Oral Tradition. Direct.
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Bea and I walk into town at sunset but there is no town. She spots a pregnant baobab tree, which becomes a running joke, the first joke I’ve told that gets a laugh from the Dogons. And not just a laugh – this is a heartshaking thunder clap of a retort, as if I knew something! That’s what this guide named Amasaygou says, the first Dogon I’ve had a real conversation with. He helps us with our Dogon greetings’ riffs, we discuss the compatibility of religions, Animist, Muslim, Christian, all coexisting here. Another joke: a Muslim can have Animist beliefs, but Animists cannot be Animists and have Muslim beliefs. More laughs.
This is taking place at the Campement, built on the grounds where Marcel Griaule’s house was. Griaule had lived with, and studied, the Dogons for twelve years when the Wise Men’s Council told him it was time for him to have a chat with the blind guy, a former hunter named Ogotemmeli. The result was a book, Conversations with Ogotemmeli, that outlined the Dogon cosmology and its interaction with daily life. Incredibly rich and evocative, these stories were the basis of everything – from which side of the room you slept, what the direction the ox plowed, and how each village was laid out as twins, to a divination method where sticks, stones and sand are used to create a sore on the earth, which night animals walk across and disturb. The paw prints and disturbances are read as your future, and resulted in another book, The Pale Fox.
That night I will visit the Kirili’s friend, Sekou Amadou Dolo (everyone in a Dogon village has the same last name: in Sangha that would be Dolo). His first words are, can Animists can’t have Animist beliefs, correct? The idle chitchat I’d had with Amasaygou just an hour or so before had already become part of Sangha lore, was returning to me in another conversation. Sekou “knows” me. Not only that, but he is asking me if I think Amasaygou would make a good guide. Why not? Things make sense in a way that is clear and understandable – the medium is the message, the content is the messenger.
Bob Holman is the host of a new travel series focused on endangered languages called ON THE ROAD WITH BOB HOLMAN on LINK TV. He traveled to West Africa, Middle East and Asia and these are his blog stories from his travels. More information at http://www.rattapallax.com/blog/on_the_road/
This is taking place at the Campement, built on the grounds where Marcel Griaule’s house was. Griaule had lived with, and studied, the Dogons for twelve years when the Wise Men’s Council told him it was time for him to have a chat with the blind guy, a former hunter named Ogotemmeli. The result was a book, Conversations with Ogotemmeli, that outlined the Dogon cosmology and its interaction with daily life. Incredibly rich and evocative, these stories were the basis of everything – from which side of the room you slept, what the direction the ox plowed, and how each village was laid out as twins, to a divination method where sticks, stones and sand are used to create a sore on the earth, which night animals walk across and disturb. The paw prints and disturbances are read as your future, and resulted in another book, The Pale Fox.
That night I will visit the Kirili’s friend, Sekou Amadou Dolo (everyone in a Dogon village has the same last name: in Sangha that would be Dolo). His first words are, can Animists can’t have Animist beliefs, correct? The idle chitchat I’d had with Amasaygou just an hour or so before had already become part of Sangha lore, was returning to me in another conversation. Sekou “knows” me. Not only that, but he is asking me if I think Amasaygou would make a good guide. Why not? Things make sense in a way that is clear and understandable – the medium is the message, the content is the messenger.
Bob Holman is the host of a new travel series focused on endangered languages called ON THE ROAD WITH BOB HOLMAN on LINK TV. He traveled to West Africa, Middle East and Asia and these are his blog stories from his travels. More information at http://www.rattapallax.com/blog/on_the_road/
