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The Ritual Solidarity of Masked Processions in Calabar, Cameroon, and Cuba

2022; UCLA James S. Coleman African Studies Center; Volume: 55; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1162/afar_a_00681

1937-2108

Ivor L. Miller,

Colonialism, slavery, and trade

African “art” makes little sense in a glass box on a museum plinth, but can be understood only in its social context of use, as Bob Thompson taught us in African Art in Motion (1974: xii). Wherever we encounter public processions of African body-masks, the performance displays “open secrets” of ritual (procedural) knowledge trans-mitted among initiates, as Wándé Abímbọ́ lá (1973: 43) observed regarding the Ifá cult.1 In each context recorded in this paper, the rituals of masked performance are expressed in different ideolog-ical categories, depending on the status of the respective subaltern groups within the political economy that rules their territories. The first case is the Ékpè “leopard” society for community justice in Calabar, Nigeria; the second is the historically related Abakuá society for mutual aid in Havana, Cuba; the third is the Jengu “water spirit” society for healing in Kribi, Cameroon.Despite their differences, the fact of neocolonial subjection in-vests the masked ritual of each group with the energy of resistance and the project of autonomy. All three share inherited concepts of “community,” defined through a tripartite relationship with the living, their ancestors, and the land they control (or in the Cuban case, the lands of their African ancestors), which are the focus of ritual processions. Rituals are magical acts expressed with performance combining speech and gesture in cathartic sequences, as we have learned from anthropologists Malinowski (1948), van Gennep (1960), Turner (1969), and Tambiah (1990).There is ample historical and comparative evidence that Cuban Abakuá represents a development of the leopard society of the Cross River basin, including Èfịk Ékpè as the most identifiable of several sources but not excluding other contributions, whether from Ìgbò, Éjághám, or populations of coastal Cameroon (“Òrọ́ kọ̀”).2 While there is less evidence for direct historic links between Kribi and Cuba, the Kribi example is relevant as another observable development of generic Cross River basin culture under conditions of displacement and dispossession in plantations separating labor from land. Calabar Ékpè was shaped by capitalist modernization in a different way, as a culture of middle-men, and the performance was accordingly enriched by economic surplus throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, in contrast to the lean conditions of Caribbean deportees and coastal Cameroonian proletarians. In the twentieth century and beyond, carnival events of all three regions have either displaced, complemented, or challenged a heritage of ritual processions.In Calabar and its Cross River hinterlands, masked processions generally express continuity in a royal lineage; by incorporating descendants of community founders, they reinforce rituals of belonging. During rites of initiation or investiture, libations and prayers invoke ancestors, followed by a procession through the communal lineage territory to announce the elevated status of participants. Likewise, annual harvest rites to thank ancestors and deities feature processions to enhance the renewal of ties among the tripartite community. In the Calabar hinterlands, a custodian of heritage articulated the purpose of ritual processions; Dr. I.U. Ìnyàng, the Òkúkú (High Priest) of Ùtìt Óbíò Clan and the Paramount Ruler of Ìbìọ̀ nọ́-Íbòm,3 reported:Dr. Ìnyàng's view of processions show a marked contrast to most carnival events, which are often innovative and competitive. Instead, ritual processions emphasize unity in an initiation group and display conservative attitudes toward inherited regal symbols. This becomes clear when reviewing an historical description of a procession with contemporary members of the group, who readily identify the symbols. In 1846 in Calabar, Presbyterian missionary Hope Waddell described a procession of the Ékpè “leopard” society organized by his host, a royal merchant of 5The leader of an Èfịk lineage, Eyo Honesty II had organized a procession with Èbònkó, the “mother” of Ékpè, whose dances are enjoyed by the entire