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| Title: | The dancing dead: ritual and religion among the Kapsiki/Higi of North Cameroon and Northeastern Nigeria |
| Author: | Beek, W.E.A. van |
| Year: | 2012 |
| Pages: | 345 |
| Language: | English |
| Series: | Oxford ritual studies |
| City of publisher: | New York |
| Publisher: | Oxford University Press |
| ISBN: | 0199858144; 9780199858149; 0199858160; 9780199858163 |
| Geographic terms: | Cameroon Nigeria |
| Subjects: | Kapsiki rituals death rites African religions |
| Abstract: | Kapsiki traditional religion is based not upon ancestors, but on a completely relational thought system, where in the end all rituals are integrated into one major cycle. Drawing on over four decades of extensive fieldwork, the author offers an in-depth study of the religion of the Kapsiki/Higi, who live in the Mandara Mountains on the border between North Cameroon and Northeast Nigeria. Concentrating on ritual as the core of traditional religion, he shows how Kapsiki/Higi practices have endured through the long and turbulent history of the region. Kapsiki rituals reveal a focus on two fundamental concepts: dwelling and belonging. The author examines their sacrificial practices, through which the Kapsiki show a complex and pervasive connection with the Mandara Mountains, as well as the character of their relationships among themselves and with outsiders. He also explores their rituals of belonging, rites of passage which take place from birth through initiation and marriage - and even death, with the tradition of the dancing dead, when a fully decorated corpse on the shoulders of a smith dances with his mourning kinsmen. [Book abstract] |
