Decolonizing Tropical Environments: Awakening Nigeria’s Indigenous Dance Theatre
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.25120/etropic.22.1.2023.3958Keywords:
Indigenous dance theatre, environmental decolonization, Indigenous knowledge, colonialism, Niger Delta tropics, toxicity and wastingAbstract
The projected apocalypse triggered by centuries of consistent environmental abuse has attracted multidisciplinary attention which has intensified in the last few years. Scholarship largely figures colonial mechanisms and their variables such as imperialism, industrialization and militarism as responsible for the wasting of tropical bodies in the guise of development. The focus of this paper is threefold. Firstly, to establish that colonialism and neocolonialism is at the center of ecosystem degradation in the tropics and examine concepts of development as colonial constructs to sustain polluting rights in Nigeria. Colonialism remains at the center of the toxicity and wasting of humans and the environment in Nigeria, hence the call for decolonization of environmental discourses. Secondly, foreground the need to dismantle the tropes of development, civilization, and industrialization, as colonial installations to sustain the toxicity of the tropics. Thirdly, to investigate the necessity to return to Indigenous knowledge resources in order to forge new mindsets for envisioning sustainable futures. The rich multiethnic culture of Nigeria points to the potential of Indigenous dance theatre as an Indigenous knowledge resource to provoke much-needed conversations and change towards decolonization and posthuman consciousness. Towards this future, the paper addresses the present challenges of Indigenous dance theatre as well as the modalities for engaging it for effective results in rewriting the Nigerian stanza in the colonial-enforced tragedy of the tropics.
References
Abagworo, A. (2013, June 19). Industrial Hub: Why More Companies Are Moving to Ogun? Vanguard Online Newspapers. https://allafrica.com/stories/201306190597.html
Adekogbe, S. O. (2016). ‘For the Love of the Environment’ Reflections on Professional Music Practice and Climate Change in Nigeria. Advances in Research, 8(1), 1–15. https://doi.org/10.9734/AIR/2016/25819 DOI: https://doi.org/10.9734/AIR/2016/25819
Agbonifo, J. (2002). The Colonial Origin and Perpetuation of Environmental Pollution in the Postcolonial Nigerian State.
AMNH. (2016). Human Microbiome: Your Body is an Ecosystem. American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) https://www.amnh.org/content/download/131241/2201972/file/human_microbiome_your_body_is_an_ecosystem_stepread1.pdf
Bakare, S. (1997). The Drumbeat of Life: Jubilee in an African Context. WCC Publications.
Barba, E. (1995). The Paper Canoe: A Guide to Theatre Anthropology. (Trans. R. Fowler) Routledge.
Binebai, B. (2010). Drums of the Delta. Kraft Books Limited.
Bullard, R. D. (2001). Environmental Justice in the 21st Century: Race Still Matters. Phylon (1960-), 49(3/4), 151–171. https://doi.org/10.2307/3132626 DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/3132626
Callicott, J.B. (2006). Conservation Values and Ethics. In Groom, M.J., Meffe, G.K., & Carroll, C.R. Principles of Conversation Biology. (pp. 111–135). Sinauer Associates.
Collard-Stokes, G. (2020 June, 9). What can dance teach us about our relationship with nature? University of Derby Blog Post. https://www.derby.ac.uk/blog/what-can-dance-teach-us-about-our-relationship-with-nature/
Center for Research on Environmental Decisions (CRED). (2009). The Psychology of Climate Change Communication: A Guide for Scientists, journalists, Educators, Political Aides, and the Interested Public. Columbia University Press.
DeLoughrey E. M. (2019). Allegories of the anthropocene. Duke University Press. https://doi.org/10.1215/9781478090021 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1215/9781478090021
Dovie, B.K.D. (2015). Africa’s Environment: A Stressed Biogeographical and Cultural Landscape. International Encyclopedia of the Social and Behavioral Sciences. (2nd Ed.). (pp. 292–299). https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-08-097086-8.10113-8 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-08-097086-8.10113-8
Eneh, C. O. (2011). “Managing Nigeria’s Environment: The Unresolved Issues. Journal of Environmental Science and Technology. 4(3), 250–263. https://doi.org/10.3923/jest.2011.250.263 DOI: https://doi.org/10.3923/jest.2011.250.263
Ezquerro-Canete, A. (2016). Poisoned, Dispossessed and Excluded: A Critique of the Neoliberal Soy Regime in Paraguay. Journal of Agrarian Change, I6(4), 702 -710. https://doi.org/10.1111/joac.12164 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/joac.12164
Fatogun, I. A. (2022). ‘Environmental Diplomacy and Nigeria’s Image in the International Arena: (2010–2020).’ Covenant University Repository. http://eprints.covenantuniversity.edu.ng/15817/#.Y1hflVMo9GE.
