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Streaming video

Title The Pathans / directed by André Singer
Published London : Royal Anthropological Institute, 1980

Copies

Description 1 online resource (39 min.)
Series Ethnographic video online, volume 2
Disappearing world
Summary There are twelve million Pathans. Bound by a common language, a common heritage and the unifying force of Islam, these proud and independent people do not acknowledge the geographical boundary which divides them between Afghanistan and Pakistan. This film was shot at the same time as Khyber in Pakistan, close to the Afghan border. The Pathans accept no imposed leadership, from without or from within. Their laws are the decisions of the democratic assembly of the village, known as the jirga. To disobey the jirga is to court heavy penalties against which there is no appeal. Their code of living is called pukhtunwali the way of the Pathan. At its core are the principles of hospitality, personal honour and revenge. A man will fight to the death to avenge a wrong done to himself, his family or friends or, above all, his women. The film is noteworthy for the way in which it brings out the importance of these values. Their fierce loyalty, coupled with the independence of spirit which tolerates no formal leaders, makes the Pathans a formidable enemy, as the British once found out and, more recently, the Soviet invaders of Afghanistan have discovered
Notes Title from resource description page (viewed Feb. 6, 2014)
Event Recorded in Pakistan
Notes This edition in English
Subject Pushtuns -- Pakistan -- Social life and customs
Afghans -- Pakistan
Refugees -- Pakistan
Ethnology -- Pakistan.
Afghans.
Ethnology.
Manners and customs.
Pushtuns -- Social life and customs.
Refugees.
SUBJECT Pakistan -- Social life and customs
Subject Pakistan.
Genre/Form Documentary films.
Nonfiction films.
Documentary films.
Nonfiction films.
Documentaires.
Films autres que de fiction.
Form Streaming video
Author Ahmed, Akbar S., contributor.
Singer, André, 1945- film director.
Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, production company.