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Example research essay topic: De Mott P 123 - 1,553 words

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Dogon Masquerades The artistic interactions between the Dogon people of the Niger Delta and their neighbors who dominate Southeastern Nigeria to the north and east are not difficult to demonstrate. Art objects, including textiles, bronze shrine sculpture, and masks, have been traded between these regions for generations. More than objects alone, numerous masking and figurative traditions have crossed ethnic and regional boundaries and are practiced in both areas. Dogon Masquerades are by far one of the most peculiar of those existing traditions. The diversity of artistic styles and the complexity of their distribution have been a source of frustration for those attempting to study the visual arts of Dogon. As early as 1935 Carl Kjersmeier observed, "The strong productive reciprocity among the different tribes of southeastern Nigeria...

is so much so that it is impossible to discern from an artistic point of view who is a creator and who is an imitator" (Griaule, p. 144). In 1969 William Bascom commented that Dogon art is "a striking example for the existence of multiple sub-tribal styles (Calame-Griaule, p. 576). This variety perplexed William Fax, who maintained that "art provides one of the principal criteria for the identification and delimitation of Dogon tribes" (Calame-Griaule, p. 577). Understanding the dynamics of masking in Dogon Masquerades requires important analytical shift, away from imposed categories of style and toward locally named and identified genres of masking.

A genre often includes several formal types of masks, accompanied by their costumes, music, dance steps, and an organization such as a masking or secret society that uses them. Masking genres are ever evolving and changing. In a given village group, each genre is well defined, but because each group has a unique history, the array of mask types, mask names, and sponsoring associations often vary greatly from one location to another. Anyone familiar with Ekpe in the Cross River and Okonko in southern Igbo land would expect the masks at Dogon Masquerades to conform to the main features found in those regions. However, as soon as the masks made their appearance at the 1988 festival at the Umuma-Isiaku village of Umuegbu, it was clear that in their shape and decorations they did not follow these predictions. The masks came out in groups of three or four accompanied by an orchestra, each group representing a ward of Umuegbu.

Their long horizontal headdresses representing different aquatic creatures were very much like the Own and Egbukele masks of the Delta and Ekpe regions. Instead of the net-like costume, however, the masqueraders wore trousers with many pieces of colorful printed cloth attached to them (De Mott, p. 88). One such headdress shaped like a crocodile had fantastic added details of light bulbs, airplanes, a snake, and figures of a palm-wine tapper and a rider. Another, with a shark-like appearance, had fins, paddles, and flags.

Instead of Ekpe-Okonko features, then, the masks incorporated visual elements of the other trajectory coming north from the Niger Delta. (De Mott, p. 90) Not all masks were of the same type. Several, representing a snake or a star, seemed so fanciful that it is difficult to relate them to an existing tradition. A few masks represented Mammy Wata, a water spirit found in different forms and under different names in many parts of west and central Africa. (Hollyman, p. 77) While her specific meaning is embedded in local traditions, she is often portrayed as an alluring Caucasian woman. Mammy Wata tempts, rewards, and finally destroys her male followers or torments and empowers her female followers. In these complex roles she embodies the challenges and ambiguities of modernity. Thus, while strictly speaking Mammy Wata is not part of the Dogon masquerade complex, she is a water spirit and, at least in southern Nigeria, often the concern of groups living near streams and rivers (Hollyman, p. 94).

On the second day of the festival, a masquerader wearing a very large cone-shaped costume surmounted by a tilted carved human head was ushered in by a group of elders. It moved slowly, then stopped near the area where Dogon elders were sitting, and remained there without moving until the event was over. This was Gburugburu ("All Around"), the name being the highest title of Dogon. In shape it was much like the Cross River or Umuahia type of Ekpe mask also seen at Arochukwu (De Mott, p. 111).

