Egungun Masquerades and Yoruba Ritual Performance
GENERAL:
Conteh-Morgan, John, and Tejumola Olaniyan. African Drama and Performance. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004. Print.
Comprehensive collection of articles engaging contemporary trends and texts in the field of African drama and performance. Of interest is Fiebach’s “Dimensions of Theatricality in Africa” and Barber’s “Literacy, Improvisation, and the Virtual Script in Yoruba Popular Theatre.”
Ogunbiyi, Yemi. Drama and Theatre in Nigeria: A Critical Source Book. Lagos: Nigeria Magazine, 1981. Print.
**This book is en route from one of the Boston Consortium libraries.** This is a foundational book in the field, attempting to collect and anthologize some of the most important voices of indigenous Nigerian theatrical history and criticism.
HISTORY OF THE YORUBA PEOPLE AND REGION:
Bascomb, William. The Yoruba of Southwestern Nigeria. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., 1969. Print.
A general, slightly outdated review of Yoruba history and culture. The book includes overviews of Yoruba economics, government, social structure, life cycle, spiritual cycle, religious deities, and aesthetics from a traditionally western-biased anthropological point of view. Much of the information is based on fieldwork conducted in the 1930s and 40s, and as such, betrays certain “othering” tendencies. This is a good book, however, for quick, general information about Yoruba economic and social structure. Much of the content must be filtered for biases and problematic points of view.
Fadipẹ, N A. The Sociology of the Yoruba. Ibadan: Ibadan University Press, 1970. Print.
Early sociological study of the Yoruba people conducted by an indigenous scholar. The work shows up in several bibliographies of leading ethnographies and analyses in the field of Yoruba performance studies.
Law, Robin. The Oyo Empire, C.1600-C.1836: A West African Imperialism in the Era of the Atlantic Slave Trade. Oxford, Eng.: Clarendon Press, 1977. Print.
**I have requested this item from the 5 College collection.** I am hoping that parts of this work will illuminate the social and political milieu of the early Oyo Empire, and the ways in which Egungun Masquerades may have interacted with the consolidation and stratification of Imperial Oyo power.
Stride, G.T., and Caroline Ifeka. Peoples and Empires of West Africa: West Africa in History 1000-1800. Middlesex: Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd., 1971. Print.
This book has in interesting history, coming out of newly-independent, recently Civil War-torn late 1960s Nigeria. The foundational aim of the book was to provide a broad yet detailed assessment of Western African history from a West African perspective for young West African students. As such, the book offers an accessible and thorough account of the history of this diverse region. Of interest to my current study is the chapter on the Oyo Empire (288-304). This chapter contains a condensed history of the Oyo Empire, including analysis of its rise and fall and the empire’s various structures of power. Much of this information will be useful in thinking about the ways Egungun performance both legitimizes and contests power structures. The rest of the history contained within the book is beyond the purview of my current study.
YORUBA AESTHETICS:
Adedeji, Joel. “Traditional Yoruba Theater.” African Arts. 3.1 (1969): 60-63. Print.
A brief, general summary of Yoruba theatre, with special emphasis on the “aesthetic” that inform performance. Most of the article reads like an encyclopedia entry, defining basic terminology and summarizing the “plot” of a specific performance viewed by the author. This piece suggests that the Yoruban aesthetic is characterized by a fusion of several different artistic elements into a holistic performance style that is above all entertaining and that achieves “magic and make-believe in theatre” (63). The article’s point of view is slightly antiquated, and focuses more on 1969 styles of performance as they emerged from and responded to the legacy of the Yoruban “masques” of the late 18th early 19th centuries.
Ajayi, Omofolabo S. Yoruba Dance: The Semiotics of Movement and Body Attitude in a Nigerian Culture. Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, Inc., 1998. Print.
