Winner of the 2012 Melville J. Herskovits award (African Studies Association)
Throughout southwestern Nigeria, Yoruba men and women create objects called aale to protect their properties―farms, gardens, market goods, firewood―from the ravages of thieves. Aale are objects of such unassuming appearance that a non-Yoruba viewer might not register their important presence in the Yoruba visual landscape: a dried seedpod tied with palm fronds to the trunk of a fruit tree, a burnt corncob suspended on a wire, an old shoe tied with a rag to a worn-out broom and broken comb, a ripe red pepper pierced with a single broom straw and set atop a pile of eggs. Consequently, aale have rarely been discussed in print, and then only as peripheral elements in studies devoted to other issues. Yet aale are in no way peripheral to Yoruba culture or aesthetics.
In Vigilant Things , David T. Doris argues that aale are keys to understanding how images function in Yoruba social and cultural life. The humble, often degraded objects that comprise aale reveal as eloquently as any canonical artwork the channels of power that underlie the surfaces of the visible. Aale are warnings, intended to trigger the work of conscience. Aale objects symbolically threaten suffering as the consequence of transgression―the suffering of disease, loss, barrenness, paralysis, accident, madness, fruitless labor, or death―and as such are often the useless residues of things that were once positively valued: empty snail shells, shards of pottery, fragments of rusted iron, and the like. If these objects share “suffering” and “uselessness” as constitutive elements, it is because they already have been made to suffer and become useless. Aale offer would-be thieves an opportunity to recognize themselves in advance of their actions and to avoid the thievery that would make the "useless" people.
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Africa
African
Graffiti & Street Art
History
West
Art
Contents 8
Map 1: Yorubaland 12
Map 2: Detail of Map 1 13
Acknowledgments 14
A Note on Orthography 19
A Note on Language and Translation 20
A Note on Photography 21
Introduction 24
Part I: Creating Ààlè 56
Presence, Power, and the Past 58
Palm Fronds (Màrìwò) 107
Part II: Call-and-Response 142
What We Look at and Remember 144
Color (Àw˚) 208
Part III: Portraits and Punishments 236
An Ontology of the Broken 238
Corncobs (Ṣùkù Àgbàdo) 301
Snail Shells (Ìkarawun Ìgbín) 324
Brooms (Ìgbále) 345
Coda 364
Glossary 410
Works Consulted 415
Index 427

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Doris, David Todd.

Buffalo Bill Historical Center

Erscheinungsort nicht ermittelbar, 2011

United States, United States of America

Seattle, Washington State, 2011

Illustrated, PS, 2011

Memory of the World Library

producers:
Adobe PDF Library 9.0

{"isbns":["0295990732","9780295990736"],"last_page":420,"publisher":"University of Washington Press"}

Memory of the World Librarian: Calamitous Annunciation

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Throughout Southwestern Nigeria, Yoruba Men And Women Create Objects Called ààlé To Protect Their Properties From The Ravages Of Thieves. Ààlé Are Objects Of Such Unassuming Appearance That A Non-yoruba Viewer Might Not Register Their Important Presence In The Yoruba Visual Landscape. David T. Doris Argues That ààlé Are Keys To Understanding How Images Function In Yoruba Social And Cultural Life --publisher Description. Introduction -- Part I. Creating ààlé: Presence, Power And The Past; Palm Fronds -- Part Ii. Call-and-response: What We Look At And Remember; Color (awo) -- Part Iii. Portraits And Punishments: An Ontology Of The Broken; Corncobs (suku Agbado); Snail Shells (ikarawun Igbin); Brooms (igbale). David T. Doris. Throughout Southwestern Nigeria, Yoruba Men And Women Create Objects Called ààlé To Protect Their Properties From The Ravages Of Thieves. Ààlé Are Objects Of Such Unassuming Appearance That A Non-yoruba Viewer Might Not Register Their Important Presence In The Yoruba Visual Landscape. David T. Doris Argues That ààlé Are Keys To Understanding How Images Function In Yoruba Social And Cultural Life. --publisher Description. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.

"Throughout southwestern Nigeria, Yoruba men and women create objects called ààlè to protect their properties from the ravages of thieves. Ààlè are objects of such unassuming appearance that a non-Yoruba viewer might not register their important presence in the Yoruba visual landscape. David T. Doris argues that ààlè are keys to understanding how images function in Yoruba social and cultural life."--Publisher description

Throughout southwestern Nigeria, Yoruba men and women create objects called aale to protect their properties-farms, gardens, market goods, piles of collected firewood-from the ravages of thieves and Vigilant Things argues that aale are keys to understanding how images function in Yoruba social and cultural life.

2021-12-31