community. While women rarely participate in Ékpè events, Èbònkó is an exception, as I witnessed in a joyful procession of Èbònkó masks accompanied by the mothers of the community in 2012 (Fig. 1). Waddell continued:The “runners” were Ékpè Ídèm Íkwọ̀ọ́ “messenger” masks with long staffs that clear the road (Fig. 2), while the noninitiated public was cordoned off with palm frond barriers (see Fig. 5). Waddell thought this a “disguise,” but in fact these masks “reveal” the presence of initiated ancestors. Ékpè initiations establish neophytes as èyénísò ̣ ng (“children of the land”) who have a voice in community matters, while the masks with “a long rod” reject nonmembers, who cannot or refuse to con-secrate their relationship to the ancestors and the land. More characters appeared:Contemporary local specialists identify the figures with “long narrow” Ékpè drums as “èkò ̣ mò ̣ boys,” who interact with the Ìsìm Ékpè (“leopard tail”) in a dance of procreation (Fig. 3). As these are symbols of “rebirth,” people ululated with joy. The procession intensified:The two with bows, arrows, and an appendage are Ànyán Ìsìm Ékpè (“long tail leopard”), whose dance is reserved for the firstborn sons of a lineage. Onlookers exclaimed with delight at the arrows representing “rebirth,” or the reincarnation of important ancestors (Bassey 2001: 96–98). In Figure 4, a royal scion wears the long tail Ékpè with a regal necklace, demonstrating his right to occupy the throne.6 A red parrot feather held in his mouth signifies the duty of discretion for initiates.7 Then pro-cessional music began:Ìsìm Ékpè wear tiny bells around their calves, as do Èbònkó body-masks (Figs. 3–4). The “deep” sounds of the mystic Voice of Ékpè represent the authorization of initiated ancestors. As a titled elder, Otu Honesty's response to the Voice confirmed the presence of living initiates who continue inherited rites, thus informing the ancestors of their assumption of responsibility to defend the lineage.8 The procession then reached its climax:This procession with a cloth-covered “ark” signals the investiture of a new lodge leader, thus reactivating Ékpè as community police, implying the reign of peace in the land. In Calabar 130 years later, the same procession was performed by Ékpè members who surrounded an “ark” covered with ritual ùkárá cloth (Fig. 5).10 Young men lead with palm leaf barriers to keep noninitiates away, followed by percussionists.A comparison of Waddell's description with contemporary processions in Ékpè-practicing communities of the Calabar region demonstrates that Ékpè codes are shared throughout the region with local variations: in urban Calabar, at the demise of an Ìyámbà (lodge leader), Ékpè “escapes” from the lodge, so the funerary rites include the collective hunt, capture, and return of the mystic leopard to the Ékpè hall in a grand procession, as Waddell described.11 But to the north in the rural Agoi-Ibami community of Yakurr L.G.A., the mystic leopard escapes every seven years and is returned through efforts of the entire community.12 This seven-year cycle concludes with a series of processions that locals describe as a carnival, which it is in the classic sense, because it culminates on Communion Day or Maundy Thursday, the day before Good Friday leading to Easter.13 The final week involves processions with sections of the entire village, including Ékpè body-masks, a troupe of singers, groups of children with invented instruments (bamboo “rifles,” decorated long sticks tipped with flowers), all enticing Ékpè back into the village (Fig. 6).14The processions of Agoi-Ibami illustrate a fundamental myth of the Ékpè institution, that women first discovered the Voice, which was captured by men. Royal women of the Idut (rainbow) association in Agoi-Ibami are key to “capturing” the mystic leopard, but only after various groups of men attempt but fail to do so.15 As I witnessed on a Wednesday in 2010, the Ìyámbà of the lodge led an Ékpè procession carrying an empty bowl of woven palm fronds. The next day, Maundy Thursday, the same procession circled the community three times, then awaited the Queen Mother of the Idut “rainbow” society (Fig. 6). Arriving with edible offerings in the bowl, the Queen Mother led the procession to deposit it in a stream (Fig. 7). All then rushed to the lodge at the top of a hill, where hundreds gathered. The entrance to the lodge was blocked