The hidden dimension of the African space

• Main Author: Łapott, Jacek
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: Polish
• Published: Uniwersytet Warmińsko-Mazurski w Olsztynie. Instytut Nauk Politycznych 2010
• Subjects: geo; socio; The Landing; Long Rock; Ark the
• Online Access: https://bibliotekanauki.pl/articles/567124.pdf; https://bibliotekanauki.pl/articles/567124

The characteristic "tourist invasion" and other aspects of modern globalisation now ongoing in Africa and specifically in Mali cause substantial changes in the local culture. In particular it affects the Dogon tribe, attractive to many. At the same time ethnologists begin to realize that something is „becoming missing". A certain research age comes to an end and scientific materials collected and gathered appear to be only fragments of a whole that would be difficult to complete. On the other hand, from the Dogon perspective the attempts to save their heritage are not always met with understanding and approval. Frequently these attempts may even become desperate. The events of my last and the previous research season seem to confirm this opinion. On the 27th October 2008 (the penultimate day of our expedition) Pangale Dolo, one of the "initiated" guardians of the "hidden dimension" of the culture came to our camp with the proposal to show us something interesting. We went with him to the border of the Sanga village where among fields we found a low, long rock formation with shallow caves. 'That's where first Nommo, our ancestors, descended from the sky' he said. 'First four sat on this rock', 'in this place they fought Jurugu' and so went the story of the most esoteric part of the tribe's life. Next, on the other side of the village we were shown the landing site of the "first blacksmith's ark", the cave where he set up the first smithy and so on. It became apparent that the myth we were told differs somewhat from the information gathered by the French ethnologists 60 years ago. Maybe during our next expedition we will be able to verify this information. In the near future this subject will take form of a separate publication. Before that I have tried at least several times to get any information on this subject and always same upon a "brick wall" which no one was willing to cross with me (us). This time it was different. The Dogon seeing our painstaking efforts and almost desperation to learn the modern image ...