Oju L'Oro Wa : From Physical Vision to Witchcraft and Mystical Insight: An Intercultural Exploration of the Face as Epistemological and Metaphysical Matrix in Yoruba Thought
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
Portraiture, Spectacle, and the Dialectics of Looking
Since the face is the seat of the eyes (oju), no discussion of aworan (representation), especially portraiture, would be complete without relating it to iworan, the act of looking and being looked at, otherwise known as the gaze.
To begin with,the Yoruba call the eyeball eyin ojú a refractive "egg" empowered by ase [a peculiar form of creative energy perhaps associated with the life force] (mediated by Esu) enabling an individual to see(riran). As with other aspects of Yoruba culture, the eyeball is thought to have two aspects, an outer layer called oju ode(literally, external eye) or oju lasan (literally, naked eye),which has to do with normal, quotidian vision, and an inner one called oju inu (literally, internal eye) or oju okan (literally,mind's eye).
The latter is associated with memory, intention,intuition, insight, thinking, imagination, critical analysis, visual cognition, dreams, trances, prophecy, hypnotism, empathy,telepathy, divination, healing, benevolence, malevolence,extrasensory perception, and witchcraft, among others. For the Yoruba, these two layers of the eye combine to determine iworan, the specular gaze of an individual.
John Annenechukwu Umeh, on the Afa system of knowledge from the culturally cognate Igbo thought in After God is Dibia: Igbo Cosmology, Divination and Sacred Science in Nigeria, incidentally complements Lawal's insights on Yoruba epistemology
In Afa language, ose naabo is the two eyes with which one sees the mortal world, while ose ora is the eye with which one sees the Spirit and the world in addition. Ose naabo has the dualities or polarities of the material world namely: anya aka nni na anya aka ekpe, i.e., right eye and left eye.
Ose ora is Uche. Uche is the Super Mind/Universal Mind/Universal consciousness…
Emeagwali, Gloria (History)
On a different note, let me recommend Oral Epics from Africa edited by Johnson and Hale. This wonderful text includes Soninke, Mande, Fulbe, Wolof and Central African epics. Several ancient epics from this region are there including the Epic of Wagadu (Soninke)
and the Epic of Njaajaan Njaay(Wolof)
Mwindo Epic (Congo Region).
Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU
africahistory.net; gloriaemeagwali.com
2019 Distinguished Africanist Awardee
New York African Studies Association
Sent: Tuesday, March 26, 2019 1:08:48 AM
To: usaafricadialogue; Yoruba Affairs
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Oju L'Oro Wa : From Physical Vision to Witchcraft and Mystical Insight: An Intercultural Exploration of the Face as Epistemological and Metaphysical Matrix in Yoruba Thought
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Michael Afolayan
Emeagwali, Gloria (History)
Sent: Wednesday, March 27, 2019 2:03 PM
To: usaafricadialogue; Yoruba Affairs
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Oju L'Oro Wa : From Physical Vision to Witchcraft and Mystical Insight: An Intercultural Exploration of the Face as Epistemological and Metaphysical Matrix in Yoruba Thought
OLAYINKA AGBETUYI
Sent: Wednesday, March 27, 2019 2:03 PM
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Oju L'Oro Wa : From Physical Vision to Witchcraft and Mystical Insight: An Intercultural Exploration of the Face as Epistemological and Metaphysical Matrix in Yoruba Thought
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
What do you think?
Femi Kolapo
Yoruba proverbs, Ifa verses, and traditions preserved in societies less touched by Christian missionary activities are the best places
to look for the real meaning of aje (as a Yoruba phenomenon). I went to school and grew up in a Nupe town where as of the time 1968-71 there was no single native Christian. The churches (located at the outskirt of town) were built and patronized by
only migrants, sojourners and traders. Traditional religious practices, including the famous Gunu, and Islam predominated. Yet among them, the witch
ega or gachizi, were always portrayed as the cause of deaths, sicknesses, misfortunes, and tragedies etc.
I also spent my holidays in the 60s as a child with my maternal grandparents in a Yoruba town with a mix of very strong traditional African
religions and Islam and Christianity. Here too, adherents of traditional religions (as well as Christians and Muslims) generally spoke negatively of witches (though they often mentioned that occasionally some witches opted to do good).