A comprehensive study of contemporary Yoruba dance. Genres discussed include: deification and worship, possession rituals, social rites of purification and rejuvenation, marriage rites, war ceremonies in peacetime and wartime, hero tributes, and miscellaneous informal and formal ritual entertainments. Introductory chapters include a helpful overview of dance semiotics as well as a concise review of the historical contexts of Nigerian dance. Overall, Ajayi focuses on the problems and possibilities of non-verbal modes of communication and culture-building, and offers a stinging critique of western scholars who have, for too long, ignored dance as a viable cultural practice worthy of study (pp. 2-3). In her book Ajayi does not focus on Egungun of Gẹ̀lẹ̀dé Masquerades (for a number of reasons) so much of her in-depth, semiotic analysis of specific dances and festivals does not answer my research question. However, her overall approach (defined pp. 1-41) offers a handy critical framework through which to view the Egungun and Gẹ̀lẹ̀dé traditions. The general festival summaries that begin each chapter also offer insight into the place of dance in forming corporate and individual identity.
Cordwell, Justine M. “The Art and Aesthetics of the Yoruba”. African Arts. 16.2 (Feb., 1983), 56-59,93-94, 100. Print.
Cordwell’s development as an anthropologist has mirrored the field’s growth as it moves from old styles of field work that position the anthropologist as aloof observer to newer modes of analysis that address post-modern problems and figure the scholar as participant (on some level) in the social drama they are recording (Margaret Drewal discusses this shift in her own work as well). Taking a performative approach, Cordwell foregrounds her study of Yoruba aesthetics in cultural display. Her work is useful in that it illuminates how Yoruba aesthetic codes interact within the context of public and private social and political performance. Some of the article is not as useful to my current study in that it does deal with the plastic arts and with “contemporary” (read: 1984) manifestations of Yoruba aesthetics.
Thompson, Robert F. Aesthetic of the Cool: Afro-Atlantic Art and Music. Pittsburgh: Periscope Publishing, 2011. Print.
**Requested item from 5 Colleges Collection.** Thompson’s concept of “the aesthetic of cool” has been referenced in several journal articles and books (Including M. Drewal, H. Drewal, Matory, Ajayi). I hope this volume will elucidate Thompson’s theory, and in so doing shed light on its connection to Yoruba dance traditions.
EGUNGUN MASQUERADE & YORUBA RITUAL PERFORMANCE:
Abiodun, Rowland, Henry J. Drewal, and John Pemberton. The Yoruba Artist: New Theoretical Perspectives on African Arts. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1994. Print.
Much of this seminal volume deals with the plastic arts across a broad geographical and cultural swath of Yorubaland. Of interest to my study is the opening chapter entitled “Art, Identity, and Identification: A Commentary on Yoruba Art Historical Studies” in which John Picton problematizes understandings of a singular historical Yoruba “identity.” He also makes some interesting observations about the contemporary state of Yoruba studies and the position of western critics in this discourse. Akin Euba’s chapter “Drumming for the Egungun: The Poet-Musician in Yoruba Masquerade Theater” is a useful summation of the role of the drummer in the Egungun Masquerade. There is also a useful glossary of terms, and an extensive bibliography.
Adedeji, Joel A. The Origin and Form of the Yoruba Masque Theatre. “Cahiers d’Etudes Africaines”. 12.46 (1972). 254-276. Print.
Fascinating article about the development of the professional traveling Yoruba theatre of the 18th and 19th centuries. While this does not relate to my current study, Adedeji’s brief recounting of the early history of Yoruba ritual performance is informative. His account sheds light on the political and competitive nature of early Egungun Masquerades. General definition of elements used in Yoruba performance are listed and described: Mask, Chant, Dance, Drama. Drama is divided between “ritual” and “review,” and while these masquerades are outside the time period I am studying, they provide interesting insight into Yoruba performances aesthetics and the importance of theatre in Yoruba cultural and political life. The rest of the article deals with the development of traveling Yoruba theatre at the zenith of Oyo political, geographic, and economic dominance.
Aremu, P.S.O. “Between Myth and Reality: Yoruba Egungun Costumes as Commemorative Clothes”. Journal of Black Studies. 22.1 (Sept., 1991). 6-14. Print.
This article provides basic information on the costumes of Egungun masquerades, based on personal communication between the author and several Yoruba practitioners and priests. Of specific interest is the author’s focus on the role of blood in both preparing and presenting the costumes. Additionally, the author talks at some length about the practice of “protecting” Egungun costumes from “traditional taboos.” Parts of this article are not objective accounts, and the author includes what appears to be personal opinion regarding the relative strength and staying power of Yoruba performance traditions in the face of “efforts of unbelievers who sabotage and campaign against all that is good about this aspect [connection to and reliance on myth] of traditional beliefs." For this reason, the author seems slightly unreliable, though he does offer clear description of the mythic origins of Egungun costumes and their ritual use in honoring and approaching ancestors.