Folke, C., Stephen P., Johan R., Victor G. et al. (2021) ‘Our Future in the Anthropocene Biosphere.’ Ambio, 50, 834 – 869. http://doi.org/10.1007/s13280-021-01544-8 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13280-021-01544-8
Gorer, G. (1962). Africa Dances. W.W. Norton & Company Inc.
Haraway, D. (2008). When Species Meet (Post-humanities). University of Minnesota Press.
Haraway, D. J. (2016). Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene. Duke University Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv11cw25q DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv11cw25q
Ibaba, S. (2021). Understanding the Niger Delta Crisis. Jiral Publication Company.
Idogho, A. J. (2018). Man and Environment: Critical Discourse on JP Clark-Bekederemo’s The Raft and J.M. Synge’s Riders to the Sea. In E. Emasealu & J. Mbacahaga (Eds.) Studies on Ecocriticism. (pp. 163 -181). BookWorks Publishers.
IHME, (2020). Nigeria, Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation, 2020. http://www.healthdata.org/nigeria.
Jorgensen, P.S., Folke, C. & Caroll, S.P. (2009). Evolution in the Anthropocene: Informing Governance and Policy. Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics. 50, 52–546. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-ecolsys-110218-024621 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-ecolsys-110218-024621
Kidner, D. (2014). “Why Anthropocentrism is not Anthropocentric.” Dialectical Anthropology¸ 38 (1), 465–480. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10624-014-9345-2 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10624-014-9345-2
Kopnina, H. (2020). ‘Anthropocentrism and Posthumanism.’ In H. Callan. The International Encyclopedia of Anthropology. (pp. 1 – 10). John Wiley and Sons. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118924396.wbiea2387 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/9781118924396.wbiea2387
Langley, A. J. (1973). Pan-Africanism and Nationalism in West Africa 1900-1945; A study in Ideology and Social Classes. Clarendon Press.
Lopez-Corona, O. & Megallanes-Guijon, G. (2020) ‘It is not the Anthropocene; It is Really the Technocene: Names Matter in Decision Making Under Planetary Crisis.’ Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, 8. https://doi.org/10.3389/fevo.2020.00214 DOI: https://doi.org/10.3389/fevo.2020.00214
Lundberg, A., Regis, H., & Agbonifo, J. (2022). Tropical Landscapes and Nature-Culture Entanglements: Reading Tropicality via Avatar. eTropic: Electronic Journal of Studies in the Tropics, 21(1), 1–27. https://doi.org/10.25120/etropic.21.1.2022.3877 DOI: https://doi.org/10.25120/etropic.21.1.2022.3877
Muñoz Martínez, Y. (2022). Gardening in Polluted Tropics: The Materiality of Waste and Toxicity in Olive Senior’s Caribbean Poetry. eTropic: electronic Journal of Studies in the Tropics (21)2, 162 – 179. https://doi.org/10.25120/etropic.21.2.2022.3907 DOI: https://doi.org/10.25120/etropic.21.2.2022.3907
Mbachu, D. (2020, July 1) The Toxic Legacy of 60 Years of Abundant Oil. https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2020-niger-delta-oil-pollution/
Mbajiorgu, G. (2011). Wake Up Everyone. Kraft Books Limited.
McGuire, B. (2007, August 7). ‘The Earth Fights Back.’ In The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/science/2007/aug/07/disasters
Moore, W. J. (2017). The Capitalocene, Part I: on the nature and origins of our ecological crisis. In Journal of Peasant Studies. 44 (3), 594–630. https://doi.org/10.1080/03066150.2016.1235036 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/03066150.2016.1235036
Mosko, S. (2018) Stepping Sustainably: The Potential Partnership Between Dance and Sustainable Development. Consilience: The Journal of Sustainable Development, 20 (1),62–87. https://journals.library.columbia.edu/index.php/consilience/article/view/3769/1573
Nixon, R. (2011). Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor. Harvard University Press. https://doi.org/10.4159/harvard.9780674061194 DOI: https://doi.org/10.4159/harvard.9780674061194
Nwaru, C. (2017). ‘The Diachronic Development of Traditional Dance in Nigeria. In JOTAMS: A Journal of Theatre and Media Studies. 2 (2), 38 – 49.
Ohenhen, S. T. (2016) “Dance as a Globalized Phenomenon and Custodian of Identity in a Democratic Polity.” Dance Journal of Nigeria. 3, 31–45.
Okorafor, N. (2014). Lagoon. Hodder & Stoughton.
Olusegun S. T. (2019). “Ecomusicology, Indigenous Knowledge and Environmental Degradation in Ibadan, Nigeria”. African Music : Journal of the International Library of African Music. 11(1), 72-90. https://doi.org/10.21504/amj.v11i1.2293 DOI: https://doi.org/10.21504/amj.v11i1.2293
Oyeleye, O. I. (2013). Challenges of urbanization and urban growth in Nigeria. American Journal of Sustainable Cities and Society. 1(2), 79–95.
