Rhodes University: Hosted Journals
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“MUSIC OF THE SLAVES” IN THE INDIAN OCEAN CREOLE ISLANDS: A PERSPECTIVE FROM THE SEYCHELLES
Get PDFThis article examines the development and expression of the moutya from Seychelles, in relation to the sega from Mauritius and the maloya from Reunion. These musical styles and their associated practices are recognised as evidence of an African heritage in the archipelagos. To better understand their connections and singularities, I utilise a diachronic and synchronic approach, at local and regional levels. The purpose is to demonstrate the mobility of musicians and the permeability of musical practices in these islands over time, using history and narratives from the colonial period (from the end of the seventeenth century) to the present, and fieldwork observations. This approach shows how music and dance elements from Africa are creolised on the islands and how they are further adapted as islanders travel around these islands. In the process one musical practice becomes many, although they fall into a matrix of styles sharing similar features. The article approaches the emergence and the transformation of (what would become) moutya in the Seychelles by first describing the emergence of musical creativity in the Mascarenes and Seychelles. This is followed by a discussion of the transition from a marginal and resistance form of music to new musical categories. Finally, the article describes circulations and musical exchanges between the islands, opening the door to a better understanding of Creole culture and music in the south-western Indian Ocean islands
Indoda Ebisithanda (“The Man who Loved Us”): The Reverend James Laing among the amaXhosa
Get PDFWhile producing a guide to the diaries and journals in the Cory Library many years ago, I found two bound volumes of a largely unfathomable journal written by an early missionary of the Glasgow Missionary Society, James Laing. These volumes were housed as part of the extensive and valued Lovedale Collection. They were unnumbered but the entry dates ranged from 1845 to 1872
Dance in West Africa: Analysis and Description in Relation to Aspects of Communication Theory
Get PDFThe Nottingham Party
Get PDFThe following comprises extracts from a talk given in the Clumber Church in 2019 by Courteney Bradfield, a sixth generation descendant of the Bradfield family of the Nottingham Party of 1820 Settlers
BEYOND NATIONHOOD: HAUL MUSIC FROM A POSTCOLONIAL PERSPECTIVE IN WESTERN SAHARA AND MAURITANIA
Get PDFThis article examines the mobility of a precolonial musical style known as Haul music in two African countries, Western Sahara and Mauritania. Haul music is based on a modal system in which music and poetry are intrinsically related. This article traces the historical and musicological aspects of the Haul modal system in Western Sahara and Mauritania by offering an insight into how the postcolonial period has determined two narratives of Haul: a historical nationalism by way of revitalising the precolonial past in Mauritania; and political nationalism when reconsidering the ongoing process of decolonisation in Western Sahara and the exile of its people to the refugee camps of the Hamada desert since 1975. Further, this article shows how the mobility of the Haul modal system provides a reconsideration of a precolonial past in existing music cultures in North Africa
Alternate African Reality: Electronic, Electroacoustic and Experimental Music from Africa and the Diaspora
Get PDF"THIS COUNTRY OF CHINA IS TOUGH": NIGERIAN IMMIGRANT MUSIC MAKING IN GUANGZHOU, CHINA
Get PDFThis article concerns Nigerian music making in Guangzhou, one of China’s leading manufacturing and trading centres, and where the largest groups of Africans in China, more generally, are concentrated. Nigerians are the largest community of Africans in Guangzhou and, like other Africans traders, practice what has been referred to as “low-end globalisation” (Mathews and Yang 2012). Beyond entertainment, music making among Nigerians, and Africans in China more generally, has a significant role in not only maintaining a sense of belonging but also in communicating key social concerns, aspirations and sentiments that stem from the experience of living and working in Guangzhou. This article describes how these experiences unfold in specific songs composed by two Igbo Nigerian immigrants whose aspirations and efforts to live and work in the city resulted in different outcomes
