This Remarkable And Controversial Book Explores The Ways In Which Colonial Europeans Have Been Represented In African Ritual Art And Drama. Through A Profound Re-examination Of Western Concepts Of Otherness And Mimesis, The Anthropologist And Art Historian Fritz Kramer Shows That African Images Of Europeans - In Sculpture, Masquerades And, Above All, Spirit Possession - Are The Reverse And Also The Counterpart Of European Images Of The Other As Savage, Whether Noble Or. Ignoble. For Africans, Europeans Belonged To The Realm Of Nature, To A State Of Innocence. Rejecting The Modernist View Of African Art As Abstract, Kramer Insists On Its Mimetic Qualities. These Rituals Are Representations Of Something Experienced, Although The Experiences Have Been Transformed Into Spirits. In Ways Which May Echo Nineteenth-century European Realism, They Reveal The Power Of The Visible, Of The Telling, Obsessive Detail: A Feather, A Shirt, Or The. Eponymous Red Fez Which Runs Like A Leitmotiv Through Spirit Possession Cults Of The Early Colonial Period. Just As One Danced An Ancestor Or An Animal, So One Could Dance A Motor-car Or An Aeroplane, Possessed By The Spirit Of The Thing. The Red Fez Is Certainly A Book Of Wonders But, More Importantly, It Is A Study Of Wonderment. Fritz Kramer Takes His Readers Through A Hall Of Mirrors, In Which Can Be Found Startling Likenesses Of Ourselves And Our Culture. By. Different Paths, Kramer Leads Us Through Another World Back To Our Own, Presenting A Challenge To Anthropology And Indeed To Social Science As A Whole. 1. The Asante And The People From The Grasslands. The Objet Trouve From Asante. The Outsiders Among The Tallensi. Digression On Cultural Heterogeneity. Digression On The Mythologeme Of The State Of Innocence. The Female Ancestors Of The Tallensi. Moral Topography In Asante -- 2. Concerning Trans-saharan Convergences. The Soul And The Landscape. The Power Of The Manifest. Spirit In Its Various Embodiments -- 3. In The Grip Of Another Culture. The Shona And The People From The Coast. The Shona And The Community Of Ancestors. Digression On Possession As Celebration And Charisma. Women And The Tribes On The East Coast. The Bori Cult And Public Life. Women's Culture And Differentiation In Sudan. The Tonga And The World Of The Migrant Worker. The Zulus, Or From Possession To Exorcism. The Politically Conscious Viewpoint -- 4. In The Masks Of Strangers And The Dead. The Pende, Or Festival And Initiation. The Figures Of The Mbuya Play. The Classic Mbuya, And Its Analogy To The Shave. Digression On The Asymmetries Of Change. The Masked Comedies Of The Anang And Afikpo. Mask Possession Among The Kalabari -- 5. The Art Of The Possessed As Fixation And Allegory. The Cokwe And The Sculpture Of The Possessed. The Cokwe And The Images Of The Portuguese. Digression On The Will To Verisimilitude. Digression On Abstraction And Empathy. The Facade Of The Fante Posuban. Allegoric Sculpture In Asante -- 6. The Guinea Coast And The Woman From The Water. The Pact With The Sea-creatures On The Coast Of Cameroon. Land As Order And Water As Nature. From The Water Spirits To Mammywater. The Festival Of Mami Wata In Togo -- 7. Trans-saharan Comparisons Of Mimesis. Alien Spirit Possession And Ethnography. Mimetic And Rational Action. The Interpretation Of The Alien By Mimesis. Fritz Kramer ; Translated By Malcolm Green. Includes Bibliographical References (p. 272-284) And Index.

Der rote Fes: ber Besessenheit und Kunst in Afrika

The Red Fez: On Art and Possession in Africa

Fritz Kramer; Malcolm R. Green

Kramer, Fritz, 1941-

Fritz W Kramer

Verso Editions

New Left Books

Verso Books

United Kingdom and Ireland, United Kingdom

September 1993

PS, 1993

Includes bibliographical references (p. 272-284) and index.

Kramer sets out to show that African images of Europeansin sculpture, masquerades and above all spirit possessionare the reverse and also the counterpart of European images of the Other as savage, whether noble or ignoble. In ways which may echo 19th-century European realism, they reveal the power of the a feather, a car, or the eponymous red fez which runs like a leitmotif through spirit possession cults of the early colonial period. The Red Fez demonstrates not only the startling likenesses to ourselves and our culture, but also reflections of forms of knowledge which this civilization has submerged.

This study of African art and spirit possession draws parallels between the realist novel and African cults, rejects the modernist view of African art as abstract (cubism) and relates the African perspective to that of the "observer" tradition in Western science.

xi, 292 p. : 24 cm
Translation of: Der rote Fes
Includes bibliographical references (p. 272-284) and index

2023-06-28