I also know of a couple of Yoruba masquerades (Egungun) , epitome of Yoruba traditional religion - one in my local precinct was called
Ota-aje (nemesis of the witch) - that were dedicated to protecting society from the evil powers and plans of the
aje. On about three occasions as a young boy I witnessed the coming to my grandparents town of an out-of town
Sango troupe invited to come to neutralize the evil actions of witches. The refrain of the song they sang is still fresh in my memory even as I write this. Also, I had a late great uncle who was a notable
ifa priest who took ill and died after a fearsome illness. The consensus explanation for his sickness and death was that he had on several occasions flouted the warnings of a witch and had through his priestly vocation rescued somebody who the witch
was afflicting (the witch was supposedly feasting on the soul of the person, but this great ifa priest uncle of mine rescued the person from the witch) thus disrupting their activities and challenging their power, for which it was thought that he paid the
ultimate price. While my great uncle was languishing in his sickness, some people, so the story goes in my extended family, had gone to beg the witch or witches (in a different village) to spare my great uncle. They were supposedly told that it was already
too late to beg since they had shared the soul of this man.
It would seem then that the conception of a witch as very negative (usually death dealing) force among the Yoruba (and Edo?) probably has
little to do with Christian missionaries. Rather, missionaries were more likely as do contemporary charismatic Christians in Africa , to have adopted the local understanding about witches and presented their own religion as an alternative source of protection
from them. Lastly, also when I was growing up, I know of a notable woman, wife of an alfa - Muslim learned in the healing art and maker and seller of charms - who said (to my mother) that she would seek initiation into
aje so as to ensure that her prospering son would thereby be safe from harm.
This general negative conception of the witch or of witchcraft seems to apply in large parts of Central Africa and East Afri.
The translation by William Bascom of an Ifa verse below is from page 459 of his (W. Bascom) Ifa Divination. There are a couple of other verses mentioning aje (witches) in a negative light.
Verse 225 - 2 459
There is someone who is favoring and indulging a woman with everything;
but the woman is a witch. She will not allow his affairs to straighten out. He
makes a sacrifice, but it has no effect; he makes medicine, but it does not work.
He should sacrifice six baby chickens, six sticks of birdlime,2 and seasoned
mashed yams because of this woman. They said he should carry them into his
farm. He carried the seasoned mashed yams into his farm, and he tied the
chicks to a basketry tray; he tied the sticks of birdlime to the edge of the tray.
The senior wife of this man turned into a bird and she flew to the farm. When
she reached the farm, she heard the cries of the baby chickens and flew down to
the ground; she saw the seasoned mashed yams and, as she began to eat them,
she stuck to the birdlime and she died.3
Ifa says there is a bird-woman4 who is standing beside this person. Ifa
says that he should make a sacrifice, so that she will not be able to kill him.
Ifa says that we are seeking advice about a matter, but that the person from
whom we are seeking advice is an enemy; therefore we should be careful not to
speak of it in front of this person, who will prove to be a tale-bearer.
2. A sticky substance made from the sap of a tree and used with a decoy to
catch parrots in the cornfield. Cf. verse 245-2.
3. Note that all of the items sacrificed are instrumental in catching the
witch.
4. A witch. Witches are believed to have birds and other animal familiars
and, as stated in this verse, to be able to turn themselves into birds.
The linkage of aje, Esu, and Orunmila in the verse below (Bascom Ifa Divination, pp. 556 - 557) would seem to provide a basis to argue that the verse predates Christianity by scores if not hundreds of years.
Iku ndana epin, arun ndana ita; aje oun Esu ndana munrun-munrun a da fun Qrunmila nigba-ti ara omore ko da;. . .
"Death kindles a fire of epin wood; disease kindles a fire of ita wood; Witches and Eshu kindle a fire of munrun-munrun wood" 1 was the one who cast Ifa for Orunmila when his child's health was not good. . . ."
Sent: Friday, March 29, 2019 7:34:24 AM
To: usaafric...@googlegroups.com; Yoruba Affairs
Emeagwali, Gloria (History)
The third story of the Westcar Papyrus is told by Bauefre, son of Khufu, and is set during the reign Sneferu. It tells of the time when the king, being really bored, goes for a sail along with twenty attractive young women on the advice of his chief lector priest, Djadjamankh. However, one of the girls drops a turquoise fish pendant in the water and is so upset by its loss that even the promise of a replacement from the royal treasury will not cheer her up. Djadjamankh then causes the water to fold over on itself so that the amulet can be retrieved (echoing the parting of the water by Moses during the Exodus).
The full translation…
Then Bauefre stood up to speak, and said: “I will let your majesty hear a wonder which happened in the time of your forefather Sneferu,justified, and is something that the chief lector priest Djadjamankh did”. Then he told the story of the green jewel.
[ ] day things have not happened. [Snefru went through] every room of the palace to seek distraction for himself but he couldn’t find any. The he said “go and bring me the chief lector priest and book scribe Djadjamankh and he was brought to him immediately. Then his majesty said to him “I have gone through every room of the palace to find distraction for myself but I couldn’t find any.”
