Faculty Lecture, OSU, Nov. 22, 2002
Abstract
FEW QUOTES FROM THIS
TALK:
1.
In 1968 David Barret published a seminal work titled, Schism
and Renewal in Africa: An Analysis of Six Thousand Contemporary Religious
Movements. Three years later, 1971, he came out with an update: African
Initiative in Religion: 21 Studies from Eastern and Central Africa. What
has happened to this suggested proliferation since 1971? At the level of
theory building and methodology, one may also ask What has happened to the
premises of Schism, Renewal, Syncretism, three important paradigms in early
studies of Religious expressions in Africa?In 1986
Bennetta Jules-Rosette, one the foremost scholars on African and African American
religions predicted this:
“By the year 2000, it
is expected that Africa will house 351 million Christians, 31.2 per cent of
the world’s total Christian population, representing a shift in the center
of Christianity from north to south (my emphasis).’’’
AICS coexist with mainline
churches originally established as part of the colonial program, and there
is an active feedback or symbiosis between these two classes of churches in
Africa. Again, the idea of two classes is a spurious categorization and simplification
of very complex existentialities. The redefinition of oneself in relation
to the other, past or present or even in relation to a future conjured up
into the present can complicate indigenous initiatives, as often assigned
to these independent churches….
2.
Christianity has encouraged experimentation and innovation in many spheres
of life in sub-Saharan Africa.The Christian factor
has thus intensified the production and reinvention of culture in Africa,
as shown in modern belief practices, legends, social ethics, costume, language
and script, oratory, costume, ethnic and gender relations (e.g., language
script innovations such as the nsibidi among Igbo churches [Dayrell,
1910:521-540; Jeffreys, 1954:155; Oji, 1940, and the kidouma of Kimbanguism
[Simbandumwe, 1992:379]). The premises and goals of musical initiatives in
the context of local appropriation of Christianity are thus closely related
to issues of cultural autonomy in complex ways. For example, aesthetic and
artistic fulfillment, as inherent in music as an experimental art form, combines
with the plural voices of economic, political and social freedom in post-independence
Africa in order to validate--and thus establish--new identities in religious
and musical traditions, and beyond….
3.
In musical contexts across the continent, the processes of borrowing, adapting,
reinventing, reinterpreting are exemplified in the innovation of new music
ensembles, drastic revision of existing ones, adoption and integration of
musical instruments and costume of foreign origins, including those of neighboring
ethnic groups....
4. Gerhard Kubik, one of
the leading Africanists of our day proposed an additional concept that would
allow the scholar to diversify and increase the explanatory potentials of
our analytical constructs—AUTONOMOUS INVENTION. Originally formulated to
expand our perspectives on African continuities in the African Diaspora,
the concept can be self-limiting unless we integrate also the ontological
status of the performative itself, that is, music or dance as inherently
experimental form. That is, the infinite materialities and sonic possibilities
of music and associated movements attract or inspire new approaches that
eventually result in seemingly new forms of music and dance expressions.
The terms “new” and autonomous invention are however, dialectically relative
to the past and contemporary issues, and more to some other venues of innovation
such as technology, local politics of culture, ethnic relations, and so on….
My initial proposition is that this fluid boundary between the sacred and
the secular are among the prime facilitators of the production, reproduction
and coproduction of what we may broadly label as popular culture….
5. PRODUCING/REPRODUCING/COPRODUCING
POPULAR CULTURE
...Cassette Culture: Both the church
and the popular music industry employ similar means of reproduction and representation,
within the economic and cultural realities of the times. The availability
of a common means of reproduction and circulation using similar marketing
strategies facilitate the crossmigration of musical ideas and tools associated
with the trade. The notions of stardom, billboards or pop charts, common
technologies, and bootlegging are very real encounters that cohere the content
and aesthetics of music from and outside of the church. This symbiosis is
particularly significant when understood within the viewpoint of limited
local resources—what is popular or current in Zaire may not be familiar in
the U.S. or France until….
6. ...The complex
nature of culture, performing arts and religious expression in contemporary
African societies defines any precise demarcation of boundaries, as far as
transient and enduring commodities and ideologies are concerned. The products,
producers, means, and processes of music, culture and religious traditions
are always being contested and negotiated in both public and church environments.
As such, identities shift from the periphery to the center, from local to
the international, from ethnic to multiethnic, and son. Circulation and re-circulation
of ideas and material commodities have become constant features of our global
system—local economies, local policies about cultural, national, ethnic,
and individual charisma are potent mediators. In local spaces.Church and popular cultures draw and rely o common pool
of audiences, participants and resources, and thereby are thus able to inform,
and engageindigenous traditions in many creative ways….
7. THE INDIGENOUS
AND DIALECTICES OF AUTONOMY
Music and its related
forms of expression constituted the core of ritual performance among the
independent churches, from their early stages ofdevelopment
(i.e., late 19th and early 20th Centuries). For example,
before the wind of indigenous initiatives in Christianity, there had been
scattered efforts that emphasized "independency" in musical outlook, as summed
up in the 1815 conversion case of Ntsikana Gaba.[d. 1828]….
8. The significant
status and role of women in religious and ritual contexts provide new perspectives
and examples that enrich our understanding of musical spaces and the articulation
of gender, power, and modernity….
9. Belief systems,
orthodoxy, and general religious outlook exert enormous impact on the aesthetics
and ideology of music and repertoires. The quality and manner of musical
involvement and participation are also implicated in the ways in which musical
types are privileged in religious, ritual or ceremonial settings….
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