Drewal, Henry J, John Pemberton, Rowland Abiodun, and Allen Wardwell. Yoruba: Nine Centuries of African Art and Thought. New York: Center for African Art in Association with H.N. Abrams, 1989. Print.
A superb and comprehensive account of Yoruba art and culture compiled by two prominent western scholars. This is the definitive collection of historical, political, social, aesthetic, and religious context of the rich and varied cultural products and traditions of the Yoruba people. The book is filled with numerous photographs from the field and from major international museum collections, as well as diagrams, maps, and charts that illuminate the concepts so clearly described by Drewal and Pemberton. Special attention is given throughout to the 3D artifacts of the Yoruba, and how these sculptures interact with and display Yoruba culture and identity. The book offers rich detail about the various motifs, trends, styles, and variants of a whole range of Yoruba artwork and crafts. While these are not immediately useful to a study of the performance of Egungun, many of the artifacts examined by Drewal and Pemberton are used in the masquerades and shed some light on the place of Egungun performance in the Yoruba cosmos. See specifically Chapter 1: The Yoruba World for a superb introduction and summary of the Yoruba cosmos and its main systems of belief. Chapter 6: The Oyo Empire (pages 156-187) is also a rich place to begin. These pages include detailed descriptions of Egungun dress and performance codes, analysis of Egungun practice in the political and social history of the Oyo Empire, and several high-quality color photos of Egungun costume.
Drewal, Margaret Thompson. “Egungun Masked Dancers in the Yoruba Tradition.” Taken by Surprise: A Dance Improvisation Reader. Eds. Albright, Ann C, and David Gere. Middletown, Conn: Wesleyan University Press, 2003. Print.
The editors of this anthology of works on dance improvisation have identified the subject of Drewal’s chapter as “Improvisation as Participatory Performance.” The chapter offers a succinct summary of the larger issues and theories Drewal explicates in Yoruba Ritual: Performers, Plays, Agency. Of interest are her introductory remarks r.e. the inability of traditional western dance critics to understand dance improvisation. Throughout the chapter, Drewal argues that Egungun performance is essentially participatory and thus blurs the line between performance and spectator. She ends the essay by contrasting Western and Yoruba concepts to spectatorship and aesthetic production while introducing a conceptual phrase for understanding the experience of Yoruba “spectators” during ritual performances : nomadic subjectivity.
Drewal, Margaret Thompson. Yoruba Ritual: Performers, Play, Agency. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992. Print.
This book is the preeminent account of Yoruba ritual. Drewal’s work has dominated and redefined the field, and continues to do so 20 years after its original publication. Yoruba Ritual offers extensive and detailed examination of the rich and multilayered dynamics of contemporary Yoruba ritual performance. Drewal’s foundational claim (based upon years of in-the-field research) is that ritual, specifically Yoruba ritual, is not fixed and static but rather constantly in flux. What’s more, knowledgeable practitioners of Yoruba performance transform ritual through improvisation, play, and their complex, ever-shifting relationship with the spectator. Drewal uses stories, interviews, myths, descriptions of dances, and photographs collected during her time living in Southwestern Nigeria to develop her thesis. The book serves two purposes: 1.) To provide a theoretical framework through which to conceive of an actor-centered approach to ritual in general and Yoruba ritual in particular, and 2.) To offer specific Yoruba examples, and in so doing, narrow the field for a researcher like myself who is just beginning to explore the vast world of Yoruba performance. I will be leaning heavily on Drewal’s analysis of Yoruba ritual in my own explications of the political nature of Egungun performance in the Oyo Empire and beyond. The book contains a helpful glossary of Yoruba terms and numerous photographs of performers in action. Drewal’s extensive bibliography is helpful for finding other source on Yoruba ritual and its performance context.
Lawal, Babatunde. The Gẹ̀lẹ̀dé Spectacle: Art, Gender, and Social Harmony in an African Culture. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1996. Print.