Then Djadjamankh said to him “Oh, may your Majesty go to the lake of the palace, and man a ship with all beautiful women from inside your palace. The heart of your majesty will be cheered by seeing them row a trip back and forth and seeing the beautiful reeds of your lake and seeing its beautiful fields and water banks. Your heart will be gladdened by this so I will arrange a rowing trip.”
Let there be brought to me twenty oars of ebony plated with gold, their handles of sandalwood plated with electrum. Let there be brought to me twenty women with beautiful bodies, well developed breasts, who have braided, and who have not yet given birth. And let me be brought to me twenty nets and give these nets to these women after their clothes have been taken off”. All was done as his majesty commanded. Then they rowed back and forth and the heart of his majesty was gladdened by seeing them row.
Then one woman who was at the stroke oar got entangled in her braids and a fish pendant of real turquoise fell in the water. Then she became still, without rowing and her side became still, without rowing and his majesty said “can you not row?” and they said “our stroke has become still without rowing” and his majesty said to her “why are you not rowing?” and she said “this fish pendant of real turquoise has fallen into the water” then [he said] to [her] “[it shall be] replaced” and she said to him ” prefer the real one to a substitute” and then his majesty said “go and bring me the chief lector priest Djadjamankh and he was brought immediately.
Then his Majesty said “Djadjamankh, my brother, I have done what you said any the heart of his majesty was gladdened by seeing them row. Then a fish pendant of real turquoise on one of the strokes fell into the water and she became still without rowing. It so happened that she disrupted her side and I said to her “why are you not rowing” and she said to me “the fish pendant that was real turquoise has fallen into the water” and I said to her “Row, lo I myself will replace it” and she said to me “I prefer my own thing to its substitute”
Then the chief lector priest Djadjamankh spoke a spell and put one side of the weater of the lake on top of the other and found the fish pendant lying on a shard. He fetched it and gave it to its owner. Now the water was twelve cubits in the middle and it ended up being twenty-four cubits after being folded up. The he spoke a spell and the parts of the water of the lake returned to their positions. His majesty spent a day of celebration with the entire royal household and at the end he rewarded the chief lector priest Djadjamankh with every good thing.
Behold a wonder that happened in the time of your forefather, the King of Upper and Lower Egypt Sneferu, which is something the chief lector priest and book scribe Djadjamankh did.
Then his majesty the King of Upper and Lower Egypt Khufu said “let an offering be made of a thousand loaves of bread, a hundred jars of beer, one ox and two balls of incense to the King of Upper and Lower Egypt Senefru, justified, and let there be given one cake, one jug of beer, a large portion of meat and one ball of incense to the chief lector priest and book scribe Djadjamankh, as I have seen an example of his learning. One did as everything as his majesty had ordered.
Adapted from translations by Marc Jan Nederhof and A.M. Blackman
Sent: Saturday, March 30, 2019 12:31 AM
To: usaafric...@googlegroups.com
Kissi, Edward
Femi’s memories of life in his Nupe town in Nigeria remind me of my own in my Adensua village in Ghana. They highlight the fact that as we grow older and farther from the world of
our birth, in the 1960s, we become carriers of oral traditions told to us in our youth, or bearers of our own historical memories.
I was born in that small village in the Eastern region of Ghana in the early 1960s, and completed elementary school there in the early 1970s. My experiences and Femi’s make for a good study in “comparative witchcraft” and “comparative Christianity.”
Like Femi’s town, Christianity---presbyterianism, methodism, and pentecostalism-----had touched my village in the 1960s but never really torched its beliefs and superstitions. People went to church on Sundays as a routine activity similar to going to farm on
Saturdays. The difference was that church attendance was also an occasion to wear a new dress or outdoor a new shoe. For elementary school kids like myself, who attended the local Methodist primary and middle schools at that time, church was mandatory, a compulsory
show of good behavior, and not an act of piety. Our beliefs in witches and witchcraft remained undisturbed. Thus, belief in witches existed in my village long before the first Christian church was built there. Even in their pre-Christian beliefs in a Supreme
Being, my people claimed in one of their proverbs that it is God who created Day, but thought it wise to attach Night to it, just as any animal has a liver attached to its bile. We believed in the White Man’s God, but never abandoned the beliefs of our Ancestors.
