African Folklore: An Encyclopedia - Marshalls University

African Americans 751
according to the marabout’s ruling). This interplay of counter-myths is not surprising in a
society characterized by bilateral descent and inheritance institutions, with more recent
patrilineal influence from Islam and neighboring sedentary agricultural peoples,
superimposed on former matrilineal institutions (for example, some non-Quranic
inheritance forms of some property transmitted among women), and current high status
and economic independence of Tuareg women (Murphy 1967; Nicolaisen 1963; Bernus
1981; Claudot-Hawad 1993).
The Performance Style of Folklore
Women sometimes tell tales in pairs, debating plots, correcting each other, and
completing sections for each other. The audience laughs and comments freely throughout
these folklore performances. In narrative gestures during storytelling, there is the idea of
sikbar (lit. “imitation”), central to performative competence (Calame-Griaule 1977, 311).
The perceived complementarity of the gesture to the spoken word in performance is
expressed in a musical metaphor that compares the gesture to the asakalabo instrument, a
calabash floating in water, beaten with a stick, which accompanies the tende mortardrum
struck with the hands during festivals and spirit-possession rituals. A Tamacheq proverb
states, “Gestures are the asakalabo of the spoken word.” Perhaps because gestures are so
important, they are sharply restricted in usage, according to the social status and roles of
the speaker. A noble, for example, should not make as many gestures as a smith, a
woman should not make as many gestures as a man, and women are obliged to avoid
equivocal, suggestive gestures altogether. Smiths use gestures to make people laugh,
contrary to nobles’ dignity and reserve. Their gestures are labeled, in effect, as a kind of
nonverbal obscenity or at least given poetic license. Men and women of all social origins
are constrained in storytelling before certain relatives. Children and all young women
stop all performance of tales and riddles when elderly men and women approach because,
they explain, they are “ashamed” to continue, from respect (in their reserved relationship
with these persons, particularly elders on the paternal side). Women may not tell stories
in front of their mother-in-law. A man may tell stories before his father-in-law, provided
the latter has asked him to do so. One does not initiate talk in front of a parent, a parentin-law
of either sex, an elder sibling, or elders on the paternal side, without having been
invited. Another constraint is that some elderly persons do not wish to have their voices
recorded because they do not wish them heard by their descendants after death. A few
Islamic scholars declined to be recorded on tape because, in the words of one,
“Marabouts are not supposed to seek glory. They should not say things profound. Rather,
they should be a reflection of God.” (Rasmussen 2001, 52).
Folklore and the Transfer of Historical and Cultural Knowledge
Among the Tuareg, verbal arts are used to transfer but also dispute, historical knowledge.
Both written and oral forms of expression remain vital today. There exist two types of
written channels: Arabic literacy of the Quran and the Tifinagh script of Tamacheq used
in love messages, poetry, and on musical instruments and jewelry. There are several types