with planks, but when the crowd began to chant “ nkárí Ékpè” (“tricks of Ékpè”), as well as “ utuk Ékpè” (“deception of Ékpè”), the mystic Voice miraculously resounded from inside the hall.16 In response the entire community emitted an astonishing roar. In front of the lodge, each titleholder stood one by one upon ritual stones to chant their rank, and then entered. The cycle was com-plete: the ancestors and gods of the land appeased, the community purified, Ékpè was reactivated to proclaim the autonomy of the community and its land.Two centuries ago in Havana, Cuba, forced migrants from the Calabar region founded the Abakuá mutual-aid society to rec-reate their royal lineage practices. Abakuá processions exhibit protocols of the Ékpè “leopard” society, demonstrating both a kindred conservative attitude towards initiation symbols and continuity with West African concepts of “community” as incorporating living initiates, their ancestors, and the land they control (or in this case, are ritually connected to).17 Abakuá founders named Cuban lodges after lineages and territories of the Calabar region, thus claiming them as “overseas departments” of the named African source group. In one example, the Havana lodge Betóngo Naróko, founded in 1843, identifies its sources in Usagaré (Isangele) in South West Cameroon (Fig. 8).18Abakuá legends evoke ritual processions in Calabar: “The … inhabitants of Calabar, founded the Abakuá society … They pa-raded the skin of the Sacred Fish found by Sikanékue” (Cabrera 2020: 45).19 An 1882 publication describes Abakuá rites as an initiation and a procession: “The oath-taking completed, the procession exits …” (“ Concluído el juramento se saca la procesión …”)(Trujillo y Monagas 1882: 367). After initiations, contemporary Abakuá members carry consecrated drums and staffs in processions (Fig. 8). Another Abakuá phrase teaches respect for ritual processions: “Remove your hat, the procession is coming” (“ Ita musón para nandubia, que abara ea Enlluqué. Dice: Quítense el sombrero, que ahí viene la procesión.”) (Roche 1925: 84).20In nineteenth-century Havana, Abakuá processions were prac-ticed within Carabalí cabildos (“nation groups”), as depicted in an 1878 painting from Havana of a Carabalí cabildo in procession with an Èbònkó-styled Ékpè mask (Fig. 9) (Orovio 2005: 9; Ortiz 1921/1984: 30).21 Until 1884 in Havana, each Three King's Day (January 6), the Captain General of Cuba authorized processions of African cabildos; after respectfully visiting each other, each cabildo would greet the Captain General at his palace.22When authorities banned the cabildos and Abakuá lodges, Abakuá processions were surreptitiously evoked in Havana carnival performances. For example, in 1908 members of former African cabildos organized the first documented Havana comparsas (“carnival troupes”).23 Because both carnival groups and Abakuá lodges existed in the same barrios, Abakuá members were consistently directors of comparsas and their music ensem-bles, as well as a majority of the percussionists.Among the earliest documented Havana comparsas, the Alacrán [Scorpion], the Gavilán [Hawk] and the Componedores de batéa [The wash-tub menders] performed in February 1908 during pre-Lenten carnival celebrations.24 The Alacrán was directed by members of the lodge Usagaré Sangírimoto Efó, founded in 1869 and linked to Usagaré in Cameroon.25 The Gavilán included members of the Ebión Efó lodge, founded in 1882 (Fig. 10).26 The Componedores was directed by Roberto Villa “El fino” from 1974 onwards.27 A member of the lodge Usagaré Mutánga Efó, founded in 1868 and linked to Usagaré, Cameroon, Villa reports deep ties between the African heritage of a barrio and its comparsa:Villa's family history reflects the scenario of all early Havana comparsas: each created a theme to demonstrate knowledge of their African sources. The Componedores’ theme included Lukumí language, while the Abakuá musicians evoked their own processions in the performance (Fig. 11). During research, participants recounted long lists of Abakuá members in each Havana comparsa, revealing hidden aspects of carnival.29 But images of Abakuá íreme (masks)—styled after the Èbònkó mask of Calabar—became publicly associated with carnival through local promotional posters and paintings. Painter Elio Beltrán portrayed an Abakuá íreme in a 1938 carnival procession in Old Havana (Fig. 12). A