The elements of our belief in witchcraft, as I heard them from older people, and long before I read a book about witchcraft, included the following. One, witches are predominantly women or females, primarily older women, or those who never had children. Isn’t
this a paradox in my matrilineal Akan society where, to echo Ibn Battuta’s words, women were seen as more important than men? In fact the Kwawu word for a witch---obayifo---means a taker of babies and foetus from women’s wombs. Older women who never
had children were believed to indulge in this nocturnal practice of stealing foetus from pregnant women and carrying them in their infertile wombs at night and returning the stolen foetus at dawn. There could be girl or baby-witches and they are presumed to
be the most dangerous of the guild. Two, there are a few male and boy witches and just as malevolent as their younger female counterparts. Three, witches operated only in the night. Four, witches turned into monstrous birds in the night, emitted sparks of
fire as they flew, and met with their fellow witches on trees near the village or far away from it to eat human beings they have turned into chicken or sheep. That they could harm anyone who approached them, and only the most powerful traditional priests could
trap them in their transformed state and hold them on the trees on which they convene and expose them to the rest of society at daybreak.
As bizarre as these beliefs in witchcraft sound to me today, after a little education, they shaped my early life. Some of my elementary school friends were told by traditional and Christian priests that witches in their households have already eaten their brains
and no matter how hard they studied, which they did, they will never make it. And they believed, then, and even now. In fact many in my village embraced Christianity in the 1960s for the purpose of protecting themselves against witches with the help of another
unseen supernatural force. Some of my schoolmates told stories about their encounters with witches not only in their dreams but on their way to somewhere in the night. I never saw a witch and never dreamt of one but the conviction with which my friends spoke
about their encounters with witches made me think they were real oral testimonies of people’s experiences. I also saw traditional priests claim that a large clay-pot with human blood and bones in it had been buried beneath the huge orange tree in the center
of the village. Since the tree was closer to my mother’s house, I lived in constant fear of its malevolent force. I would not even walk past it in the night. In short, superstition paralyzed all of us in the village and impeded our thinking about what we could
do to improve ourselves and our village.
I began to reassess and dismiss my beliefs in witchcraft when I started graduate studies in Waterloo, Canada, in 1989. There, and far from my small village in Ghana, I did not mind staying in the University library late into the night and returning to my apartment
without fearing an encounter with a witch, or a ghost, as I would have in my village that had no electricity. It seems to me that as people and places move from one mode of existence to another, their beliefs change. There may still be some residues of the
belief in witchcraft in my village, but my recent interactions with people who live there now suggest that the old era of belief in witches has given way to a new life under the glare of electric lights, the sound of music into the night, and the constant
dings and beeps of cellphones.
No one seems to believe in witchcraft anymore in my village. But where did the witches go? Or was it our own theoretical grappling with the explicable realities of life? Whatever it is, something has changed in my village and that is worthy of study.
Edward Kissi
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
Okey Iheduru
General News of Thursday, 28 March 2019
Source: Graphic.com.gh
Otumfuo’s 20th anniversary celebrations: 250 river gods assemble at Manhyia
Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, placing his hands on leaves before he sat in state to receive visi
As part of the 20th anniversary celebrations of the Asantehene, Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, 250 Asante Atano gods (river gods) were assembled at the Manhyia Palace yesterday for a purification and thanksgiving rites.
The event, which depicted a re-enactment of the history and relevance of the gods and the roles they played in the protection and building of the Asante Kingdom which predates Christianity, was also used to pray for a better future for the Asantehene and Asanteman.
Otumfuo Osei Tutu II led in the performance of the rites to demonstrate the rich history of Asanteman and the source of its strength and protection.
Preceding his arrival for the performance of the rites was a gathering of the 250 deities and their priests who were clad in white. All clans in Asanteman were represented.
The slaughtering of a number of rams, led by the Asantehene and the spilling of the blood on each deity was performed behind closed doors.
There were some anxious moments as hundreds of indigenes struggled for space to catch a glimpse of the rites.
The excitement outside the locked Manhyia Palace gates was enough for the younger generation to appreciate the culture of Asanteman.
Moments later, a group of young men emerged with huge white rams with blood dripping all over them.
But it was the fight of ownership over each carcass by another group outside, particularly the palace workers, that really drew the attention of the people.
It was indeed an awe-inspiring moment as anxious youth followed the carcasses.
As Otumfuo later sat in state to receive his guests and chiefs, kete, Fontofrom music and dance filled the atmosphere.
The traditional priests and priestesses were not left out of the excitement as some of them who were overtaken by the "spirit", went into moments of frenzy and went '’wild.'’
The Atano rites officially announced the commencement of the 20th anniversary celebration of the Asantehene Otumfuo Osei Tutu II, who was enthroned in 1999 and whose reign has brought some unparalleled development to Asanteman.
