Wednesday, February 16, 2011

February 17 readings

•Sublette, Ned. Cuba and Its Music. From the First Drums to the Mambo. (Chicag: Chicago Review Press, 2004), p. 73-83
•Budasz, Rogério. “Black guitar-players and early African-Iberian music in Portugal and Brazil.” Early Music, 35:1 (2007), 3-21

Suggested:
•Lewis, Laura A. “Blacks, Black Indians, Afromexicans: The Dynamics of Race, Nation, and Identity in a Mexican ‘moreno’ Community (Guerrero).” American Ethnologist 27:4 (2000), 898-926


Question: "In what ways do these examples show that creolization goes both ways (between Africans and Europeans)?"

45 comments:

  1. Budasz:
    Slaves and free blacks working as sailors and dockworkers came into contact with Africans from other regions and with blacks “assimilated” into the Iberian culture. They mixed music traditions resulting in a creolized musical form. Slaves, free blacks, and mulatos began to incorporate the guitar, an instrument having European elements, into musical pieces associated with dances of African influence such as amorosa with paracumbé.

    Whites and mulatos attended calundas to dance with the black people, but I would not call this creolization because they did not associate it with their culture. In Black Catholic brotherhoods, religious African derived musics were played, and are still played, in many Catholic feasts in Brazil. The music performed by slaves and free blacks was transcribed for European instruments. However, it was believed that these need to be purged of it’s blackness so many of them are now products of blanquemiento, combined with idiomatic European elements, for the European audiences.
    One clear example of creolization is the use of the Western African polyrhythm in the guitar strummed chords in triple time and percussive effects on the guitar soundboard in duple time in Murcia’s cumbées.

    Sublette:
    Dancing was prohibited in Christian Europe and the first mention of dance dates at 1477. Around 1600, there was switch to metric musics; this is around the same time that the African slave trade was on the rise.

    “As everywhere else Africans have gone, they played music and got people dancing” (76). The zarabanda, danced first by blacks in Cuba, became very popular in Spain, even though the church still did not approve of it. The chacona was another dance that came from Havana to Seville to the rest of Europe. It was transcribed to “classical” music, blanqueó but still retained most of its africanisms like the repeating cell.

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  2. It is clear through these readings that creolization went both ways (European influences found their way into African culture, but also parts of African culture were incorporated into European culture). In terms of music, Sublette talks about various instruments and dances/rhythms that traveled from Africa and black cultures in the Caribbean and Latin America to European nations. For example, he specifically talks about how the drum was not present in European music until Europeans came into contact with African cultures. Although the drumming in European nations evolved differently after it was first introduced, it is clear that the original source of this practice was African drumming. Further, he talks about how a dance called the zarabanda appeared in European colonies in Latin America. Although many scholars did not make the connection originally, he points out that the origin of this dance was the nsala-banda from the Congo. This dance then spread from the colonies back over to Europe, starting with slaves and servants and eventually spreading to the upper levels of European society. Budasz also talks about the guitar's movement from African culture to European music. Although the ways of playing were slightly different (with African technique being more percussive than European), the similarity between the European and African guitar is unmistakable. Further Budasz also talks about religious exchanges that went on between European and African cultures. We have looked at the incorporation of Catholicism into santeria, but it seems that Europeans also adopted African religious practices. He talks about how Europeans began to use calundus, African rituals that were often considered witchcraft, in addition to their usual Christian practices.

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  3. Steven Borukhin

    Creolization or syncretism is a hybridization of a culture where outside or foreign influences are absorbed into it. Budasz explains that the majority of people who performed on stage were blacks. The performers were trained in the Iberian tradition. The Portuguese had a large influence on black culture because it was a dominating force in the slave trade especially in Angola. Budasz says “African influence appeared almost simultaneously in different points of the so-called Atlantic triangle, a region that comprised coastal cities of the Congo-Angola, Iberian Peninsula and Latin America.” Free Blacks and slaves alike in the Iberian peninsula would gradually incorporate their own elements into the new environment. The Sublette reading that in Europe, an area that up until this point was dominated by religion had just started seeing music and dance. This was also around the time when the first black slaves from Africa began to appear. The best example of this is the way Sublette describes the drum. The Europeans only began to hear drums when Africans had arrived. It is interesting that the minority in both readings is making the influence on the majority.