An extensive and multi-layered analysis of Gẹ̀lẹ̀dé performance. Lawal’s book enlarges and complicates the conversation surrounding Gẹ̀lẹ̀dé spectacle initiated by the Drewals and other scholars. Lawal’s work focuses on a Yoruba ritual tradition with a legacy just as complex and rich as the Egungun Masquerades of Oyo. While most of the book is outside the scope of this project, Lawal’s comparison and contrast of Gẹ̀lẹ̀dé and Egungun performance help to illuminate interesting facts, underlying assumptions, and hidden problems in the later performance form.
Matory, J. Lorand. Sex And The Empire That Is No More: Gender and the Politics of Metaphor in Oyo Yoruba Religion. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994. Print.
Matory’s ethnography of the Oyo Empire is a dense and heavily research account of gendered power structures and their interactions with past and current divination practices. Using the transvestism of male priests in the Sango possession tradition, Matory argues that Yoruba understandings of sex are independent of gender categories. The structure of the old Oyo Empire was not built around hierarchies of man/woman, Matory argues, but the metaphorical hierarchy of husband/wife. Matory also deals with current Yoruba possession rituals. Given this, his book extends past the purview of my research. A majority of the book focuses on colonial and postcolonial practices, while I am looking to focus my attention on pre-colonial ritual. Some of Matory’s generalizations about the Yoruba play of gender, however, will be helpful to frame my own discussions of the largely-male performed Egungun Masquerades.
Ogunba, Oyin. “Stage and Staging in Yoruba Ritual Drama.” African Theatre in Performance: a Festschrift in Honour of Martin Banham. Ed. Dele Layiwola. Amsterdam: Harwood Academic. 2000. Print.
Brief but thorough examination of the uses of space in Yoruba ritual drama from a well-known Nigerian scholar of Yoruba performance. Ogunba suggests that space is an integral part of ritual, without a specific, symbolic space ritual become “child’s play” (57). Three types of stages are described: the stage-in-the-round, the rectangular stage, and the picture-frame stage. Ogunba also discusses significant variations in these three types, and talks about the play of spectatorship in each. This source balances clear, general information about performance spaces with interpretive analysis of their use.
Olajubu, Oludare and J.R.O. Ojo. “Some Aspects of Oyo Yoruba Masquerades.” Africa: Journal of the International African Institute. 47.3 (1977): 253-275. Print.
The first part of this article provides a thorough summary of many of the elements of Egungun Masquerades performed in the Oyo region of Yorubaland. Olajubu and Ojo are traditional anthropologists, and as such their article reads as a dry, field study, though it does boast an impressive depth of linguistic and observational detail. The article offers raw data and information that can be interpreted using frameworks suggested by Drewal and ritual theorist Victor Turner. Specifically, many of the aspects of performance recorded in the article interact in interesting ways with issues of gender performance, space, improvisation, and Yoruba economics. While this is an older article, it does not impose western structures on the Yoruba rituals discussed. Great source for simple, step-by-step summary of several Egungun Masquerades.
RECENT ADDITIONAL SOURCES:
Beckwith, Carol, and Angela Fisher. African Ceremonies. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1999. Print.
Cole, Herbert M. I Am Not Myself: The Art of African Masquerade. Los Angeles: Museum of Cultural History, University of California, 1985. Print.
Drewal, Margaret Thompson. “Dancing the Ogun in Yorubaland and in Brazil.” Africa’s Ogun: Old World and New. Ed. Barnes, Sandra T. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989. Print.
Goody, Jack. “Against ‘Ritual’: Loosely Structured Thoughts on a Loosely Defined Topic.” Eds. Moore, Sally F, and Barbara G. Myerhoff. Secular Ritual. Assen: Van Gorcum, 1977. Print.
Myerhoff, Barbara. “The Transformation of Consciousness in Ritual Performances: Some Thoughts and Questions.” By Means of Performance: Intercultural Studies of Theatre and Ritual. Eds. Schechner, Richard, and Willa Appel. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990. Print.
Omojola, Bode. "Rhythms of the Gods: Music and Spirituality in Yoruba Culture." The Journal of Pan African Studies. 3.5 (March 2010): 29-50. Print.
