A Brief History of African

Theatre:
An Overview

April 13, & 18, 2016

What do you know about
Africa and its people?
Did you know
this?

Population:
1,166,239,306
 Africa: An Overview
 Known to be the place from which the very first humans
originated;
—  Great diversity of geography, climate, politics, and languages
(more than 800 spoken languages);
—  Interactions with other cultures:
  ★ Northern coasts à with European and Middle Eastern cultures
for millennia;
  ★ Eastern coasts à long history of trading relations with of the
Indian Ocean, including India and Saudi Arabia;
  ★ Western, Central, and Southern coasts à few contacts with
European maritime travelers – Establishment of small colonies;
—  1885: Official start of colonialism;
—  Reorganization of colonies after WWI and WWII;
—  Independence movement in late 1950s and early 1960s;
Religious Africa
 Some Basic Issues and Problems
—  Non-written languages
—  Oral historic records (Importance of the Griot in West Africa);
—  Colonial powers dismissal of these histories and traditions;
—  Many of the histories were lost by the time writing symbols were
adopted;
—  Contradictions between the imposed European history and the
Natives’ oral histories
—  Double Consciousness à Assimilation ßà Matriculation
—  Civil wars following independence – Apartheid
—  Slavery and Slave Trade and the loss of part of the population
and memory of the past – But also, impacts on World music and
arts
—  Western and Eastern religions vs Ancestral belief systems
—  “In Africa, performance is a primary site for the production
of knowledge, where philosophy is enacted, and where
multiple and often simultaneous discourses are employed.
Not only that, but performance is a means by which people
reflect on their current conditions, define and/or re-invent
themselves and their social world, and either re-enforce,
resist, or subvert prevailing social orders. Indeed both
subversion and legitimation can emerge in the same
utterance or act.” (3)
[Margaret Drewal, “The Sate of Research on Performance in
Africa,” African Studies Review, 34, 3 (Dec., 1991): 1-64]
 Defining Theatre and Performance in Africa

Pre-colonial African performance: Still a lot of research

needed

—  Complexity of forms, languages, and symbolisms

—  Drumming

—  Dances

—  Masks and Masquerades (Pende Masks, Yoruba Egungun)

—  Puppets (Bamana or Bambara)

—  Rites and Social Drama

—  Religions
Pende Masks & Bamana Puppets
Minganji
Rituals and Ritualistic Performances
—  Initiation ceremonies for boys and girls (Rites of
Passage)

—  Preparation for hunting sessions

—  Preparation for wars

—  Power functions

—  Honoring the dead

—  Daily Social Functions

 Ritual

Main structure from Arnold Van Gennep’s ideas à

Contribution of Victor Turner’s Social Drama
—  Four stages:

1.  BREACH

2.  CRISIS

3.  REDRESSIVE PROCESS: Ancestral transactions or

sentences – Political Processes – Legal-Judicial Process

4.  REINTEGRATION (or RECOGNITION OF

IRREPARABLE SCHISM)
Mukanda Initiates
Egungun Costume & Mask
 Preliminary Concepts/Performance Functions
—  Richard Schechner’s Dyad:
- Entertainment
- Efficacy

—  Victor Turner’s ideas:

- Social Drama
- Aesthetic Performance

—  Bakary Traoré and the Social Functions of African Theatre:

- Political Functions à Criticisms – Presentation of Models

- Galvanizing Functions à Collective Actions

- Didactic Functions à Education and Change of Mentalities
- Recollection of Major Events and Past Heroes
 Colonial and Post-colonial Situations

—  The Negritude Movement

-  Aimé Césaire, Léopold Sédar Senghor, Léon
Gontran-Damas à Black literature in Paris (1932 to
1966)

-  Coined by Aimé Césaire, who deliberately and

proudly incorporated this derogatory word into the
name of his ideological movement – 1932
 Colonial and Post-colonial Situations

—  Panafricanism
-  The Independence Movement à Edward Blyden,
W.E.B. Dubois, Haile Selassie, Kwame Nkrumah &
Sékou Touré

-  The belief that people of African descent

throughout the Diaspora (meaning spread
throughout the world) share a common history,
culture, and experience and should stick together.
 Modern and Westernized Theatre and
Performance
—  The Role of Western Schools:
> The William Ponty School for Native Teachers and Colonial
Administrators (1913)

In Gorée Island (later transferred to Sebikotane) 

—  Audio-Visual Media
—  The BBC Drama Competition (1957 and onward)
—  Radio France Internationale Competitions (1968 – 1990)

—  The Role of Festivals such as the 1st Black World Festival (Dakar
1966)

—  Fight Against Apartheid

—  Mau-Mau Uprising and Post-Colonial Africa
 Types of Theatre Companies

—  National Theatres and National Ballets

—  Traveling Theatre Companies (the case of

Nigeria)
> Duro Ladipo
> Hubert Ogunde
—  Non-Commercial Companies
—  Radio and Television Groups
—  The Advent of Nollywood
Hubert Ogunde (1916-1990)
Duro Ladipo (1931-1978)
 Major Themes and Characteristics of Modern
African Theatre

