History was made recently in Ibadan, the political capital of the Yoruba people, when an Egungun was attacked for trespassing on a domain perceived unholy for it. EMMANUEL ADENIYI writes on the cross-current of masquerading in African society amidst various religious and cultural orientations that query the practice, submitting that a clash of civilizations could cause extinction of this cultural mode.
In what can be described as his canonical essay on the next phase of post-modern relationship among different cultures and superstructures immanent in each culture around the world, Samuel P. Huntington wrote the way a seer would.
To write the way he did, he must have foreseen the disruption that would attend the loss of value system, apathy towards African culture among Africans themselves and a possible clash between/among cultural identities which he grouped into eight, namely Western, Confucian, Japanese, Islamic, Hindu, Slavic-Orthodox, Latin America and African civilizations.
In his 1993 essay, entitled The Clash of Civilizations?, the Eaton professor of Science of Government in Harvard, averred that the clash of civilizations would be the battle lines of the future, and that conflict between civilizations would be the latest phase of the evolution of conflict in the modern world, which according to him, would not be “…primarily ideological or primarily economic… (but) cultural.”
Events that have occupied the epicenter of cultural discourse in the recent time, where what is essentially African is subjected to ridiculous interrogation, while wisdom of the ages is left to walk nude in the public ordinarily recalls Huntington’s prognosis of clash and the redefining of human society through rancour that would shape mutual relations of the world’s cultural identities.
Ibadan, which could be described as an archetype of post-modern African society, witnessed its own clash of civilization a couple of weeks ago. The event was the unmasking of a revered masquerade by Muslims.
At the end of the clash, which slightly gravitated towards religious crisis, lives were claimed and property whose value is yet to be ascertained was destroyed.
Though accusations and counter accusations were traded on why a masquerade should invade the venue of an Islamic function, the whole incident, many have said, smirked of a renewal of clash between two rival belief systems.
They hold that there is a mutual distrust among worshippers of African religion and Euro/Arabic religious beliefs as to whose religious practices or aspects of belief are authentic and receive divine sanction.
This, they believe, is responsible for the aversion of foreign religions for most aspects of African traditional belief, which are seen as evil or ungodly. Certain colours, according to them, are disapproved in some religious quarters, while a number of cultural practices and festivals are termed fetish or seen as the celebrations of the heathen.
Alhaji Saheed Adigun and Mr. Peter Haruna said seeing a masquerade within the vicinity of a mosque or church connoted bad omen, submitting that if a masquerade appears to any human in a dream, that itself has a devilish connotation. “In essence, masquerading is stereotyped evil in both Islam and Christianity,” they revealed.
Chief Ifaleke Ojelabi, an Ondo based Ifa priest, said there could be no real world without the mystical. The mystical, according to him, are the unseen which have the capacity to shape the real world.
“In Yoruba cosmology, and by extension African worldview, three worlds of existence are recognized. They are the worlds of the living, the dead and the unborn. There is a constant interplay among the three. Who are you to say this is not so?
“Happenings around here should tell you that one world leads to another, and without one world the continuum of human existence would be altered.
“The truth is that one world is a reflection of another, and the three maintain a mutual pillar on which their foundations are erected. We were born yesterday, today we live, by tomorrow we join the ancestors; that is the belief about continuum of living in Africa, and it cannot be faulted.”
Ojelabi added that one of the endearing features of the pre-literate African society was the unique role of culture in the society and the zeal with which the people who lived at the time held tight to it and promoted it.
“The primitiveness of the people and their worldview helped to create a sphere of thought and lifestyle that defined them as a people in constant touch with the Divine Essence. What we witness nowadays is the bastardization of our culture in the name of embracing what is alien to this society. This is where the conflict lies,” he submitted.
Answering questions on whether certain aspects of African culture are being phased out and replaced by the pseudo-modern Western/Eastern cultural orientation, a cultural ambassador, Chief Segun Awojobi, said that African culture was no longer intact the way it was many years ago.
“Truly, culture is dynamic, but the corrosive effects of Western values on our culture have impacted negatively on African culture that many are no longer proud of what is originally theirs. Look at it from name-calling; many have changed their culturally-laden names to reflect the ethos of their new-found religion.
“What we hear now are religious names. This is not to say people who bear those names acted foolishly, it is, however, a reflection of their hatred and disapproval of their culture. Same goes for our local languages, dressing, cuisines and so on.
“The destruction of African society started long time ago when we embraced what is theirs while we closed our eyes to what is ours. No culture thrives in such a situation. Our stunted growth is also a by-product of this negligence on our part,” he said.
He described the attack of Oloolu in Ibadan recently as a manifestation of hatred and intolerance of a religious group towards what they perceived to be evil or representation of evil in their environment, noting that if cordial relationship had existed between them “the presence of Oloolu at the occasion would have been interpreted to mean the acceptance of their prayers by the ancestors, but the contrary was the case.”
