Sandra T. Barnes (editor) - Africas Ogun: Old World and New (African Systems of Thought)

General Editors
Charles S. Bird
Ivan Karp

Contributing Editors
James Fernandez
Luc de Heusch
John Middleton
Roy Willis

Edited and with a New Introduction by Sandra T. Barnes

INDIANA UNIVERSITY PRESS
Bloomington & Indianapolis

1997 by Indiana University Press

All rights reserved

No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. The Association of American University Presses Resolution on Permissions constitutes the only exception to this prohibition.

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984.

Manufactured in the United States of America

Africas Ogun : old world and new / edited by Sandra T. Barnes.

2nd, expanded ed.

p. cm.(African systems of thought)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 0-253-33251-6 (cl : alk. paper).

ISBN 0-253-21083-6 (pbk. : alk. paper)

1. Ogun (Yoruba deity)CultAfrica, West. 2. Ogun (Yoruba deity)CultAmerica. 3. Yoruba (African people)Religion.

4. BlacksAmericaReligion. I. Barnes, Sandra T. II. Series.

BL2480.Y6A46 1989

299.63dc20 9643166

2 3 4 5 02 01 00 99 98

The Many Faces of Ogun: Introduction to the First Edition

The Etymology of the Word gn

Ogun, the Empire Builder

Systematic Remembering, Systematic Forgetting: Ogou in Haiti

Ogum and the Umbandista Religion

The Dreadful God and the Divine King

A Portrait of Ogun as Reflected in Ijala Chants

Oguns Iremoje: A Philosophy of Living and Dying

Dancing for Ogun in Yorubaland and in Brazil

Art or Accident: Yoruba Body Artists and Their Deity Ogun

A Comparative Analysis of Ogun in Precolonial Yorubaland

Repossession: Ogun in Folklore and Literature

Unveiling the Orisha

Ogun and Body/Mind Potentiality: Yoruba Scarification and Painting Traditions in Africa and the Americas

gn: Builder of the Lkms House

MAPS

FIGURES

This enlarged version of Africas Ogun comes at a special momenta time when the flow of ideas and peoples from one continent to another is producing a crescendo of reinvented traditions, novel representations, and fresh ideas about how the world has been and, perhaps more important, should be making itself. The second edition captures the spirit of these accelerated processes with five new essays and a new introductionall centered on Ogun, and for the most part written to portray his new meanings and expressions at their creative peak.

The impetus for a larger volume emerged from the pleas of critics and readers for more descriptions and analyses of Oguns late-twentieth-century florescence and for more insights into Oguns nineteenth-century manifestations in West Africa. Originally, the ideas in this volume began to take shape in 1971 when I first began field research in Lagos, Nigeria, and they were periodically reinforced during subsequent research periods in the 1970s and 1980s. Each time I was struck by the vitality of certain religious ideas and practices and their adaptation to contemporary African life. Ogun, the ancient god of iron, warfare, and hunting, stood out in this respect, for his cult and the ideas espoused in it were alive, expanding, and flourishing. In present-day Nigeria his realm had extended to embrace everything from modern technology to highway safetyanything, in fact, that involved metal, danger, or, not incompatibly, political resistance.

In searching for an explanation for Oguns vitality, I was led to his past, which, upon investigation, and certainly not surprisingly, revealed that Ogun embodied a core of Pan-African themes about human nature, conflict, and change that were basic to the construction of the world view of many peoples. In the Guinea Coast region of West Africa these ancient ideas remained as mere concepts in some societies whereas in others they eventually crystallized in the god Ogun and his cult. Later, as a result of the slave diaspora, some of these ideas were given a place in the reconstructed traditions of African descendants in the New World and, in time, in the lives of the peoples with whom they were coming in contact.

Ogun thus presented a challenging vehicle for examining issues that are categorized under the heading of continuity and change. Given the overwhelming dominance of global religions such as Islam and Christianity, how does a deity such as Ogun survive? How is it that he can appeal to an expanding audience? What does he mean to his followers? Is he the same in all contexts and at all time periods, or does he mean different things to different peoples?

These were the guiding questions in an earlier study, Ogun: An Old God for a New Age (Philadelphia, 1980), and at an Ogun colloquium held at the annual meeting of the African Studies Association in Los Angeles in 1979. The idea and encouragement for the colloquium and this volume came from Paula Girshick Ben-Amos and Dan Ben-Amos, who suggested that the international vitality of Ogun was in need of further exploration. Inasmuch as my early work came out of a mainly Yoruba experience, the obvious challenge was to examine Ogun elsewhere in West Africa and in the Caribbean and Latin America. In many places not only was Ogun a key figure in contemporary religious settings that had clear connections with the past, but he also was incorporated into new ideological systems and what might be called popular religions. Needless to say, it became increasingly clear that Ogun and others like him were not part of a disappearing world. In fact, Ogun and other divinities were beginning to play the same role that classical deities of the Greek and Roman world have long played in literature, drama, painting, and sculpture in Western civilization.

From its inception, putting together the essays about the international Ogun was a collective enterprise. It began with presentations by colloquium participants which became a core around which other contributions could be added. The U.S. Embassy in Lagos kindly provided a travel grant to Adeboye Babal