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  4. Brendan McDermott
    Creolization is the blending of cultures and ways of life. While in the Eurocentric view considers that Natives and Blacks took on European culture, what often isn’t pointed out is that European culture and traditions were also creolized by contact with other people. In fact drums were banned by the Catholic Church for many centuries in Europe and with the start of the slave trade black culture black drums began to appear in Europe. Many African rhythms were brought into Europe and it was pointed out that they usually started with black slaves, moved up to the poor whites, and eventually to all of society. The zarabanda, a dance found in Cuba and Panama, even made its way to Spain and Europe with great popularity with its instrument, the guitar. During the heyday of this dance it was not a one way passage from the New World to Europe as the dance would often jump back and forth.
    The second article also discusses how sailors and seaman were important in the process of carrying music and dance forms around to different places in the Atlantic. This article also discussed the serembeque which was an extremely common dance that even before its appearance in 18th century Portugal was common throughout the Mozambique colony of Africa. In Brazil whites even often attended and participated in the Afro-Brazilian ceremony of spirit possession or calundus. African dances and music continue to play a role in Catholic ceremonies in Brazil.

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  5. Sublette shows how people of African descent brought the "drum" to the European continent and its use for dancing thus changing the way music was notated forever, by introducing meter. As a result of the extent of the slave trade the drum was able to travel across the Atlantic Ocean to the Americas. Sublette also mentions subtly that some African people were already "Christianized" by the time they came to the Caribbean which shows European influence on African people. There is also a discussion of how the Spanish refused many groups except for Catholics allowing for a particular kind of Christianity to manifest in Cuba amongst the African people. Budasz describes a particular instance where a Portuguese administrator brought a guitarists back with him to Brazil to teach his children how to play the instrument during the 17th century. I assume this is implies the guitar as a southern European instrument that was introduced to people of African descent in South America. He goes further to suggest that a musical blend of Iberian, Central and West African musical styles was more than possible. The author also uncovers a connection between Angola and Brazil with trade routes existing directly between the two countries.

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  6. Charlotte Beach


    Not only have Africans adopted European musical elements, but Europeans have also adopted many African practices into their own music. Because creolization is often modeled by a continuum, it only makes sense that in European music there are different degrees of African elements just like in African music there are different degrees of European influence. For many centuries, Europeans generally rejected African music styles. The Church disapproved of the drumming and many national leaders make an effort to eradicate black dances from their communities. However, many whites and mulattos began to adopt these practices and thus they became intertwined with European music. This began when African entered the European society via slave trade. And everywhere that Africans went, “they played music and got people dancing” (Sublette 76). Africans became involved in the Spanish theater during the seventeenth century as dancers, singers, musicians, and authors (Sublette 79). As Budasz mentions in his article, “sailors and dockworkers played an important role in this cross-fertilization between the sounds and rhythms” (5) of the Congo-Angola, the Iberian Peninsula, and Latin America. Examples of African influence in the European world are the sarambeque which is the “most common dance of African influence in the Iberian-American world” (Budasz 11). Whites also attended possession rituals called calundus when their own religion seemed ineffective (Budasz 12). Whites also danced with black people to the sounds of drums at the quilombo and also attended brotherhood celebrations.

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  7. The 17th and 18th century played a vital role in creolization between African and European music elements. The interchange of African music cultures occurred frequently as the African slave trade reached its peak. Sublette describes the transfer of different African rhythms, dances and instruments to show the process of creolization that circulated throughout “a syncopated rhythmic loop… beginning with African culture to Havana to Spain, and eventually into Europe.

