Collaborative autoethnography can function as a means of reclaiming certain African realities that have been co-opted by colonial epistemes and language. This can be significant in very concrete ways: northern Uganda is suffering a catastrophic loss of tree cover, much of which is taking place on the collective family landholdings that academia and the development sector have categorized as “customary land.” A collaboration by ten members of such landholding families, known as the Acholi Land Lab, explores what “customary ownership” means to them and their relatives, with a view to understanding what may be involved in promoting sustainable domestic use of natural resources, including trees.

合作式的民族志可以作为一种手段来恢复某些被殖民认识和语言所吸收的非洲现实。这在非常具体的方面可能具有重要意义：乌干达北部正在遭受灾难性的树木覆盖损失，其中大部分发生在学术界和发展部门归类为“传统土地”的集体家庭土地上。由这些拥有土地的家庭的十名成员组成的一个合作项目，即阿乔利土地实验室，探索“习惯所有权”对他们及其亲属意味着什么，以期了解促进国内自然资源（包括树木）的可持续利用可能涉及哪些内容。