Conteh-Morgan, John, and Tejumola Olaniyan. African Drama and Performance. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2004. Print.
Comprehensive collection of articles engaging contemporary trends and texts in the field of African drama and performance. Of interest is Fiebach’s “Dimensions of Theatricality in Africa” and Barber’s “Literacy, Improvisation, and the Virtual Script in Yoruba Popular Theatre.”
Ogunbiyi, Yemi. Drama and Theatre in Nigeria: A Critical Source Book. Lagos: Nigeria Magazine, 1981. Print.
**This book is en route from one of the Boston Consortium libraries.** This is a foundational book in the field, attempting to collect and anthologize some of the most important voices of indigenous Nigerian theatrical history and criticism.
HISTORY OF THE YORUBA PEOPLE AND REGION:
Bascomb, William. The Yoruba of Southwestern Nigeria. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, Inc., 1969. Print.
A general, slightly outdated review of Yoruba history and culture. The book includes overviews of Yoruba economics, government, social structure, life cycle, spiritual cycle, religious deities, and aesthetics from a traditionally western-biased anthropological point of view. Much of the information is based on fieldwork conducted in the 1930s and 40s, and as such, betrays certain “othering” tendencies. This is a good book, however, for quick, general information about Yoruba economic and social structure. Much of the content must be filtered for biases and problematic points of view.
Fadipẹ, N A. The Sociology of the Yoruba. Ibadan: Ibadan University Press, 1970. Print.
Early sociological study of the Yoruba people conducted by an indigenous scholar. The work shows up in several bibliographies of leading ethnographies and analyses in the field of Yoruba performance studies.
Law, Robin. The Oyo Empire, C.1600-C.1836: A West African Imperialism in the Era of the Atlantic Slave Trade. Oxford, Eng.: Clarendon Press, 1977. Print.
**I have requested this item from the 5 College collection.** I am hoping that parts of this work will illuminate the social and political milieu of the early Oyo Empire, and the ways in which Egungun Masquerades may have interacted with the consolidation and stratification of Imperial Oyo power.
Stride, G.T., and Caroline Ifeka. Peoples and Empires of West Africa: West Africa in History 1000-1800. Middlesex: Thomas Nelson and Sons Ltd., 1971. Print.
This book has in interesting history, coming out of newly-independent, recently Civil War-torn late 1960s Nigeria. The foundational aim of the book was to provide a broad yet detailed assessment of Western African history from a West African perspective for young West African students. As such, the book offers an accessible and thorough account of the history of this diverse region. Of interest to my current study is the chapter on the Oyo Empire (288-304). This chapter contains a condensed history of the Oyo Empire, including analysis of its rise and fall and the empire’s various structures of power. Much of this information will be useful in thinking about the ways Egungun performance both legitimizes and contests power structures. The rest of the history contained within the book is beyond the purview of my current study.
YORUBA AESTHETICS:
Adedeji, Joel. “Traditional Yoruba Theater.” African Arts. 3.1 (1969): 60-63. Print.
A brief, general summary of Yoruba theatre, with special emphasis on the “aesthetic” that inform performance. Most of the article reads like an encyclopedia entry, defining basic terminology and summarizing the “plot” of a specific performance viewed by the author. This piece suggests that the Yoruban aesthetic is characterized by a fusion of several different artistic elements into a holistic performance style that is above all entertaining and that achieves “magic and make-believe in theatre” (63). The article’s point of view is slightly antiquated, and focuses more on 1969 styles of performance as they emerged from and responded to the legacy of the Yoruban “masques” of the late 18th early 19th centuries.
Ajayi, Omofolabo S. Yoruba Dance: The Semiotics of Movement and Body Attitude in a Nigerian Culture. Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press, Inc., 1998. Print.
