Research Catalog

Signs of the spirit music and the experience of meaning in Ndau ceremonial life

Title
Signs of the spirit [electronic resource] : music and the experience of meaning in Ndau ceremonial life / Tony Perman.
Author
Perman, Tony, 1973-
Publication
Urbana : University of Illinois Press, [2020]

Available Online

Available onsite at NYPL

Details

Description
1 online resource (viii, 269 pages) : illustrations, map.
Summary
"In 2005, Tony Perman attended a ceremony alongside the living and the dead. His visit to a Zimbabwe farm brought him into contact with the madhlozi, outsider spirits that Ndau people rely upon for guidance, protection, and their collective prosperity. Perman's encounters with the spirits, the mediums who bring them back, and the accompanying rituals form the heart of his ethnographic account of how the Ndau experience ceremonial musicking. As Perman witnessed other ceremonies, he discovered that music and dancing shape the emotional lives of Ndau individuals by inviting them to experience life's milestones or cope with its misfortunes as a group. Signs of the Spirit explores the historical, spiritual, and social roots of ceremonial action and details how that action influences the Ndau's collective approach to their future. The result is a vivid ethnomusicological journey that delves into the immediacy of musical experience and the forces that transform ceremonial performance into emotions and community"--
Uniform Title
Signs of the spirit (Online)
Alternative Title
Signs of the spirit (Online)
Subject
  • Ndau (African people) > Music > History and criticism
  • Ndau (African people) > Social life and customs
  • Rites and ceremonies > Zimbabwe
  • Dance > Zimbabwe
  • Drum > Performance > Zimbabwe
  • Music, Influence of > Zimbabwe
  • Spirit possession > Zimbabwe
  • Spiritualism > Zimbabwe
Bibliography (note)
  • Includes bibliographical references (pages 249-262) and index.
Access (note)
  • Access restricted to authorized users.
Contents
Prologue: Music, Experience, Meaning. -- Part I. Foundations. -- Introduction: Finding Madhlozi in Chipinge -- Moving Signs: The Experience of Affective Semiosis -- Part II. Ceremony at Horus Farm -- Late Afternoon: Madzviti and the Foundation of Interpretation -- Evening: Zvipunha, Signs, and Transformative Experience -- Overnight: Mhongo and the Effects of Performance -- Early Morning: Zvaayungu and the Shaping of Ndau Modernity.
LCCN
2019052272
OCLC
ssj0002295316
Author
Perman, Tony, 1973-
Title
Signs of the spirit [electronic resource] : music and the experience of meaning in Ndau ceremonial life / Tony Perman.
Imprint
Urbana : University of Illinois Press, [2020]
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (pages 249-262) and index.
Access
Access restricted to authorized users.
Connect to:
Available onsite at NYPL
View in Legacy Catalog