Alfa Sheu Idris Olododo of NASFAT expressed contrary opinion on the issue. To him, light and darkness cannot cohabit. “Where would they merge?” he quipped.
Alfa Olododo disclosed that Islamic religion forbade anything that would bring impurity on the soul of man, adding that a true believer and follower of Prophet Mohammed (SAW) would have nothing to do with Egungun.
“Don’t you look at the masqueraders and their followers? Study the pattern their lifestyle follows and tell me what always becomes of them. Do you see a responsible person among them, who in the name of upholding the culture of his forefathers, dress in a scary manner and practise voodoo?
“I come from a family where masquerading is done too, and I know what I’m saying. Move close to them, you will hate their practices,” he noted.
Pastor Olusegun Daniel of Light House Church, Lagos, said Christianity similarly had aversion for certain aspects of African culture, like masquerading and many others, noting that God hated such practices, and that it was because of that God wiped out certain nations in the Bible.
He stressed the importance of serving God in truth, saying the problems that pervaded most African countries today had a root in their neglecting the true God for evil practices, including masquerading.
However, the Araba (Archbishop) of Ifa in Osogbo, Osun State, Chief Ifayemi Ayinde Elebuibon, decried the acrimony between the traditional worshippers and other religious orientations in Nigeria.
According to him, every person in the country has constitutional right of religious worship, “there should be no problem as to which religion you belong to. Islam claims to stand for peace, if truly it is peaceful, why does it have traces of violence? Why do Muslims always attack the Olorishas? Same goes for the crusaders?”
He debunked the insinuation that masqueraders were miscreants and the dregs of society, admitting that street urchins always followed Egungun wherever it went, but that the real masqueraders were responsible members of the society.
The Olori Alagbaa of Ibadanland, Chief Ojetunji Adeleye Asoleke, described all human beings as masqueraders, noting that since all human beings always put on cloth, “…we are all masqueraders. No one can claim exception. Even when you sleep, you still cover yourself with cloth, which makes you a masquerader too. In overseas, there are masqueraders there too. How can anyone claim the practice to be fetish then?”
Chairman, Oyo State Council of Arts and Culture, Chief Supo Kosemani, described the masquerade tradition as an age-long practice that should not be abandoned.
He said the custodians of masquerade had taken the practice from its sublime plane to the mundane by inculcating various practices which were alien to masquerading in the land.
“How do you explain a situation whereby families of masqueraders during their festival organize parties and invite Fuji musicians when masqueraders themselves can perform?
“This is why you always see miscreants and urchins hijack it from them. It is an opportunity for hoodlums to exploit it for their own advantage, this why we always urge them to include us in their planning so that we can help them fine-tune it.
‘Nothing stops us from having Father Alapansapa’
Professor Gbemisola Adeoti is the Director of the Institute of Cultural Studies, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State. He speaks on African masquerade and ways to mutualise harmonious relationship among various religious orientations in Nigeria.
What is masquerading? How does it fulfil the yearning of a people to bring the unseen to the physical world?
The word “Masquerade” is related to “mask” which implies the covering of the eyes, nose or the entire face to prevent people from recognising or discovering the correct identity of whoever is behind the mask. The purpose of the masking is basically for amusement and entertainment in many cultures, but it can also be situated within the context of the religious or the spiritual. Thus, you have many religious festivals being devoted to the celebration of masked entities or the masked entities featuring as part of a larger religious celebration. The art of masquerading is not peculiar to Yoruba society or African societies. Even among the ancient Greeks to whom modern Europeans trace their own ancestry, masked figures were prominent features of Dionysus festivals. The essence of this is to fulfil the mimetic instinct of human beings. Masquerades tend to recall or imitate beings who are believed to be inhabiting the spiritual realm. Among the Yoruba, it is associated with the ancestors, with the people believing in an unbroken link between those who are living and their predecessors who have moved into another realm of existence. That is why they are called Ara Orun (denizens of heaven). When the denizens of heaven appear to relate with their siblings on earth, the atmosphere is usually that of merriment, carnival, jubilation, feasting, free expression of innate desires which are to be translated into reality in the days to come. So, on the whole, there is the spiritual dimension to the masquerade, there is also the secular dimension. For instance, among the Igbos, the masquerades performed judicial roles in their traditional societies, settling disputes on lands, family matters etc.
What would you say is the cultural significance of masquerading in the contemporary African society as well as its spiritual and social functions in the society?
The masquerade is an affirmation of the people’s belief in life after death. In the face of many changes that have taken place in our societies especially with the spread of Christianity and Islam, the influence of masquerades as entertainment or as political entities seems to have reduced. But that does not mean that they cannot serve the purposes already highlighted above for those who believe in them. Our contemporary society can learn a lot from the communalism, the sense of unity or brotherhood as well as tolerance that come to manifest in the celebration of the masquerades.