A comprehensive study of contemporary Yoruba dance. Genres discussed include: deification and worship, possession rituals, social rites of purification and rejuvenation, marriage rites, war ceremonies in peacetime and wartime, hero tributes, and miscellaneous informal and formal ritual entertainments. Introductory chapters include a helpful overview of dance semiotics as well as a concise review of the historical contexts of Nigerian dance. Overall, Ajayi focuses on the problems and possibilities of non-verbal modes of communication and culture-building, and offers a stinging critique of western scholars who have, for too long, ignored dance as a viable cultural practice worthy of study (pp. 2-3). In her book Ajayi does not focus on Egungun of Gẹ̀lẹ̀dé Masquerades (for a number of reasons) so much of her in-depth, semiotic analysis of specific dances and festivals does not answer my research question. However, her overall approach (defined pp. 1-41) offers a handy critical framework through which to view the Egungun and Gẹ̀lẹ̀dé traditions. The general festival summaries that begin each chapter also offer insight into the place of dance in forming corporate and individual identity.
Cordwell, Justine M. “The Art and Aesthetics of the Yoruba”. African Arts. 16.2 (Feb., 1983), 56-59,93-94, 100. Print.
Cordwell’s development as an anthropologist has mirrored the field’s growth as it moves from old styles of field work that position the anthropologist as aloof observer to newer modes of analysis that address post-modern problems and figure the scholar as participant (on some level) in the social drama they are recording (Margaret Drewal discusses this shift in her own work as well). Taking a performative approach, Cordwell foregrounds her study of Yoruba aesthetics in cultural display. Her work is useful in that it illuminates how Yoruba aesthetic codes interact within the context of public and private social and political performance. Some of the article is not as useful to my current study in that it does deal with the plastic arts and with “contemporary” (read: 1984) manifestations of Yoruba aesthetics.
Thompson, Robert F. Aesthetic of the Cool: Afro-Atlantic Art and Music. Pittsburgh: Periscope Publishing, 2011. Print.
**Requested item from 5 Colleges Collection.** Thompson’s concept of “the aesthetic of cool” has been referenced in several journal articles and books (Including M. Drewal, H. Drewal, Matory, Ajayi). I hope this volume will elucidate Thompson’s theory, and in so doing shed light on its connection to Yoruba dance traditions.
EGUNGUN MASQUERADE & YORUBA RITUAL PERFORMANCE:
Abiodun, Rowland, Henry J. Drewal, and John Pemberton. The Yoruba Artist: New Theoretical Perspectives on African Arts. Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1994. Print.
Much of this seminal volume deals with the plastic arts across a broad geographical and cultural swath of Yorubaland. Of interest to my study is the opening chapter entitled “Art, Identity, and Identification: A Commentary on Yoruba Art Historical Studies” in which John Picton problematizes understandings of a singular historical Yoruba “identity.” He also makes some interesting observations about the contemporary state of Yoruba studies and the position of western critics in this discourse. Akin Euba’s chapter “Drumming for the Egungun: The Poet-Musician in Yoruba Masquerade Theater” is a useful summation of the role of the drummer in the Egungun Masquerade. There is also a useful glossary of terms, and an extensive bibliography.
Adedeji, Joel A. The Origin and Form of the Yoruba Masque Theatre. “Cahiers d’Etudes Africaines”. 12.46 (1972). 254-276. Print.
Fascinating article about the development of the professional traveling Yoruba theatre of the 18th and 19th centuries. While this does not relate to my current study, Adedeji’s brief recounting of the early history of Yoruba ritual performance is informative. His account sheds light on the political and competitive nature of early Egungun Masquerades. General definition of elements used in Yoruba performance are listed and described: Mask, Chant, Dance, Drama. Drama is divided between “ritual” and “review,” and while these masquerades are outside the time period I am studying, they provide interesting insight into Yoruba performances aesthetics and the importance of theatre in Yoruba cultural and political life. The rest of the article deals with the development of traveling Yoruba theatre at the zenith of Oyo political, geographic, and economic dominance.
Aremu, P.S.O. “Between Myth and Reality: Yoruba Egungun Costumes as Commemorative Clothes”. Journal of Black Studies. 22.1 (Sept., 1991). 6-14. Print.
This article provides basic information on the costumes of Egungun masquerades, based on personal communication between the author and several Yoruba practitioners and priests. Of specific interest is the author’s focus on the role of blood in both preparing and presenting the costumes. Additionally, the author talks at some length about the practice of “protecting” Egungun costumes from “traditional taboos.” Parts of this article are not objective accounts, and the author includes what appears to be personal opinion regarding the relative strength and staying power of Yoruba performance traditions in the face of “efforts of unbelievers who sabotage and campaign against all that is good about this aspect [connection to and reliance on myth] of traditional beliefs." For this reason, the author seems slightly unreliable, though he does offer clear description of the mythic origins of Egungun costumes and their ritual use in honoring and approaching ancestors.
