GENDERED SPACE TRANSGRESSORS: STUDY OF TWO YORÙBà FEMALE DÙNDÚN DRUMMERS
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.21504/amj.v10i4.2238Keywords:
Dùndún, drumming, Yorùbá music, female drummers, gender issues, male dominance, gendered spaceAbstract
The contemporary Nigerian musical landscape occasionally becomes a site for contesting and negotiating the established ideology of Yorùbá patriarchy. These movements are evident in many women's decisions to venture into drumming, an age-old male dominated musical profession. Informed by the theory of spatial trialectics, this article investigates gendered space in relation to dùndún drumming with a view to understanding the changing nuances of gender relations among the Yorùbá of southwestern Nigeria. Ethnographic techniques were used to generate data on Àrà and Àyánbìnrin, two well-known urban popular female dùndún performers whose aspirations and career trajectories reside outside the Àyà n lineage and spiritual tradition. Biographical accounts and lived experiences of both artists suggest that women's agency in Yorùbá drumming is hedged by different, prevailing socioeconomic contexts, including a determination to challenge limitations to a career path and economic progress. By describing how female dùndún drumming may be regarded as a response to social and musical change, and discussing how issues of masculinity and femininity are constructed, negotiated and contested, I argue that the belief forbidding women from playing Yorùbá drums is not strictly applicable to the dùndún because the dùndún ensemble is more connected to social than religious performances.
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