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NGONNSO: THE CAGED GUIDING SPIRIT OF THE NSO PEOPLE
In recent years, there has been a call for cultural artifacts smuggled, looted and stolen from Africa to be returned to their rightful place and owners. Just like the "Bring Back Ngonnso" campaign we have today, a similar campaign was launched for the Afo-a-Kom in 1973. Kom and Nso do not only share a common Tikar origin; both groups were deprived of their guiding spirits that ended up in American and German museums respectively. While Kom succeeded in bringing back their revered Mbang, as It is fondly...Read full article
Oral history has it that Ngon'nso and her elder brothers migrated from the Tikari (Tikar) plains in Adamaoua Region. They were the offsprings of Fon Kimi. Mbuundung (spellings may vary), the eldest son, as tradition warrants, was the legitimate prince to ascend the throne. Out of insubordination, Nchare and Foumbam left the village together with their followers. Ngon'nso is said to have equally set out with her own fleet of followers and later joined her two brothers in search of a new place and space that could better accommodate them. These three wandered together till separation became inevitable because of...Read full article
Matters surrounding death tend to be treated with solemnity in most cultures. This is partly because death is viewed as a prerequisite for the journey to the world beyond, to the dwelling place of our ancestors or to the land of the spirits. So, how we bid farewell to the dead is conditioned by what we think happens to the person after death... Read full article
I had convinced myself that I was not going to write any music reviews for a while and concentrate on other folklore related projects but when I watched Wan Shey’s Andirifaa, directed and produced by Geraldrico Guevara and Lanjo respectively, I started taking notes compulsively and could not stop myself from writing. This is not Wan Shey’s sole venture into the folkloric genre because we have seen illustrations of the assimilation of hip hop in his EPs but, it is definitely one of the pieces in which he invests in artistically and taps...Read full article
I am yet to visit a restaurant in Cameroon and the North West Region in particular where rats are served like is the case in some parts of Asia and South America but, I have visited homes where the men seldom let the women in charge of the kitchen when rats are on the menu. Mole rats (bush rats) have been on dinner tables for a very long time now and they constitute what is generally known as bush meat. This species of mole rat is different from the naked mole rat found in East Africa. It is a misconception that mole rat meat is eaten mainly by the poor or out...Read full article
Julio Abong is probably a new name to most makossa lovers but, he has been into music for over 20 years and has worked with great names in the music industry. He was mentored by Eko Roselvelt and the training he received permitted him to cross paths, at some points very briefly, with Salle John, Dipita Ebongue, late Same Batcho, and Alex Toto with whom he worked. At the moment, he is working with Ruben Binam of Kemit 7. His international exploits, which have been very productive as well, have mostly been with bands such as the...Read full article
Growing up in a semi-urban community comes with a blessing that permits you to experience rural life and urban life; at the end of the day, you have the best of both worlds. Some of the things I loved about the marriage of these two worlds are the stories we told and the games we played. With friends and peers, we told the famous “John and Mary” stories, tortoise stories, fox stories and those who had watched cartoons or read a few books came in with Cinderella and Snow White stories. The games we played ranged from dodging, stone, pitai, stinging, kaks, outh, one two, play-play, mbanga, hopscotch (tabala), scrabble, snakes and...Read full article
Growing up in a rural setting is a fascinating experience. Learning (formal and informal) in such an environment has its peculiarities. In primary schools in those days, extracurricular activities played a vital part in the end of term overall score. These activities ranged from the making of chairs, brooms, bamboo mats and, most importantly, to the fencing of the school toilet and urinary. What's important here is the material with which the fencing was done. It was done with the elephant grass stalk. It sufficed for one to visit the banks of River Bui to...Read full article
When we talk about communal life and hospitability, the village and its inhabitants is the first thing that comes to my mind. I don't know if people in the village are born different but there's something so different about them. I grew up in a semi urban area where it was permitted to mind each others business to an extent, even though each family unit made it their primary business to care about their various households. I was privileged to visit my father's village only when I was about 12 years old. It was an awesome experience and I was greeted by totally new real...Read full article
This unique work of art known as “Nkok” in the Oku language is the artistic work of the Oku woman and it is for women only. It is carried on the back and used principally for transporting farm produce and firewood.
What stroke the attention of this writer is the cone-like shape of the basket. It narrows down from top to bottom. When loaded, as one craft woman explained, it balances on the carrier’s back firmly and the weight of the content is not felt as...Read full article
Joue moi le Menjang, a hit track of Dynasties Le Tigre 2015 album, La Loi de la Nature, is a commendable piece of art steaming with lessons for the curious. The lyrics, the rhythm, and the video maintain a rich mélange of cultural flavours that carry a salient message. The video depicts a journey that commences from a mesh of identity crisis and self-conflict and which then evolves into self-realisation; a realisation which eventually materialises to self-identification...Read full article
By L. Norwan
Graffi is locally used to refer to indigenes of the Western Grassfields of Cameroon administratively known as the North West region. It is a region known for its assorted traditional rhymes and rhythms. This music is today consumed far and wide and a fraction of the younger generation of artist have been doing a lot lately to make this music available to us. The foundation had been laid for them by pioneers like Francis Dom, John Menan, Chris Njowe and Afo-a-Kom who took a commercial turn to traditional...Read full article
The artwork titled Ngrimba (watch video here), masterminded by Kikoh was released on YouTube on the 4th of Feb, 2018. In these notes, we share the impressions and ideas that crossed our minds as we interacted with this wonderful piece of music. Our obsession with the melodious beats explains the extra attention given to it in the second part of this work.
Video: The Visuals and the Message
The HD Filmworks directed video begins with a helicopter view of the landscape that serves as a proper introduction. The view later narrows and we get details of the main scenes of the video. The plot tells a familiar hip hop story. The story is about...Read full article
