Die Pangwe; völkerkundliche Monographie eines westafrikanischen Negerstammes; Ergebnisse der Lübecker Pangwe-expedition 1907-1909 und früherer Forschungen 1904-1907

Johnston, H. H.; Tessmann, Gunter

doi:10.5479/sil.120925.39088000008037

Cited by 16 publications

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“…1 The documentation indicates 1907 as the year of Tessmann's recordings. However, a close comparison of the locations where the recordings have been made with the description of Tessmann's journey (Tessmann 1913), has brought to evidence that at least the thirteen cylinders with xylophone music have been recorded in 1908 (Lacombe 2013).…”

Section: Zusammenfassungmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hornbostel and me. Expectations towards historical recordings of the Ewondo drum language (South Cameroon)

Fürniss¹

2016

jpa

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Pangwe-Expedition, recorded 86 cylinders that are complementary to his important monography Die Pangwe (Tessmann 1913). They contain music and oral literature of the Fang as well as some Ewondo-songs. Waldow Kamerun, 1907. The colonial doctor Hans Waldow recorded 29 cylinders with songs of the Bagyeli 2 , Banen, Bulu, Ewondo and Ngumba in Fudde, Lolodorf and Ndondo. Zenker Kamerun, 1908. Georg Zenker, botanist and important member of the colonial administration 3 , recorded 8 cylinders with dance songs of the Bakoko, Bulu and Mabi in Kribi. Two other collections have been recorded by Hornbostel in Berlin in 1909 with young Cameroonians who spent some time in the German capital: Archiv Kamerun contains 41 cylinders with songs from the Bakoko, Banoho, Bulu, Duala, Mabea and Malimba, sung by two young men from the Southern Cameroonian Atlantic coast. Archiv Jaunde contains 14 cylinders with songs, instrumental music and speech surrogates of the Ewondo ("Jaunde" in colonial German). 1.1. Speech surrogates in Archiv Jaunde Four cylinders of this collection document speech surrogates produced [77] on two different instruments: cylinders n° 2, 3 and 5 concern messages played on a slitdrum, n° 13 is played on a double-bell. Three of them are analytical recordings and explicitely illustrate the link between a drummed and a spoken message. A fifth drum language recording is mentioned in the documentation (n° 14), but the mention is crossed out and replaced by comments on the xylophone recorded on cylinders n° 8 to 12. The recording confirms this information: cylinder n° 14 presents the scale of a xylophone. The documentation of these four recordings is heterogeneous and very poor (see the documentation sheet in the appendix). The note for n° 5 mentions only "Lament on the speechdrum", but contains no indication of what is supposed to be said, neither in German, nor in Ewondo. For the other recordings, there is at least a German translation of the drummed phrase, for n° 3 also a linguistic transcription of the Ewondo phrase. Unfortunately, contrary to other recordings by Hornbostel, this is the entire available information. The lack of documentation is a problem already addressed by Susanne Ziegler in her article on Hornbostel's role in the activities of the Archive. According to the author, it is possible that the actual documentation might not be complete (Ziegler 1998:147). 2. Hornbostel's publications on African Music Another point already mentioned by Ziegler (1998:154) is that in many cases there is no written scientific exploitation of the recordings by Hornbostel himself. This seems to be the case not only with the collection considered here, but also with the collection Archiv Kamerun. In his survey of Hornbostel's studies of African Music (Hornbostel 1909, 1917, 1928, 1933), Gerd Grupe mentions six populations from Tanzania, Ruanda and Cameroon, but not the Ewondo and none of the other African cultures documented by recordings made in the Archive either by Hornbostel himself or by another person 4 (Grupe 1998:107)...

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Section: Zusammenfassungmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hornbostel and me. Expectations towards historical recordings of the Ewondo drum language (South Cameroon)

Fürniss¹

2016

jpa

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“…In Tessmann's Die Pangwe , it appears in various contexts and with various implications. It is first mentioned with quite negative overtones in relation to the Mekukmann (1913 [Part II]: 149), the evil sorcerer who kills people to use their skull as a mystical access to wealth. Later on ( ibid .…”

Section: Tessmann: ‘The King Of the White Spot’mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Tessmann began his research in what is now South Cameroon in 1904, just after the Germans began to establish their control over this region. A notion that keeps coming up in his classic monograph Die Pangwe (1913), especially about the Fang, is biang akuma – the medicine of wealth – which, to Tessmann's own surprise, turns out to be directly related to same-sex practices. Following up this link led us into interesting complications.…”