    The dances performed by the different African cultures were initially seen as dances of the Devil. The Catholic Church played a dominant role in the constant subordination of the enslaved black people and the condemnation of dance and rhythm in Europe for years. In Sublette’s words the Catholic Church “acted as a rhythmic retardant by doing everything possible to banish dancing and dance music from European culture. “ (p.72) However as centuries went by the use of the drum became ‘whitened’ through the incorporation of drums in Martial drumming of the Ottoman Empire into Europe. The power and depth of the drum had switched from an instrument of the Devil to a signal for the prestige of a noble European. European’s did not recognize or admit that the new music that inspired their love for dance was a gift from the ‘the black people and their drums’; all the individuals they had made slaves.
    Sublette makes an important point in that although the musical elements of the different African cultures became popular, the slaves remained as the lowest class of Europe. The dances and rhythms would climb up the social classes until it became a ‘general popular base’ and would then reach the nobility.
    Budasz explained the interdependence between Angola and Brazil through the expression “without Angola there is no Brazil.” The resources of Brazil were exchanged for Angolans to be used for slave labor. Budasz writes “ social accommodation was possible if backs succeeded in assimilating the standards of culture and behavior of their oppressors, anticipating a fundamental aspect of race relations in Brazil in the following centuries.” (p.4) Forcing the black population to adopt the cultural standards seems like it may have forced a creolization between music styles without any intention.

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  8. Elizabeth Humphrey
    Black Musics in Latin America
    Professor Birenbaum Quintero


    The Atlantic triangle that consisted of Kongo-Angola, Iberian Peninsula, and Latin America helped to foster cross-fertilization between the sounds and rhythms of three continents (Budasz, 5). This interaction caused many African musical cultures to incorporate certain aspects of their new environment into the music they had retained from their own country. In the suggested reading by Lewis, there was a statement made that Blacks had no other choice but to have creolization occur since that would be the only way of surviving. This meant that they had to do away with certain characteristics of their culture: dress, language, and religious customs for example (Lewis, 906).


    The gandus, cumbés, and sarambeques were associated with either African religious practices or stemmed from African-derived music of some sort. The Europeans used these musical pieces in conjunction with elements of European music and made it so that it could be understood by and attract more of a European audience (Budasz, 13). The biggest example of creolization where Africans had some influence in European culture would be the dances that arrived from Habana, Cuba. In the Sublette article, it was mentioned how the zarabanda and the chacona became a part of religious festivals, and thus spread throughout the Iberian Peninsula. Some Europeans, of course, adapted certain aspects of the dance in order to keep within the conservative confinements of the music to which they were more accustomed (Sublette, 83). Even though this creolization of musical culture happened, Europeans did not acknowledge the origin of the change that could be found in their music.

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  9. Laura Connolly
    Through these readings, it is clear that creolization was not a phenomenon that only impacted the black populations. Creolization was also present in white European populations. In the Sublette article, dancing was prohibited in Europe and wasn’t even mentioned in literature until about 1400s, the point at which the slave trade became a major industry. Drumming and dancing was a huge part of African and slave culture. White sailors and dock workers, after coming into contact with Africans, were able to reinterpret the music they heard aboard these ships. Drum beats and musical styles were integrated into standard European styles of music. It was not just the slave populations who were being influenced by the white Europeans; it was also white Europeans who were taking bits of culture that they were interacting with on a now regular basis which is the definition of creolization. This type of creolization was also seen in the interactions between populations in Brazil and in Portugal. While some of the incorporation of African music aspects came from parody, it eventually became integrated in the music of Portugal. Take the dance zarambeque which was actually found in the African colony of Mozambique before it made its way to Portugal. This is another instance of the interactions between sailors and slaves that led to a dispersal of musical styles. There were instances, however, in which European and African musical styles were not mixed due to racial tensions and they would try to move away from each other. In the Lewis article, embracing blackness was important to whites because it allowed for them to create a national identity that represented its past and its present. By creolizing the Europeans, they could romanticize the cultural history. Creolization was prevalent for Europeans, too; however, the reasons behind the creolization of the white populations were not always unpredictable, but, rather, a calculated attempt to create a social hierarchy that favored them.