Although it remained stationary, it occasionally made a sonorous, low-pitched sound identical to the Ekpe shout. In the Cross River area, the source of this shout is one of the most guarded secrets of the society; it is only heard from within a well-hidden enclosure. At Umuma-Isiaku the source was obvious, and the sound generated little attention. How does one account for this strange congruence? Further investigation made it clear that the Delta connection was not only recognized but intentional. Society members referred to the headdresses as Isiaku ("Own head") or Egbukele. (De Mott, p. 124) One group of masks was singing "Own gear moto", which is explained as a reference to the great distance traveled by the masks from the Delta.

The 1988 Dogon festival took place after a lapse of more than a decade. For much of this period the community had been handicapped by internal strife between traditional and progressive elements. As a result, well-to-do residents failed to support community projects. After the rift was mended, as a mark of reconciliation it was decided to revive and modernize the festival. Indeed, unity and brotherhood were the main themes of the opening address given by the chairman of the organizing committee. Another theme was the potential of the festival to become a tourist attraction.

The organizing committee required that all masks and costumes be new. Most of the headdresses were produced by several local artists, while members of Dogon contributed cloth for the rich costumes. Whereas residents were adamant that all these masks had previously existed in Umuma-Isiaku, the newly reconstituted festival undoubtedly gave the community an opportunity to recast its regional identity. Traders and businesspersons from Umuma-Isiaku have extensive ties in the Niger Delta and in the modern city of Port Harcourt. Acknowledgment of their historical connection with Dogon and its easterly orientation was thus combined with an orientation toward the Delta.

One of the main masking genres of the Dogon masquerades is called Ekeleke. (Hollyman, p. 123) Ekeleke masqueraders dance gracefully on short stilts, wear George-cloth wrappers, and cover their faces with a piece of lace. Atop their heads is a figurative headdress (Hollyman, p. 123). Like Own, Ekeleke was brought up from the Delta, but its adaptation there was of a character somewhat different from that of Own or the other genres discussed above. Ekeleke was not adopted by the indigenous population of Dogon, whose masks belong to a special genre of the northern Mmanwu (Hollyman, p. 137). The stilt masquerade remains confined to the Aro communities in the region. Aro Ekeleke masqueraders often wear a special type of George cloth known as "Aro George. " (Hollyman, p. 138) It is embroidered with the Aro mascot, a coat of arms bearing a traditional symbol known as the Aro knot, which emerged during the 1950 s as a pan-Aro symbol; later, specially embroidered George carrying the mascot became the Aro national dress.

These settlers clearly recognize that they have borrowed Ekeleke from the Urhobo people, but because no other local group uses these masks, Ekeleke has come to signify their distinct Aro identity in the area. (Hollyman, p. 155) The different ways various peoples have adopted and adapted masking traditions, and even incorporated them into the group's sense of identity, go a long way toward defying an essentialist notion of cultural authenticity that equates ownership with ultimate origin. As we survey the fluidity of styles, genres, and organizations that support masking, it becomes, evident that we are witnessing not merely a pattern of distribution over a given geographic area but also deliberate and creative amalgamations of diverse possibilities suggested by the historical experience of any given community. The particular combination of masking traits found in any locality is the result of a conscious decision by participants to use cultural resources of their region to fashion a specific genre. Thus we see that the Dogon Masquerades traditions discussed here form continuum's of various configurations of formal features, of mask-using organizations, of occasions for mask performance, and of names of associated institutions as well as mask genres and types.

Each of these elements can move independently of the other variables. As demonstrated above, the configuration of a masking tradition cannot be determined simply by plotting the location of a community along these cultural trajectories. Instead, historical circumstances particular to each village group, and sometimes individual villages, create a singular sense of regional identity, an identity that is then articulated in the visual forms of the masks. Nevertheless, Dogon masquerades still remain one of the most picturesque events in Africa. Words Count: 1, 529. Bibliography: Calame-Griaule, Genevieve. "On the Dogon Restudied. " Current Anthropology 32: 5, Dec 1991, p. 575 - 577.

De Mott, Barbara. Dogon Masks -- A Structural Study of Form and Meaning. Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1992. Hollyman, Stephen. Dogon: Africa's People of the Cliffs. 2001. Griaule, Marcel.

Conversations with Ogotemmeli: An Introduction to Dogon Religious Ideas. London: Oxford University Press, 1965.


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