Section: Introduction1mentioning

confidence: 99%

Anusocratie? Freemasonry, sexual transgression and illicit enrichment in postcolonial Africa

Geschiere¹,

Orock²

2020

Africa

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Cameroonians recently invented a new word to characterize the state of their country: anusocratie (the rule of the anus). This became central in the moral panic from 2000 onwards over a supposed proliferation of homosexuality. Anusocratie links such same-sex practices to illicit enrichment by the national elites and their involvement with secret associations of Western provenance, such as Freemasonry, Rosicrucians and the Illuminati. This article tries to unravel this conceptual knot of homosexuality, the occult (Freemasonry) and illicit enrichment: first, by historicizing it. Of interest in the Cameroonian case is the fact that a similar link is mentioned in one of the first ethnographies, Günther Tessmann's Die Pangwe. Freemasonry is clearly a colonial imposition on the country, but the link between same-sex practices and enrichment has a longer history. Second, a comparison with similar ideas elsewhere on the continent can also open up wider perspectives. The link with illicit enrichment does not figure in classical conceptions of ‘homosexuality’ as developed in Europe, yet it strongly emerges from examples from all over Africa. Both Achille Mbembe and Joseph Tonda show that this image of the anus – anal penetration – articulates popular concerns about staggering inequalities. Yet, this aspect is ignored in debates about growing ‘homophobia’ in Africa. A confrontation with classical texts from Western queer theory (Bersani, Mieli) can help us discover other layers in African discourses, notably an emphasis on sexual diversity as an answer to homophobia. It can also serve to relativize the linking of sexual practices to sexual identities, which is still seen as self-evident in much queer theory of Western provenance.

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“…Thus the old idea of biang akuma seems connected to present-day rumors about Freemasons and their same-sex practices as an initiation into getting rich. The interest of Tessmann’s ethnography is that it shows that homosexuality as a transgression is doubly tempting: erotically, but also coupled with material wealth—after all, it is associated with biang akuma, the wealth medicine that serves as a Deckmantel (cover) for same-sex intercourse (Tessmann 1913 [vol.2]:271). It is also interesting that in Tessmann’s analysis both partners are supposed to become rich.…”

Section: Another Line In the Genealogy Of “Homosexuality” In Cameroonmentioning

confidence: 99%

A “Vortex of Identities”: Freemasonry, Witchcraft, and Postcolonial Homophobia

Geschiere¹

2017

Afr. stud. rev.

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Abstract:The recent moral panic in Cameroon about a supposed proliferation of “homosexuality” is related to a special image of “the” homosexual as un Grand who submits younger persons, eager to get a job, to anal penetration, and are thus corrupting the nation. This image stems from the popular conviction that the national elite is deeply involved in secret societies like Freemasonry or Rosicrucianism. The tendency to thus relate the supposed proliferation of homosexuality in the postcolony to colonial impositions is balanced by other lines in its genealogy—for instance, the notion of “wealth medicine,” which Günther Tessmann, the German ethnographer of the Fang, linked already in 1913 to same-sex intercourse. This complex knot of ideas and practices coming from different backgrounds can help us explore the urgent challenges that same-sex practices raise to African studies in general. The Cameroonian examples confuse current Western notions about heteronormativity, GLBTQI+ identities, and the relation between gender and sex. Taking everyday assemblages emerging from African contexts as our starting point can help not only to queer African studies, but also to Africanize queer studies. It can also help to overcome unproductive tendencies to oppose Western/colonial and local/ traditional elements. Present-day notions and practices of homosexuality and homophobia are products of long and tortuous histories at the interface of Africa and the West.

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Die Pangwe; völkerkundliche Monographie eines westafrikanischen Negerstammes; Ergebnisse der Lübecker Pangwe-expedition 1907-1909 und früherer Forschungen 1904-1907

Cited by 16 publications

References 0 publications

Hornbostel and me. Expectations towards historical recordings of the Ewondo drum language (South Cameroon)

Hornbostel and me. Expectations towards historical recordings of the Ewondo drum language (South Cameroon)

Anusocratie? Freemasonry, sexual transgression and illicit enrichment in postcolonial Africa

A “Vortex of Identities”: Freemasonry, Witchcraft, and Postcolonial Homophobia

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