poster for the 1937 carnival features two Abakuá íremes, evoking initiated ancestors in this government sponsored tourist event (Fig. 13). In English, the poster announces that carnival will revive “the gaiety and splendor of Havana's glamorous past,” a phrase that simultaneously erases the suffering of slavery and racism while advertising the music and masks of African-descended communities.Havana's self-organized carnival groups were frequently coopted by authorities for tourist initiatives; in 1937 the Havana mayor's office sponsored carnival as an international tourist spectacle.30 Attempting to present a hybrid nation, they replaced the ethnic name of the Lukumí comparsa with Bolleras, a Spanish term for àkàrà, a popular snack in West Africa and Cuba (Orovio 2005: 45–46; Anderson 2011: 10–11).31 While elites removed the Lukumí reference, participants pushed back by expressing Abakuá codes in the music of the Bolleras comparsa, by playing the rhythm of the obí-apá (“one hit”) Abakuá drum on the “ salidor” conga drum.32 Percussionist Armando Valdés “Loquillo” explains:Furthermore, the iron gong of Abakuá rites is implicit in the cow bell of Havana carnival music.34Many Abakuá musicians have used comparsas as platforms for presenting music derived from African-based lineages.35 Examples include popular music innovators like Ignacio Piñeiro (1888–1969), director of the Barracón comparsa in 1937.36 A member of the lodge Efóri Komó, founded in 1840 with sources in Usagaré, Cameroon, Piñeiro created the son group Septeto Nacional in 1927.37 His composition “ Los cantares del abacuá” (the abakuá chanters) evokes the victory of Carabalí heritage through the line, “When the bonkó drum sounds everybody is moved.”38Another innovator was Luciano Pozo “Chano” (1915–1948), member of the lodge Ékue Munánga Efó, founded in 1871, with sources in Usagaré, Cameroon. Promoters who saw Pozo's performances in Havana comparsas launched his career through radio and recordings.39 In New York City in 1947, Pozo recorded the first known Abakuá ceremonial on vinyl, then through collab-orations with Dizzy Gillespie infused US jazz music with codes from Abakuá and other African-derived lineages, opening a path followed by percussionists in the United States.40Santos Ramírez “El niño” (1903–1975) was Iyámba of the lodge Usagaré Sangírimoto Efó.41 In 1938, he reorganized the Alacrán comparsa and composed its theme song “ Tumbando caña” (cutting cane).42 A family tradition, Ramírez's son Santos Ramírez II became the comparsa director, and later Santos Ramírez III became the general director, while his sister was artistic director.43 In 1980 an Alacrán procession featured Santos Ramírez II playing the bombo (“large drum”), while all the musicians wore straw hats representing sugar cane cutters (Fig. 14).44Pedro Izquierdo “Pello el Afrokan” (1933–2000) was the most renowned Abakuá comparsa musician of his generation, who named the Mozambique rhythm he created after the African homeland of his enslaved grandmother.45 “Pello” and his two brothers were Abakuá initiates, as were most band members (Miller 2009: 165). In 1964, while directing the comparsa of the Construction Labor Union, “Pello” released the Mozambique rhythm; its popularity led to a world tour in 1965 (Fig. 15).46 Footage from Paris shows “Pello” leading comparsa style processions through a town square, in effect projecting his African family lineage globally.47As previously discussed, Abakuá lodge names identify African royal lineages and territories, as evidenced in Abakuá private manuscripts created since the 1800s (for details on these manuscripts, see Miller 2017). One manuscript documents “Batanga: Dealer (of petty merchandise and ivory)”—which is corroborated by the diary of Thomas Hutchinson, a British visitor to Batanga (present Kribi) in the late 1850s (Cabrera 2020: 76).48 Another documents the historical figure “Batánga Mbére, ‘king of Mukandá land in Africa.’”49 In Cameroon, Batanga oral tradition identifies Mbedi as an ancestor whose first son Tanga founded BaTanga (people of Tanga) centuries ago.50 Because Abakuá members belong to lodges representing African source territories, they eventually become themselves important ancestors of the group; their processions therefore have the same objective as the ritual processions of Calabar, Kribi and adjoining territories.51In South Cameroon, each