Red Fez: Art And Spirit Possession in Africa

Explores the ways in which colonial Europeans have been represented in African ritual art & drama. Through a re-exam'n. of Western concepts of otherness & mimesis, Kramer shows that African images of Europeans -- in sculpture, masquerades &, above all, spirit possession -- are the reverse & also the counterpart of European images of the Other as savage, whether noble or ignoble. These rituals are representations of something experienced, although the experiences have been transformed into spirits. They reveal the power of the visible, of the telling, obsessive detail: a feather, a shirt, or the eponymous red fez which runs like a leitmotiv through spirit possession cults of the early colonial period. Illustrations. Translated from German.