Drewal, Henry J, John Pemberton, Rowland Abiodun, and Allen Wardwell. Yoruba: Nine Centuries of African Art and Thought. New York: Center for African Art in Association with H.N. Abrams, 1989. Print.
A superb and comprehensive account of Yoruba art and culture compiled by two prominent western scholars. This is the definitive collection of historical, political, social, aesthetic, and religious context of the rich and varied cultural products and traditions of the Yoruba people. The book is filled with numerous photographs from the field and from major international museum collections, as well as diagrams, maps, and charts that illuminate the concepts so clearly described by Drewal and Pemberton. Special attention is given throughout to the 3D artifacts of the Yoruba, and how these sculptures interact with and display Yoruba culture and identity. The book offers rich detail about the various motifs, trends, styles, and variants of a whole range of Yoruba artwork and crafts. While these are not immediately useful to a study of the performance of Egungun, many of the artifacts examined by Drewal and Pemberton are used in the masquerades and shed some light on the place of Egungun performance in the Yoruba cosmos. See specifically Chapter 1: The Yoruba World for a superb introduction and summary of the Yoruba cosmos and its main systems of belief. Chapter 6: The Oyo Empire (pages 156-187) is also a rich place to begin. These pages include detailed descriptions of Egungun dress and performance codes, analysis of Egungun practice in the political and social history of the Oyo Empire, and several high-quality color photos of Egungun costume.
Drewal, Margaret Thompson. “Egungun Masked Dancers in the Yoruba Tradition.” Taken by Surprise: A Dance Improvisation Reader. Eds. Albright, Ann C, and David Gere. Middletown, Conn: Wesleyan University Press, 2003. Print.
The editors of this anthology of works on dance improvisation have identified the subject of Drewal’s chapter as “Improvisation as Participatory Performance.” The chapter offers a succinct summary of the larger issues and theories Drewal explicates in Yoruba Ritual: Performers, Plays, Agency. Of interest are her introductory remarks r.e. the inability of traditional western dance critics to understand dance improvisation. Throughout the chapter, Drewal argues that Egungun performance is essentially participatory and thus blurs the line between performance and spectator. She ends the essay by contrasting Western and Yoruba concepts to spectatorship and aesthetic production while introducing a conceptual phrase for understanding the experience of Yoruba “spectators” during ritual performances : nomadic subjectivity.
Drewal, Margaret Thompson. Yoruba Ritual: Performers, Play, Agency. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992. Print.
This book is the preeminent account of Yoruba ritual. Drewal’s work has dominated and redefined the field, and continues to do so 20 years after its original publication. Yoruba Ritual offers extensive and detailed examination of the rich and multilayered dynamics of contemporary Yoruba ritual performance. Drewal’s foundational claim (based upon years of in-the-field research) is that ritual, specifically Yoruba ritual, is not fixed and static but rather constantly in flux. What’s more, knowledgeable practitioners of Yoruba performance transform ritual through improvisation, play, and their complex, ever-shifting relationship with the spectator. Drewal uses stories, interviews, myths, descriptions of dances, and photographs collected during her time living in Southwestern Nigeria to develop her thesis. The book serves two purposes: 1.) To provide a theoretical framework through which to conceive of an actor-centered approach to ritual in general and Yoruba ritual in particular, and 2.) To offer specific Yoruba examples, and in so doing, narrow the field for a researcher like myself who is just beginning to explore the vast world of Yoruba performance. I will be leaning heavily on Drewal’s analysis of Yoruba ritual in my own explications of the political nature of Egungun performance in the Oyo Empire and beyond. The book contains a helpful glossary of Yoruba terms and numerous photographs of performers in action. Drewal’s extensive bibliography is helpful for finding other source on Yoruba ritual and its performance context.
Lawal, Babatunde. The Gẹ̀lẹ̀dé Spectacle: Art, Gender, and Social Harmony in an African Culture. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1996. Print.
