
- There is no introduction, conclusion or bibliography.
- Quotations are sparse and each one underlines a point already made in your own prose.
Use this guide to plan and review your own work. Follow your institution's rules and read our academic-integrity policy.
Written by
Aaron Bishop
MA, Education
assignment interpretation and research-methods coaching across disciplines
Aaron leads the EssayCrackers editorial desk. He works on how assignment briefs are read — what a rubric is actually asking for, and where students most often answer a different question than the one set.
Reviewed by
Dr. Nathan Cole
PhD, Rhetoric & Composition
Argumentation and thesis development
Nathan teaches first-year composition and directs a university writing center. He reviews EssayCrackers guides for argumentative soundness and citation accuracy.