Pepperell, R. (2005). Posthumans and Extended Experience. Journal of Evolution and Technology 14, 27–41.
Pona H. T., Xiaoli D., Ayantobo, O., & Narh T. (2021). Environmental Health Status in Nigeria: Current Status and Future Needs. Heliyon, 7, 1–12. http://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2021.e06330 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.heliyon.2021.e06330
Routley, R. & Routley, V. (2013). Against the Inevitability of Human Chauvinism. In Goodpaster, K.E & K.M Sayre. Ethics and Problems of the 21st Century. (pp. 36 – 59). University of Notre Dame Press.
Sardar, Z. (2010). Welcome to postnormal times. Futures, 42(5), 435–444. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.futures.2009.11.028 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.futures.2009.11.028
Sarkar, S., & Rangarajan, S. (2022). Marine Entanglements: Tropical Materialism and Hydrographic Imaginary in Nnedi Okorafor’s Lagoon. eTropic: electronic Journal of Studies in the Tropics, 21(2), 180–197. https://doi.org/10.25120/etropic.21.2.2022.3900 DOI: https://doi.org/10.25120/etropic.21.2.2022.3900
Serra, J. (2019). Postnormal Governance. In Z. Sardar (Ed.) The Postnormal Times Reader. (pp. 242–251). Centre for Postnormal Policy and Futures. https://postnormaltim.es/sites/default/files/uploads/PostNormalTimesReader(booktext)-USintlepub(25APR2019).pdf
Seto, K.C., Reenbergm, A., Boone, C., Fragkias, M., et al. (2012). Urban Land Telecommunications and Sustainability. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 109(20), 7687-7692. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1117622109 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1117622109
Stones, J. (2015) Environmental Dance: Listening to and Addressing the Big Question. In Stock, C. & Germain-Thomas, P. Contemporising the Past: Envisaging the Future: https://ausdance.org.au/articles/details/environmental-dance-listening-to-and-addressing-the-big-questions-gently
Tagowa, W.N. (2005). The Changing Patterns of the Boat Regatta as Maritime Heritage in Nigeria. WIT Transactions on the Built Environment, 79, 143-151.
Turner, M., Grauert, R., & Zallman, A. (1971) New Dance: Approaches to Non-literal Choreography. University of Pittsburg Press.
Udoka A. (2005). Dance in Search of a Nation: Towards a sociopolitical Redefinition of Dance in Nigeria.” In A. Yerima, O. R. Bakare & A. Udoka. Critical Perspectives on Dance in Nigeria. (pp. 276 – 292). Kraft Books.
Ugochukwu, N. (2020, March 10). 7 Top African Environmental and Climate Activists Fighting for a Sustainable Future. Eco Warrior Princess. https://ecowarriorprincess.net/2020/03/7-top-african-environmental-climate-activists-sustainable/
Valera, L. (2014). Posthumanism: Beyond Humanism? Cuadernos Bioetica, 24(3), 481–491.
World Health Organization, WHO (2017). 10 Facts on the State of Global Health, WHO, https://www.who.int/features/factfiles/global_burden/en/
What is Climate Justice? https://groups.friendsoftheearth.uk/resources/whats-climate-justice. Accessed 15 March 2023
WHO (2018). 9 out of 10 people worldwide breathe polluted air, but more countries are taking action. https://www.who.int/news-room/detail/02-05-2018-9-out-of-10-people-worldwide-breathe-polluted-air-but-more-countries-are-taking-action. Accessed: 24 October 2022.
Yerima, A. (2006). Hard Ground. Kraftgriots.
Yusoff, K. (2019). A Billion Black Anthropocenes or None. University of Minnesota Press. https://doi.org/10.5749/9781452962054 DOI: https://doi.org/10.5749/9781452962054
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2023 CC-BY
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors who submit articles to this journal agree to the following terms:
1. Authors are responsible for ensuring that any material that has influenced the research or writing has been properly cited and credited both in the text and in the Reference List (Bibliography). Contributors are responsible for gaining copyright clearance on figures, photographs or lengthy quotes used in their manuscript that have been published elsewhere.
2. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) License that allows others to share and adapt the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
3. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository, or publish it in a book), with proper acknowledgement of the work's initial publication in this journal.
4. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (see The Effect of Open Access or The Open Access Citation Advantage). Where authors include such a work in an institutional repository or on their website (i.e., a copy of a work which has been published in eTropic, or a pre-print or post-print version of that work), we request that they include a statement that acknowledges the eTropic publication including the name of the journal, the volume number and a web-link to the journal item.
5. Authors should be aware that the Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) License permits readers to share (copy and redistribute the work in any medium or format) and adapt (remix, transform, and build upon the work) for any purpose, even commercially, provided they also give appropriate credit to the work, provide a link to the license, and indicate if changes were made. They may do these things in any reasonable manner, but not in any way that suggests you or your publisher endorses their use.