Some religious groups have stereotyped masquerading and other aspects of African culture as fetish and evil, is it evil? If yes, what is evil in this aspect of African traditional religion?
This denigration of masquerade like many aspect of our culture is a carryover of colonialism which believed in our non-humanity as Africans and that we have to recreate ourselves in the image of the West or the East. Those adjectives you used in your questions were exactly the adjectives used by the whites to describe our people and their ways. I do not agree with that. The fact that I don’t understand or do what they do in other religion does not mean that I should dismiss them. I think we should recognise the humanity in the other person, regardless of the faith or creed he or she professes otherwise we will be courting anarchy and doom as we are already witnessing in the last two decades in our country.
If not, in what way do you think culture experts and masqueraders can remove this negative labelling and use masquerading as a tool to convey the richness of African culture?
I think the first thing to do is to recognise that masquerade in any culture is part of that culture. Even the English who brought Christianity to Nigeria had the masque tradition which was a popular entertainment tradition in Renaissance England. If we can tolerate Father Christmas with its mask of amusement and beard of benevolence, then those who enjoy the fun of Father Alapansanpa should do so unhindered. Tolerance, that is the word, and anything short of it will only be heading in the direction of chaos as you have seen being demonstrated recently.
Recently in Ibadan, some Muslim youths unmasked Oloolu masqueraders publicly, what would you say this portends for the future of African culture?
This is not too different from the situation where people kill worshippers in a church or set ablaze a mosque with worshippers because they share different faiths. People should just mutually respect their rights to worships, their freedom of association without infringing on the rights of others. If we don’t, it is not only the culture that is endangered, our politics and economy will also be in danger. In any case, they are already endangered. The issue is how are we going to right the wrongs.
Have people’s perception of masquerade changed?
Yes. People’s views of the masquerade have altered considerably. In the past, they regarded it as the representative of the ancestors on earth; they treat the masked being with awe and respect. In turn, he infuses the living with hope as they pray to him and the beings that he represents. They radiate happiness and joy, watching him perform. But all those things have changed. Apart from the fact that the masquerade does not inspire such awe in many quarters now, some people behind the masks do things that denigrate the essence of masquerade.
What would you say is wrong with the continental Africans who throw away their culture only to embrace what is foreign to them while descendants of Africans, especially in the Americas still hold dearly to the culture?
From the era of slavery and colonisation, there had been much brainwashing that made Africans to believe that they have an ignoble past, a terrible present and an inauspicious future. Therefore, they have to deny themselves and embrace the ways of the Whiteman to be useful and happy. Political independence has not done much to remove this complex and that is what you see manifesting in people, not being proud of who they are and what they have.
Unfortunately, the Europeans don’t do that to themselves, they preserve what they have and attune it to the present.
Can masquerading be promoted and turned to economic potentials for the practitioners?
Yes. If you look at the amount of money that thousands of Father Christmas make for themselves or their sponsors every year in Nigeria alone, you will see the economic potentials of this kind of secular entertainment that has grown out of the religious context. Father Christmas is fun. It is entertainment enjoyed by the old, but more importantly the young. The same thing can be done to traditional masquerades, if we think that is the next thing we should do to them. But more importantly, we should be proud of who we are and where we are coming from. We should tolerate them and let them be so long as they don’t infringe on our own rights too.
Using Nigeria as a microcosm of African society, do you foresee harmonious relationship between/among different religious and cultural identities (Christianity, Islam, Hindu, Western/Eastern orientations etc)?
Yes. Religious harmony, peaceful co existence and unity among different identities (religion, gender, ethnic and political) are quite possible, if we are ready to tolerate each other, if we don’t endow ourselves with needless superiority complex or inferiority complex. The problem is that some people are benefitting from the orchestration of these differences. They profit from it and they will not want to block this source of their bread. They are the people that the Yoruba will refer to as Arije nibi madaru (those who benefit from chaos). Once we realise this and we are determined to see ourselves first and foremost as human beings endowed with similar features, we will begin to win the war. The first battle is to erect a society where majority if not all human beings will have equal opportunity to exist and realise their potentials, regardless of those identities. Democracy is a sure way to it; unfortunately, our own brand of democracy is like the democracy of the masquerade. The more you look at it the less uncertain you are at its correct identity.
As a culture expert, how do you think African culture could be salvaged from undue Western hegemony?
We need education. Correct education, a kind of education that stems from a correct apprehension of ourselves, our past and where we are going. We should not see ourselves as products of a dark past. There is nothing in our past that the Europeans whom we tend to worship today do not have, masquerade, idols, etc. If you compare our myths with that of the Westerners, they are quite similar, so why should any African feel inferior to the Whiteman or the Asian? What is important is how we can make use of elements within our culture to address our developmental challenges of the moment and there are many useful aspects of such cultural values, if we care to examine them in details, and not starting out on the premise of prejudice.
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