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#benin

mikhailmuzakmen@pod.geraspora.de
BeatclubFC

#politics #art #history #colonialism #benin #artefacts #restitution

Explore Digital Benin

Digital Benin brings together all objects, historical photographs and rich documentation material from collections worldwide to provide a long-requested overview of the royal artefacts from Benin Kingdom looted in the late nineteenth century. The historic Benin objects are an expression of Benin arts, culture and history, and were originally used as royal representational arts, to depict historical events, to communicate, to worship and perform rituals. 

The digital platform introduces new scholarship which connects digital documentation about the translocated objects to oral histories, object research, historical context, a foundational Edo language catalogue, provenance names, a map of the Benin Kingdom and museum collections worldwide. Digital Benin connects data from 5,246 objects across 131 institutions in 20 countries.

Digital Benin’s scope focuses on objects looted by British forces from the Kingdom of Benin (now Edo State, Nigeria) in February 1897 and distributed in its immediate aftermath. Together, these events and processes led to the worldwide translocation of the objects shown on this platform. A small set of objects is included in the catalogue to represent the broader context in which the artistic production of Benin guilds is situated: Bini-Portuguese Ivories, produced and circulated outside West Africa in the 16th centuries, objects produced in neighbouring regions of the kingdom and a selection of works produced by named artists after 1930, which are held in museum collections. 
- https://digitalbenin.org/

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jaywink@jasonrobinson.me
Jason Robinson 🐍 🍻

#HIFF movies, last day of the festival, movie 1/2.

Movies based on historical events are always a soft spot for me. "The Woman King" felt an interesting one being based in Africa, in the slave trade times, and with the story being around an all-female elite kings guard. The story takes part in the kingdom of Dahomey, at the time a tributary to the Oyo Empire. Both the Dahomey and the Oyo states participate in the slave trade, selling captured foreign citizens to the European and American slave traders, gaining in return modern weapons to wage more war against their neighbours. A vicious circle, and we all know how it all ended, pretty much all of Africa under European colonial rule.

The lead of the film is general Nanisca, a tough as nails warrior leading the Agojie soldiers, an elite kings guard unit of female warriors. The role is played well and the story is well written. This is a very serious film with very few laughs and lots of rather brutal fight scenes.

Spoilers follow!

It was nice to read that a lot of the details in the film are in fact quite accurate. The kingdom of Dahomey existed, and still does, though it's called Benin these days. The king Ghezo, portrayed early in the film as kind of weak but later showing strong character, was also a real character. Unlike in the film, he didn't abolish slave trade after the defeat of the Oyo Empire. In the film the Dahomey end up raiding the port used for slave trading by Europeans, and chase them to their ships. In reality, the Dahomey kingdom ended the practice of selling their own citizens as slaves to the Europeans under king Ghezo, but did not limit slave trade of Africans captured in raids. They also used slaves themselves for work labor and had some human sacrifice rituals where slaves were used. The ending speech of the king promising no more slave trade was empowering, but also completely false in historical accuracy.

General Nanisca is also a fictional character, though the Agojie female warriors were a central part of the Dahomey kingdom, as per the film.

All in all a very interesting film, highly recommend for anyone interested in history based films. Now I want to immediately go home and play Europa Universalis IV, and see what I can do with the Dahomey kingdom myself.

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3RDaPV_rJ1Y

Wikipedia (for historical facts): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Woman_King#Historical_accuracy

#movies #history #dahomey #benin

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deutschewelle@squeet.me
Deutsche Welle (inoffiziell)

Abtreibungen: Afrika wird liberaler - nur auf dem Papier? | DW | 15.07.2022

Beim Thema Abtreibung geht der Trend in Afrika in eine andere Richtung als in den USA: Die Gesetzgebung in afrikanischen Ländern werde fortschrittlicher, sagen Experten. Doch die Lage ist widersprüchlich. Ein Überblick.#Afrika #Abtreibung #Abtreibungsrecht #Lagos #Nigeria #WHO #TedrosGhebreyesus #Schwangerschaftsabbrüche #Benin #SierraLeone
Abtreibungen: Afrika wird liberaler - nur auf dem Papier? | DW | 15.07.2022

Abtreibungen: Afrika wird liberaler - nur auf dem Papier? | DW | 15.07.2022

Beim Thema Abtreibung geht der Trend in Afrika in eine andere Richtung als in den USA: Die Gesetzgebung in afrikanischen Ländern werde fortschrittlicher, sagen Experten. Doch die Lage ist widersprüchlich. Ein Überblick.

One person like that