è A Committed Theatre à No art for art’s sake:

—  Ritualistic Theatre
—  Memory Theatre à Historical figures (Sundiata,
Shaka, Kimpa Mvita, Lumumba, Samory
Touré…)
—  Surrealistic Theatre
—  Political Criticism
—  Social Issues
 Few Names
—  Francophone Africa:
> Bernard Dadié (Béatrice du Congo…)

> Cheik Aliou Ndao (L’Exil d’Albouri)

> Seydou Badian Kouyaté (La mort de Chaka)

> Guillaume Oyono (Trois prétendants, un mari)

> Tchikaya U Tam’si (Le Zulu)

> Sony Labou Tansi (Parenthèses de sang)

> Pierre Ndedi-Penda (Le fusil)

> Guy Menga (La marmitte de Koka-Mbala)

> Norbert Mobyem Mikanza (Procès à Makala)
—  Anglophone Africa:
> J.P. Clark (Song of a goat)
> Wole Soyinka (Death and the king’s horseman)
> Ngugi Wa Thiongo, with Micere Mugo** (The
Trial of Dedan Kimathi)
> Femi Osofisan (Who’s Afraid of Solarin?)
> Efua Sutherland** (Edufa)
> Ama Ata Aidoo** (Dilemma of the Ghost)
> Zakes Mda (We Shall Sing for the Fatherland)
> Athol Fugard (Sizwe Banzi is Dead)
> Hussein Ebrahim (Kinjeketile)
 The Case of South Africa
à  The history of theatre in South Africa is bound up in the
complexities of its colonial and recent past.

à  Because of its strategic location and resources, South Africa began

early to be coveted by Europeans. Beginning around 1652 the
Netherlands encouraged Dutch immigrants to settle there.

à  British occupation starting around 1814

à  Resistance against the European occupation – Death of Shaka

(1828)

à  Independence of Union of South Africa (reconciliation of the

Boers/Afrikaners and British settlers) from Britain in 1931

à  Apartheid System (1948-1994) – Black people moved to townships

(shantytowns) – Separate homelands in the least desirable lands
à As in other African countries, indigenous performances were
numerous and of long standing before the arrival of
Europeans.

à The first performance of a European play in South Africa

came in the 1780s, and after 1801 – theatrical performances
were available occasionally through visiting companies from
England and elsewhere.

à Because of government restrictions, many white English-

language and virtually all black playwrights worked outside
the subsidized theatre.
à Black interest in theatre, other than traditional performance,
can be traced back to at least the 1920s. In 1927, G.B. Sinxo’s
Debeza’s Baboons became the first play in Xhosa language to
be performed

à H.I.E. Dhlomo (1903-1956) – The Girl Who Killed to Save:

Nongquase the Liberator (1935) – first drama in English by a
black person to be published.
June 16, 1976: Soweto Uprising
 Black Political Theatre

à  Political theatre grew out in the 1970s out of the Black Consciousness Movement (in
universities) – Not being able to act politically, this movement chose theatre as means
of uniting blacks, reminding them of their history and lost culture, and building
resistance

à  Mbongeni Ngema, Percy Mtwa, and Barney Simon – Woza Albert!

à  Athol Fugard, John Kani, and Winston Ntshona – Sizwe Bansi Is Dead, Statements
after an Arrest under the Immorality Act, The Island

à  Style of Performance:

—  Improvisations from basic storyline grounded on everyday struggles

—  Combinations of spoken words, songs, dance steps (gumboot dance)

—  Musicals such as Asinamali! (1983) -

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cNmXT1Q_ECw

—  Sarafina (1986) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpYaGfnnnYI &

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrtAAhZeVBc

—  Township Fever (1990)

Woza Albert!

Sizwe Bansi Is Dead

Wole Soyinka Guillaume Oyono
Mbia
 Wole Soyinka (1934)

—  Nigerian playwright, poet, author, teacher and

political activist
—  Nobel Prize Laureate for Literature in 1986.
—  Some of his 29 or so plays:
—  The Swamp Dwellers (1958), The Lion and the Jewel (1959), The
Trials of Brother Jero (1959), A Dance of the Forests (1960), The
Strong Breed (1964), Kongi's Harvest (1964), The Road (1965),
Madmen and Specialists (1970), The Bacchae of Euripides
(1973), Death and the King's Horseman (1975), Opera Wonyosi
(1977), A Play of Giants (1984), King Baabu (2001)
 Guillaume Oyono Mbia (1939)
—  African dramatist and short-story writer, one of bilingual
Cameroon’s few writers to achieve success both in French
and in English.
—  Compared Molière – created comedies that play well both
on stage and on radio.
—  Among them are Trois prétendants . . . un mari (1962; Three
Suitors . . . One Husband), Until Further Notice (1967), Notre
fille ne se mariera pas! (1969; “Our Daughter Will Not
Marry!”), and His Excellency’s Train (1969)
—  Favorite theme: youth versus adult, modernity versus
tradition.
—  Three satire volumes of amusing tales of life in his native
village, Chroniques de Mvoutessi (1971–72; “Chronicles of
Mvoutessi”).