My Beauty Best Teacher

Over at Aachronym:

Sotheby's is trafficking in stolen goods and it is doing so without any concern for the fact of its brazen criminality. It is clear that the Benin artworks are a contested collection of cultural artifacts. The history of their plunder from Benin is not in doubt, and the Benin Kingdom has never at any time given up its claim to these artworks. There has been significant amount of words written about the history of the British plunder of Benin and why the artworks should be repatriated. How is it then that despite the constant requests for the repatriation of these artworks and their clear identification as stolen goods, they continue to be sold by firms such as Sotheby’s without any hesitation?

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From the BBC:

When magnificent 16th-century bronze casts were discovered in the kingdom of Benin in 1897, many could not believe they had been made by Africans. It was thought West Africa lacked the technical development required to make them. Dr Casely-Hayford travels to present-day Nigeria and Mali in search of the truth, exploring what the bronzes mean, how the technology to make them developed, and what it reveals about the lost kingdoms of West Africa.

Watch the video:

via Bombastic Elements

George Ayittey writes in Harvard International Review:

In crisis-resolution, the African tradition entails consultation and decision-making by consensus. When a crisis erupted in a typical African village, the chief and the elders would summon a village meeting and put the issue to the people. There it was debated by the people until a consensus was reached. During the debate, the chief usually made no effort to manipulate the outcome or sway public opinion. Nor were there bazooka-wielding rogues, intimidating or instructing people on what they should say. People expressed their ideas openly and freely without fear of arrest. Those who cared participated in the decision-making process. No one was locked out. Once a decision had been reached by consensus, it was binding on all, including the chief.
These village meetings are indigenous African political institutions and commonplace across the continent. Despite their distinct names in various parts of the continent, the basic principles and methods employed are the same. In recent years, this indigenous African tradition was been revived by pro-democracy forces in the form of national conferences to chart a new political future in Benin, Cape Verde Islands, Congo, Malawi, Mali, Niger, South Africa, and Zambia.

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Blessing-Miles Tendi writing in the Guardian:

The standard explanation offered by Africans opposed to gay rights is that homosexuality is alien to their culture and was introduced to Africa by European colonialists. A good deal of African-American homophobia relies on the same justification. But late 19th-century records on Africa and African oral history show that homosexual practices existed in pre-colonial Africa. One case in point are the Azande people in the north-east of modern-day Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), where it was acceptable for kings, princes and soldiers to take young male lovers.
Further evidence for the existence of homosexuality is that pre-colonial African ethnic groups ascribed tribal classifications to gay people. While some of these categorisations had negative associations, many had neutral connotations. Certain tribes in pre-colonial Burkina Faso and South Africa regarded lesbians as astrologers and traditional healers. A number of tribal groups in Cameroon and Gabon believed homosexuality had a medicinal effect. In pre-colonial Benin, homosexuality was viewed as a boyhood phase that males passed through and eventually grew out of.

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The Tang Museum on Phyllis Galembo's series of masquerade images:

Large-scale color photographs from 2005 to 2006 reflect the ritual adornment and spirituality of masquerade in Nigeria, Benin and Burkina Faso in West Africa. These portraits of masqueraders build on Galembo's work of the past twenty years photographing the rituals and religious culture in Nigeria, Brazil, Cuba, Jamaica and Haiti, as well as the homegrown custom of Halloween in the United States.

via Shadow and Act

In 234Next Akintayo Abodunrin reports on an exhibition -Benin1897.com- that highlights the sacking of the Benin Empire:

In February 1897, a ‘punitive expedition' was sent to Benin to capture the king and destroy his kingdom in retaliation for the killing of a British Counsel and his party on their way to investigate reports of ritual human sacrifice in the city. But the punitive expedition not only went beyond its brief - capturing and destroying the city - it also engaged in large scale looting of artifacts. Among other war ‘booties', about 900 Benin bronze works were taken from the city to "defray the cost of the war." Many of these are held at the British Museum in London, and have been the subject of long standing contention between Britain and Nigeria.