Achievements
Otumfuo is credited with establishing the Otumfuo Educational Fund to assist brilliant, needy students in Ghana and promote literacy in general.
As one of his achievements in the educational sector, Otumfuo used his influence to initiate the famous project known as "Promoting Partnership with Traditional Project," mainly to build school infrastructure and build capacities of facilitators.
He was one of the lead campaigners in the fight against HIV prevalence in the region at a time the Ashanti Region topped the prevalence rate in the country.
Over the last 20 years, the king of Asanteman has championed the preservation of the Asante culture through strengthening of the chieftaincy institution and streamlining its organogram and authority.
Otumfuo is said to have played a key role in bringing government's development projects to Kumasi, in particular, including the Kejetia Market Redevelopment Project, the Kumasi City Mall and currently has initiated the construction of the Kumasi Airport City to house first-class offices and businesses.
Education
Born some 69 years ago, Otumfuo Osei Tutu attended the Sefwi-Wiaso Secondary School for his GCE Ordinary Level, then to the Osei Kyerekyere Secondary School for his Advanced Level certificate before proceeding to the then Institute for Professional Studies (IPS) to study accounting.
He later went to the United Kingdom for further studies where he also worked as a professional accountant and had stints in other businesses before he was enstooled as the Asantehene on April 26, 1999.
Just published “The African Corporation, ‘Africapitalism’ and Regional Integration in Africa” (September 2018). DOI: https://doi.org/10.4337/9781785362538.
Kwabena Akurang-Parry
Edward writes:
"No one seems to believe in witchcraft anymore in my village. But where did the witches go? Or was it our own theoretical grappling with the explicable realities of life? Whatever it is, something has changed in my village and that is worthy of study."
The witches still inhabit the minds of our people. From my considered opinion, the witches have not gone anywhere. Christianization and Modernity, the latter of which I don't know its beginnings, when it will end, and whose concept, have not displaced witchcraft. To state, unless in the literal sense, that witchcraft is a thing of the past may be described as an empirical hoax with theoretical maximization. Our ontology still recognizes the existence of witches/witchcraft. This is truer in this age of all kinds of casino, prophetic, and prosperity religious institutions, including the "orthodox" churches that feed on the apocalyptic fears of the gullible. I would argue that the construction and perceptions of witchcraft are stronger today than yesterday because of the strains and stresses of materialism, broadly conceptualized, which has become a major part of our cultural landscape.
Kwabena
To: usaafricadialogue
Kwabena Akurang-Parry
Sent: March 31, 2019 1:49 AM
To: USAAfrica Dialogue
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
A visual and verbal exploration of life's twists and transformations through
the visual art of El Anatsui and Richard Serra as responded to by art critic
Rikki Wemega-Kwawu and complemented by Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju on the
writings of Toyin Falola.
This second edition has a new musical score, more images and more text, facilitating better understanding of the film's theme.
The film is inspired by art critic Wemega-Kwawu's Facebook post of 11th March 2019 on El Anatsui's installation "Lorgorligi Logarithms", I adapt that interpretation to Richard Serra's "The Matter of Time" and other works of Serra's and Anatsui's , Serra having been introduced to me by the discussion thread generated by Rikki's post.
The simplicity and profundity of the ideas expressed by Wemega-Kwawu’s post are used in unifying images of the art of Anatsui and Serra, ideas I see as resonant across the various works in those images from various online sources.
These verbal and visual expressions are complemented by my distillations of biographical progression in relation to ideals of scholarly activity from the work of Toyin Falola in “Toyin Falola’s In Praise of Greatness and its Intercultural Resonance in the Context of Classical Yoruba Hermeneutics”, an essay under consideration for publication in the Yoruba Studies Review.
My reflections on Falola’s work expand upon the impulse generated by Wemega-Kwawu, carrying forward their ideational possibilities as the images unfold.
This is an expanded second edition of the film benefiting from Wemega-Kwawu's critique of the first edition .
This edition has a new musical score, more images and more text,
facilitating better understanding of the film's theme.
Comments on the film are visible on its Facebook post.
Emeagwali, Gloria (History)
History Department, Central Connecticut State University
www.africahistory.net
To: usaafricadialogue
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Rhythms 2nd, Transformative Edition : El Anatsui and Richard Serra : A Film on the Journey of Life as Visualized by Artists El Anatsui and Richard Serra.
Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
Emeagwali, Gloria (History)
History Department, Central Connecticut State University
www.africahistory.net
To: usaafricadialogue
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Rhythms 2nd, Transformative Edition : El Anatsui and Richard Serra : A Film on the Journey of Life as Visualized by Artists El Anatsui and Richard Serra.