African Ceremonies

Like the book, price should have been less than what I paid for it was a former library book.

The "concise edition" of AFRICAN CEREMONIES opens with a preface by Dr. Malidoma Some, president of "Echoes of the Ancestors" and author of his autobiography OF WATER AND THE SPIRIT and THE HEALING WISDOM OF AFRICA. Malidoma is from the Dagara tribe of Burkina Faso. His name means "make friends with the stranger/enemy," and that is why he now lives in the West.I have met Malidoma on a few occasions (participating in some of his rituals) and I corresponded with him for a time. He has been incredibly helpful and supportive in my own spiritual journey (he is an initiated shaman of his tribe and has recently become the youngest initiated elder), and therefore I trust what he says. Malidoma's preface makes it clear that, sadly, AFRICAN CEREMONIES documents a world that - unlike the claims of some - is not entirely gone, but that is quickly vanishing. Malidoma comments that these photographs are very important because they show the last time that some of these ceremonies will be performed in such elaborate nature, and perhaps they will never be performed again at all. AFRICAN CEREMONIES continues the tradition of these well respected photographers by providing a beautiful volume of beautiful peoples.

I received African Ceremonies as a birthday present two months ago and soon began to read the book carefully since the photographs beg you to listen to the stories they tell about people, their lives, their aspirations and their ceremonies. For centuries Africa was a continent of massive migrations and vibrant cultures. All had their high time, declined in the normal course of events and left a legacy for their successors. Yet most ceremonies, although embellished and refined over time, remained largely the same. The hypnotic photograph of the Voodoo dancer from Ghana on the front of the slip case, for example, speaks of a time of spirits, oracles and divinations. Of soothsayers and intermediaries between man and the higher powers as well as of the unshakable belief that intervention is needed to protect man from evil, to solve his troubles, to cure his illnesses and generally to secure good fortune. And the Berber bride in her bejeweled headdress and cloak on the spine of the book reminds us that not all Africans are of black skin colour and that depending on what coast of Africa one finds oneself on, influences from out of Africa have helped to create new Africans. And with them ceremonies. Beckwith and Fisher have been photographing Africa for over thirty years, and like a ripe savoury wine African Ceremonies was many years in the making. With the expert collaboration of writers and designers each volume now contains three sections: Birth and Initiation; Courtship and Marriage; Royalty and Power in Volume 1; and Seasonal Rites; Beliefs and Worship; Spirits and Ancestors in Volume 2. The Dagara shaman Malidoma Patrice Som‚ from Burkina Faso, a special friend and guide to the photographers, sets the tone in his Foreword by saying that Beckwith and Fisher's travails are really a labour of love for Africa and that the two women responded "to an urgent call from the continent's ancestors to record sacred ceremonies before it is too late." And record they did: the two volumes contain over 700 pages and hundreds of exquisite colour photographs showing 43 ceremonies in 26 countries. Birth, childhood, initiation, marriage and death are fateful events in an African's life. The first photograph in African Childhood of a Surma father in Ethiopia surrounded by five children with their bodies painted has universal appeal as do those of ochred Himba children in Namibia and young Krobo girls draped in their beautiful cloths from Ghana. The initiation ceremonies and practices leading a young boy or girl from childhood to adulthood are elaborate, and while they are sometimes difficult for us to look at they have nevertheless been part of African life for time immemorial. The rituals of the Taneka initiation in northern Benin, of Ndebele womanhood in South Africa or Maasai warriorhood in the Great Rift Valley of Kenya and Tanzania are deeply rooted in the land and its people. Glistening with red ochre body paint

The New York Times Sunday Book Review section today had a wonderful review of this book (2 volumes in a slipcase). The documentation of ritual and people performing rituals as the seasons change in Nature and life cycles turn for People is a sacred task. The photographers appear to have embraced their subjects with care and respect - perhaps others will follow in this way in the future. What strikes me most about the book and the reviews is the genuine approach of the authors to the dignity, honor and respect of the African People they have photographed and documented. This alone makes the book a winner for me.Regarding the book, I am particularly impressed by their treatment of sacredness without judgment and jaded lens. Indeed the art and form of ritual itself creates tradition. The music of these images is at once visual and alive celebrating the sacred as timeless expressions of culture and community.

Beckwith and Fisher exceed their prior masterpieces with thistwo-volume collection of photographs and descriptions of traditionalceremonies. The diversity of settings, the splendor of styles and smiles, and the care and reverence they bring to this work speaks to their respect and faithfulness to the quest. The text is as clear as the customs are intriguing. The photographs capture the breadth of scenes and go to the details. This is not the work of dilettantes or voyeurs, nor is it an exercise of academic minutiae, sensational reporting, or sentimental travel writing. AFRICAN CEREMONIES has been born of the drive in the human race to celebrate life and mystery, the wisdom of elders and officials who have granted access to private domains in a number of nations, and the hard work and devotion of two extraordinary women who have paid their dues in the field for decades. There is something still missing, however, in their publishing odyssey. One can hope that they are hard at work on a volume to crown the splendor of their last six--a celebration of life in everyday terms. Who are better prepared to assemble visual albums of villages where there are no K-Marts? From cotton boll to blanket, palm nut to fragrant oil, log to canoe, their keen and practiced eyes can show us the process of lives much like our recent ancestors lived when they too cooked over open fires and chased birds from the fields before harvest.