Africana Studies A Criticism of Three Works.
Rachel Elizabeth Harding mentioned in her discourse a Senzala Slavery, Women and Embodied Knowledge that Haitian children who encounter fear respond by going into a possession as a means of reconnecting with their spiritual deities to foster feelings of protection and comfort. The same probably goes, she says, with how 18th century African slaves reacted when they disembarked from their ships and landed on the shores of Haiti, on the shores of the vast continent of the Americas. It is this need to connect with symbols of their native land through religion and art that has become the focal point of the three articles given to us. It is about the reconstruction of their lost identity and ideology in a society that inhibits it.
In her essay, Harding discusses the history of the Afro-Brazilian culture as seen in the proliferation of Candombl, a major religion amongst the Afro-Brazilian community. She engages us with stories that give the readers a personal glimpse in the lives and beliefs of this people in order to understand how it came to be. An interesting part of her study is her focus on the feminist aspect of the religion. This gives us an overview of how women were regarded in their society and how this hierarchy came to be the very foundation of the religion. In the larger sense, it is a remarkable insight into the feminist dealings within the social circle. Another notable topic that she discusses is the integration of the religion into the daily workings of the peoples lives. She says that there is no clear distinction between work and worship in Candombl (14). This tells us that the religion has been so deeply ingrained into the social consciousness of the people that it has come to represent, not just belief, but a lifestyle.
John Michael Vlach also tackles this enduring and pervasive quality of African culture in his assessment of their many artistic forms in By the Work of Their Hands Studies in Afro-American Folklife. Like Harding, he displays the usage of art and its many forms to be able to sustain a culture that has been pushed towards the brink of social amnesia. Turning our attention to the Black cultural manifestations in America, he says that Afro-American art, much like Afro-Brazilian art, came to survive the longs years of slavery when it went through the process of syncretism, or the interweaving of two cultures, that is African and American. Evidence of this can be seen in the quilting, pottery, and boat-building skills of the Afro-Americans. It is this openness to adapt a culture while still staying true to your own that has made their art last.
And in the bigger sphere of things, Morton Marks concludes in Uncovering Ritual Structures in Afro-American Music that the intertwining of cultures, in the end, played the biggest part in defining what the New World would be. He develops this by analyzing the different functions that music has come to play in Afro-American rituals and how this, ultimately, spilled over to the greater public.
All three articles bear witness to the growth of African art in the New World but what I feel is most lacking in their treatise is the understanding of this art in todays context. Yes, they bear great historical meaning and gives us a brand new perspective of how this genre came to be, but what could their possible function today be Harding mentions that Afro-Brazilians still live in the senzala or slave quarters. Until now, a line that separates the Blacks from the Whites still exists in their society. How then do we see their cultural assimilation in this aspect Is it a failure Or is assimilation not even a subject
We saw in these three articles how the cultural hybrid that is African culture in America began simply as a means of expression to being a medium for dialogue. It is their response to the oppressive state that they were put in. The response was to build upon their own sense of history (Vlach). They are saying that despite being called slaves in a land far from home, they can still be free in their beliefs.
In her essay, Harding discusses the history of the Afro-Brazilian culture as seen in the proliferation of Candombl, a major religion amongst the Afro-Brazilian community. She engages us with stories that give the readers a personal glimpse in the lives and beliefs of this people in order to understand how it came to be. An interesting part of her study is her focus on the feminist aspect of the religion. This gives us an overview of how women were regarded in their society and how this hierarchy came to be the very foundation of the religion. In the larger sense, it is a remarkable insight into the feminist dealings within the social circle. Another notable topic that she discusses is the integration of the religion into the daily workings of the peoples lives. She says that there is no clear distinction between work and worship in Candombl (14). This tells us that the religion has been so deeply ingrained into the social consciousness of the people that it has come to represent, not just belief, but a lifestyle.
John Michael Vlach also tackles this enduring and pervasive quality of African culture in his assessment of their many artistic forms in By the Work of Their Hands Studies in Afro-American Folklife. Like Harding, he displays the usage of art and its many forms to be able to sustain a culture that has been pushed towards the brink of social amnesia. Turning our attention to the Black cultural manifestations in America, he says that Afro-American art, much like Afro-Brazilian art, came to survive the longs years of slavery when it went through the process of syncretism, or the interweaving of two cultures, that is African and American. Evidence of this can be seen in the quilting, pottery, and boat-building skills of the Afro-Americans. It is this openness to adapt a culture while still staying true to your own that has made their art last.
And in the bigger sphere of things, Morton Marks concludes in Uncovering Ritual Structures in Afro-American Music that the intertwining of cultures, in the end, played the biggest part in defining what the New World would be. He develops this by analyzing the different functions that music has come to play in Afro-American rituals and how this, ultimately, spilled over to the greater public.
All three articles bear witness to the growth of African art in the New World but what I feel is most lacking in their treatise is the understanding of this art in todays context. Yes, they bear great historical meaning and gives us a brand new perspective of how this genre came to be, but what could their possible function today be Harding mentions that Afro-Brazilians still live in the senzala or slave quarters. Until now, a line that separates the Blacks from the Whites still exists in their society. How then do we see their cultural assimilation in this aspect Is it a failure Or is assimilation not even a subject
We saw in these three articles how the cultural hybrid that is African culture in America began simply as a means of expression to being a medium for dialogue. It is their response to the oppressive state that they were put in. The response was to build upon their own sense of history (Vlach). They are saying that despite being called slaves in a land far from home, they can still be free in their beliefs.
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