An extensive and multi-layered analysis of Gẹ̀lẹ̀dé performance. Lawal’s book enlarges and complicates the conversation surrounding Gẹ̀lẹ̀dé spectacle initiated by the Drewals and other scholars. Lawal’s work focuses on a Yoruba ritual tradition with a legacy just as complex and rich as the Egungun Masquerades of Oyo. While most of the book is outside the scope of this project, Lawal’s comparison and contrast of Gẹ̀lẹ̀dé and Egungun performance help to illuminate interesting facts, underlying assumptions, and hidden problems in the later performance form.
Matory, J. Lorand. Sex And The Empire That Is No More: Gender and the Politics of Metaphor in Oyo Yoruba Religion. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994. Print.
Matory’s ethnography of the Oyo Empire is a dense and heavily research account of gendered power structures and their interactions with past and current divination practices. Using the transvestism of male priests in the Sango possession tradition, Matory argues that Yoruba understandings of sex are independent of gender categories. The structure of the old Oyo Empire was not built around hierarchies of man/woman, Matory argues, but the metaphorical hierarchy of husband/wife. Matory also deals with current Yoruba possession rituals. Given this, his book extends past the purview of my research. A majority of the book focuses on colonial and postcolonial practices, while I am looking to focus my attention on pre-colonial ritual. Some of Matory’s generalizations about the Yoruba play of gender, however, will be helpful to frame my own discussions of the largely-male performed Egungun Masquerades.
Ogunba, Oyin. “Stage and Staging in Yoruba Ritual Drama.” African Theatre in Performance: a Festschrift in Honour of Martin Banham. Ed. Dele Layiwola. Amsterdam: Harwood Academic. 2000. Print.
Brief but thorough examination of the uses of space in Yoruba ritual drama from a well-known Nigerian scholar of Yoruba performance. Ogunba suggests that space is an integral part of ritual, without a specific, symbolic space ritual become “child’s play” (57). Three types of stages are described: the stage-in-the-round, the rectangular stage, and the picture-frame stage. Ogunba also discusses significant variations in these three types, and talks about the play of spectatorship in each. This source balances clear, general information about performance spaces with interpretive analysis of their use.
Olajubu, Oludare and J.R.O. Ojo. “Some Aspects of Oyo Yoruba Masquerades.” Africa: Journal of the International African Institute. 47.3 (1977): 253-275. Print.
The first part of this article provides a thorough summary of many of the elements of Egungun Masquerades performed in the Oyo region of Yorubaland. Olajubu and Ojo are traditional anthropologists, and as such their article reads as a dry, field study, though it does boast an impressive depth of linguistic and observational detail. The article offers raw data and information that can be interpreted using frameworks suggested by Drewal and ritual theorist Victor Turner. Specifically, many of the aspects of performance recorded in the article interact in interesting ways with issues of gender performance, space, improvisation, and Yoruba economics. While this is an older article, it does not impose western structures on the Yoruba rituals discussed. Great source for simple, step-by-step summary of several Egungun Masquerades.
RECENT ADDITIONAL SOURCES:
Beckwith, Carol, and Angela Fisher. African Ceremonies. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1999. Print.
Cole, Herbert M. I Am Not Myself: The Art of African Masquerade. Los Angeles: Museum of Cultural History, University of California, 1985. Print.
Drewal, Margaret Thompson. “Dancing the Ogun in Yorubaland and in Brazil.” Africa’s Ogun: Old World and New. Ed. Barnes, Sandra T. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989. Print.
Goody, Jack. “Against ‘Ritual’: Loosely Structured Thoughts on a Loosely Defined Topic.” Eds. Moore, Sally F, and Barbara G. Myerhoff. Secular Ritual. Assen: Van Gorcum, 1977. Print.
Myerhoff, Barbara. “The Transformation of Consciousness in Ritual Performances: Some Thoughts and Questions.” By Means of Performance: Intercultural Studies of Theatre and Ritual. Eds. Schechner, Richard, and Willa Appel. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990. Print.
Omojola, Bode. "Rhythms of the Gods: Music and Spirituality in Yoruba Culture." The Journal of Pan African Studies. 3.5 (March 2010): 29-50. Print.