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The Benin Moats (Iya) have been described as "a complex system of moats and ramparts spread over some 6,500 square kilometers". The aims of the Benin Moat Foundation are to:

Restore the integrity of the moats integrate them into park systems for tourism. Find the sites of the Nine Gateways into old Benin and in each, acquire land large enough for buildings for the needs of history, relaxation, transportation and tourism.Do the utmost to realize the moats’ tourism potential for Benin City, Edo State, Nigeria and the World.Work to find the moats their respected, permanent and revered places, and eventually as a World Heritage Site .

Image courtesy of Benin Moat Foundation

Bubacarr Sankanu writes in Africa Council

The prophets of intolerance cannot seriously claim to be defending African Values as all the monotheistic religions they are using to argue are foreign imports. It is the serious Voodoo Practitioners like those of the Republic of Benin who can talk about defending the true African Values. In fact no one can talk about bringing faith/salvation to Africans, be it monotheist or otherwise.

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In a paper Leonard Wantchekon & Nathan Jensen

...present empirical evidence suggesting a robust and negative correlation between the presence of a sizeable natural resource sector and the level of democracy in Africa. We argue that not only is resource abundance is an important determinant of democratic transition, but also partially determines the success of democratic consolidation in Africa. The results illuminate the fact that post-cold war democratic reforms have been successful only in resource poor countries such as Benin, Mali, and Madagascar. We argue that resource-rich countries such as Nigeria and Gabon can become democratic only if they introduce strong mechanisms of vertical and horizontal accountability within the state.

More here(pdf)

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• The Trust Deficit (my-beauty-best-teacher.blogspot.com)

Xeni Jardin of Boing Boing profiles the work of artist Romuald Hazoumé:

Romuald Hazoumé...transforms salvaged materials into symbols of spiritual power...Starting in the mid-1980s, Hazoumé began creating works made from a locally ubiquitous type of plastic container -- I've heard them referred to as "jerry cans?" Basically, you see them everywhere in Benin, used and reused and reused to store everything from palm oil to water to gasoline...[continue reading]

Via Boing Boing

Leonard Wantchekon talks about the lack of interpersonal trust within a community as a major challenge to economic development.Communities in Benin where he has seen this phenomenon manifest most, he says, are the same communities where the highest amount of slave exportation took place from the 1600s to the 1900s -- villages and towns in the southern part of the country, where the huge slave ports once stood, and where massive numbers of (basically) war captives were sold into bondage. Wantchekon documents all of this in a research paper he co-authored with Nathan Nunn...[continue reading]

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• Xeni on the road in West Africa: Ritually Stolen Penises and Vaginas - Not a Joke Here. (boingboing.net)

BBTV's Xeni Jardin reports on Benin's relatively unknown Pendjari Biosphere:

The Pendjari Biosphere lies in Benin's remote rural northwest, along the border of Burkina Faso. Despite poaching and environmental damage, it's still home to a diverse number of species -- elephants, lions, monkeys, cheetah, and around 300 species of birds. We traveled here during the dry season, when animal spotting is easiest. Here is what we saw at dawn (the time of day when critters all come out to the watering holes and rivers)...[continue reading]

Prosper Mondé writes:

Identifying traditional knowledge and putting it to good use is more important than ever, given that our economies remain geared towards outside markets and that people, especially those living in towns, do not have any viable way of feeding themselves. You only have to look at the quantities of frozen meat from the West and rice from Asia being imported by a number of West African countries, products that are widely acknowledged as less nutritious than their local counterparts. Sorghum and millet are disappearing in some parts of southern Benin, though these crops play an important role during lean periods.
How can we reverse this trend? By fighting collective ignorance. In this respect, governments, national and international civil society organisations, researchers and journalists all have a major role to play...[continue reading]