 Back in 1963 anthropologist Paul Bohannan wrote an article in which he states, it is probable that no single topic has exercised so many students and men of affairs concerned with Africa as has that of land. It is equally probable that no single topic concerning Africa has produced so large a poor literature. The reason for the state of affairs is close at hand. There exists no good analysis of the concepts habitually used in land tenure studies and no detailed critique of their applicability to cross cultural study. While much ethnographic work and writings by indigenous scholars themselves has been done since that time to elucidate the diversity of ways that land tenure and security are known and practiced. I argue that the insights from this work have scarcely influenced the concepts at play within the international land governance community. In my talk, I will provide a preview of a book forthcoming with the University of Michigan Press, in which I draw on the tools of ontological anthropology to explore the land governance concepts and instruments at play. And to contrast them with other ways of knowing and enacting land land tenure and security from across the African continent. As you might imagine, radically different land worlds emerge in the dominant constructs being deployed in land governance community emerge not as having universal validity, but as deeply situated culturally, and I would argue politically. What does it mean then to be deploying them unquestionably on the world stage. In my talk, I profile these findings and explore their consequences by engaging with political economy and writings on coloniality. What worlds are being brought into being with the dominant constructs surrounding land governance and why, and what worlds are foreclosed in the process. This allows us to locate the operation of power within the constructs and practices being advanced as socially progressive antidotes to land grabbing. I hope you will all join us at this session. I look forward to seeing you there.