South Africa # 16-Dancing With The Ancestors.

Do you think that your Great-Grandmother and your Uncle Fred are watching over you from above? Many people do. A 2005 CBS News poll reported that 48% of Americans believe in ghosts and that 22% have seen or felt a ghost. Many traditional cultures throughout the world believe in the power of ancestor spirits to affect the lives of the living, including societies in South Asia, Japan, South America, The South Pacific region, Africa, and Native America. The same is true for the Tswana ethnic group (from Botswana and the Northwest Province of South Africa) that is the subject of this series of drawings. In some older books and films this belief is sometimes mistakenly labeled "ancestor worship." But, in fact, it is a remote and inaccessible creator God that is the object of worship, while ancestor spirits serve as intermediaries between God and the living. In this system, spirits serve some of the same functions that biblical angels do. As with witches, spirit snakes, and "evil" animals (see South Africa # 1, # 10, and # 11,) I found the belief in the power of these spirits to be nearly universal and entirely sincere in the area of rural South Africa where I lived. My friends would often tell me about dreams where ancestors had come to them with instructions. A common dream involves an ancestor saying, "I'm cold." This dream was interpreted to mean that the family should pool funds to erect a headstone on that person's grave (many poorer families only have enough money for a person's burial at the time of their death and must pay for a tombstone at a later time-sometimes years later.) In another common dream an ancestor would say, "I'm hungry." This was interpreted to mean that an offering of meat, traditional beer, sweets or another favorite food should be placed on that ancestors grave as an offering. Ancestors also give advice in the manner of a cosmic Dr. Phil, functioning as a kind of community conscience-everything from "You're putting on a few pounds." to "Don't marry that man. His heart is full of black magic." When I asked what would happen if these dreams were ignored, my friends would just chuckle and give me a sickly grin. The ancestors are not to be trifled with. But any system that relies on the unseen is ripe for abuse. A teacher at one of the schools I worked for would regularly receive "messages from her ancestors" just in time to get out long and boring meetings (I wonder what my ancestors have to say about student loan payments.) Of course, everyone at school was on to her, but who wants to tempt fate? One of the primary responsibilities of traditional healers in Tswana culture is the interpretation of the dreams of their patients and the attainment of an ecstatic state that will allow them to communicate with their own ancestors. This state is usually reached through repetitive rhythmic activities like clapping, drumming, dancing. The trance is one aspect of this subject that I can relate to very well. I often get or develop ideas for artwork by pacing back and forth and listening to music with a heavy beat. Once in this state, the healer is said to be "with" or "talking to" the ancestors and is often insensible to what is going on around them. When dancing while taking part in traditional ceremonies, healers may crash in to walls, speak in private languages or shout, and flail their limbs (see South Africa # 2.) Once coming down from this natural (supernatural?) high, healer report or interpret relevant discoveries to their patients. Often, the advice that comes from these sessions is little more than common sense, but with the weight of tradition and belief behind it, people are comforted. Mma Seitsang, my friend and guide to African spirituality (see the essay "About The South Africa Series,") would often repeatedly shrug and jiggle her shoulders when in this trance-like state. After one of these incidents, she reported to me that she had not just communed with her ancestors, but visited the land of the ancestors (reckoned by the Tswanas to be deep under the earth.) She told me about meeting with her ancestors and various biblical characters (including Jesus) there in a village very similar to her own, but "much cleaner." Because ancestor spirits were usually described to me as looking like everyday people, I had to use my own artistic licence when working on this series of drawings. In today's picture, a man is receiving instruction from a giant spirit snake (see South Africa # 11) Circled around him are a ring of my own representation of ancestor spirits. They are white(the color of the spirit world) and red (the color of power.) Next time: Why make matches, when you can touch the real fire?