Batanga village organizes annual processions following rites to communicate with water spirits called jengu (pl. mengu or miengu) that are integral to their communities (Ardener 1956: 93). Since 1916, this practice has been magnified with a carnival event in urban Kribi wherein three Batanga communities express their unity as inhabitants of coastal lands.52 This event commemorates the 1914 deportation of Batanga populations during battles between German and French forces, when the French military shipped them to South West Cameroon to work on plantations. In 1916 groups of survivors returned to Kribi, where a procession cel-ebrated their return and commemorated the dead.53 Photographs from the 2012 event show a banner announcing its 96th anniversary (Fig. 16); a group of women in dresses cut from one cloth to signal unity, with fists raised in defiance of outside aggression (Fig. 17); their banner reads “Deportation to Bakoko,” in the Littoral Region, Cameroon. As seen in Figures 16–17 and 19–22, participants wear fabric depicting deportation on two ships.The festival begins with collective rites in each village. In one village, an Ekongolo mask performance summons the local deity to strengthen the community (Fig. 18).54 Other villages conduct jengu rites by sending ritual canoes to sea to communicate with the ancestors and mengu. On May 9 the traditional ruler of Kribi leads the unified festival.55 A ritual bọlọ (“canoe”) is performed, followed by a float representing a deportation ship (Fig. 19).56 Behind this, a float features a living representative of a jengu maiden with attendants (Figs. 20–22).In present-day Cameroon, the beaches of Kribi are famous tourist destinations under threat from corporate real estate in-terests. The Batanga festival therefore has renewed meanings as participants collectively resist invisibility and displacement.57In Calabar, Hope Waddell's 1846 description of an Ékpè “leopard” society procession was recognizable to contemporary initiates, demonstrating stability in this representative practice of royal lineages. In 2004, with the inauguration of a state-spon-sored carnival, it was logical that processions of Ékpè groups were highlighted.58 But in later years, the participation of local groups was gradually sidelined by the recreation of a Trinidad-style carnival. In one example, the same body-mask form described by Waddell and seen in recent processions (Fig. 2), was represented by a lifeless Ékpè mask statue on a 2012 carnival float, as if in a museum (Fig. 23).Dismayed with the increasing displacement of Calabar masking heritage by government sponsored events, B.E. Bassey urges Calabar residents to appreciate the intrinsic value of their own indigenous creativity. His monograph celebrates the historic carnivalesque tendencies of Calabar residents:Bassey describes a practice of collective rites leading into processions. Locals recall a 1959 celebration for Mrs. Nkoyo Isikalu, the first Èfịk woman lawyer called to the bar, wherein women of Calabar welcomed her with what locals describe as “carnival procession.”60 Historically in Calabar, Christmas was when locals performed masks around the town, either of an initiation group or of their own design. But by 2008, local mask performances were displaced by the government-sponsored Carnival, billed as “Africa's Biggest Street Party.” According to one report,Such clashes with the government and corporate sponsored carnival has led to debates about its hinderance of processions of initiation masks to express solidarity with ancestors and collective land.This review of processions in three historically and culturally related groups of the circum-Atlantic emphasizes how Africans and their descendants have used mobile actions to strengthen their communities, comprising the living, their ancestors, and traditional lands. Even when enslaved or deported for plantation labor, they have continued to represent family and cult lineages. In Havana, carnival events have been disrupted and transformed since the 1960s through the turbulent political situation of the island, yet some traditional comparsas continue through family lineages.61 In Calabar and Cameroon, given the increasing struggle for land resources, one would expect to witness even more pro-nounced expressions of lineage unity, overtly or covertly, through processions, festivals, and carnivals in the century to come.