Gesture and Power : Religion, Nationalism, and Everyday Performance in Congo / Yolanda Covington-Ward.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Covington-Ward, Yolanda, 1979- author.

Series:

Religious Cultures of African and Africa.

Religious Cultures of African and Africa

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Social sciences.

Genre:

Electronic books.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (297 pages).

Other Title:

Knowledge Unlatched.

Place of Publication:

Durham NC : Duke University Press, 2015.

System Details:

text file

Summary:

In Gesture and Power Yolanda Covington-Ward examines the everyday embodied practices and performances of the BisiKongo people of the lower Congo to show how their gestures, dances, and spirituality are critical in mobilizing social and political action. Conceiving of the body as the center of analysis, a catalyst for social action, and as a conduit for the social construction of reality, Covington-Ward focuses on specific flashpoints in the last ninety years of Congo's troubled history, when embodied performance was used to stake political claims, foster dissent, and enforce power. In the 1920s Simon Kimbangu started a Christian prophetic movement based on spirit-induced trembling, which swept through the lower Congo, subverting Belgian colonial authority. Following independence, dictator Mobutu Sese Seko required citizens to dance and sing nationalist songs daily as a means of maintaining political control. More recently, embodied performance has again stoked reform, as nationalist groups such as Bundu dia Kongo advocate for a return to pre-colonial religious practices and non-Western gestures such as traditional greetings. In exploring these embodied expressions of Congolese agency, Covington-Ward provides a framework for understanding how embodied practices transmit social values, identities, and cultural history throughout Africa and the diaspora. This title was made Open Access by libraries from around the world through Knowledge Unlatched.

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

Local Notes:

Knowledge Unlatched Round 2

BiblioBoard internal publisher id: 103403

ISBN:

9781478091264

OCLC:

927174935

Access Restriction:

Open Access Unrestricted online access