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  10. Ben Hill-Lam

    From the three readings, it is easy to see how creolization goes both ways, affecting the Europeans and the blacks in both the New World and Europe. This creolization is mostly evident in the music and dances of the slave holding societies in Latin America and the Caribbean. It is obvious that creolization occurred in slave, mulatto, maroon societies as evidenced by their incorporation of European elements, but frequently not discussed is the reverse side, where Europeans incorporated African elements into their music and dance. Examining Iberian secular music, we see that it is clearly influenced with “structures, rhythms, and melodic formulae from Central and Western African music traditions” (Budasz 5). The merchants and traders carrying out the slave trade were unwittingly carrying back the melodies they heard in the colonies and transferring them to the lower classes in Spain and Portugal, where they became extremely popular. Specifically, the umbigada, a suggestive dance move whose origins lie in the Congo-Angola region, eventually made its way from Africa, to Brazil, and back to Portugal’s popular dances. If we examine religion, we also find examples of creolization on the European side of the culture exchange. In Brazil, whites often resorted to “calundus”, African-Brazilian rituals, when their own religion failed them. This association also provided the perfect place for the contact and mixing of African and European musical cultures. Turning to Sublette’s article, the easiest example of creolization in European culture is the drum, forbidden and conspicuously absent from European culture until the start and proliferation of the slave trade. Obviously this new drumming influence came from the African culture of the slaves. Another clear example is the Morris dance, an example of the hot southern dances that came to northern Europe from Africa and the New World through the Iberian Peninsula. A third clear example of cultural creolization is the zarabanda, a stimulating passionate dance modeled after a similar dance from the Congo, which became wildly popular during the annual Corpus Cristi festivals in Sevilla, Spain. Here we have clear evidence of an African derived dancewhich became wildly popular in Spain, despite the negative connotations the Europeans associated with Africans and slaves. Clearly, cultural creolization, especially in the case of music and religion, worked both ways, altering both European and black cultures at the same time.

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  11. After reading these articles, it is easy to see that creolization can also function in the reverse direction from what we have been discussing in class thus far. Sublette’s article discusses the progression of music and dance from being essentially prohibited in the 14th century to being lively throughout Europe. The first drumming appeared in Europe via the Ottoman Empire’s military music. However, as the Iberian empire became dependent on slave trade, African influences inevitably flowed through. African drumming and dance had to move up through society starting with slaves and ending with the white elite, but once it became common in the Iberian peninsula, it quickly spread through the rest of Europe as well. A great example of this is the Zarabanda in Sevilla, which was initially practiced by blacks during the festival of Corpus Christi. The Zarabanda grew in popularity and eventually spread through the rest of Europe. Many African musics and dances also came to Europe via Latin America. Sublette and Budasz’s articles both highlight the importance of musics and dances traveling to Sevilla through Cuba and Brazil. An example of this is the Chacona, which went through a sort of evolution to become more slowed down and less suggestive of the devil. Examples of this from Budasz’s article are the Sarambeque, Fofa and Cumbe in the 18th century and the Lundum in the 19th century. Budasz also highlights that the music went through “decent modifications” before it became popular with the white elite. He also describes the importance of mulattos for connecting the slaves to the white elite.

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  12. Most of what we have read so far has talked about the creolization of the Africans during the diaspora. Creolization is the hybridization of a culture as it absorbs things from the outside. As the African people were taken out of africa and displaced they were forced into slavery and forced to adapt to some of the customs and cultures of the new places they now lived. It would make sense that people would write about how they were forced to change and absorb new cultures. However through these readings we see that in fact creolization goes both ways. Not just from Europeans to Africans but from Africans to Europeans. Sublette talks a lot about the creolization of the Europeans starting his piece by explaining, "the use of the word drum in English appears only in 1540... But in 1527 there were already a thousand or so negros in Cuba, and sailors and conquistadors were already dancing in Havana." Sublette talks about how the church in england considered the drum to be an instrument of the devil. Also they banished dancing and dance music from European culture. They only accepted music was church music which was monastic and purely vocal. With the increase of African slaves came the use of drums and dancing which became more visible throughout Europe. Sublette explained that dances and rhythms would move from the slaves and free blacks up to the general people. He goes on to talk about the rise of zarabanda and the guitar. Its explained that black influence on guitar playing began before the guitar even had six strings. The zarabanda was also adapted in Europe from black slaves. So as we can see much of music stemmed from what the Europeans learned from africans. Music therefore wouldnt be what it is today without this form of European creolization.

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  13. Mackenzie Schleicher
    There are many ways in which creolization has taken place between both Africans and Europeans. Sublette describes how drumming spread throughout Europe in the fifteenth century. This was first seen with the troops of the Ottoman Empire, and although Europeans would not describe these drums as “black drums”, there was a clear association between the increase in African slave trade in Europe, black people and their drums, and the increase in the use of these drums throughout Europe. As a result, there was an invasion of rhythm where “black people were an important part of the social life” (Sublette 75). There was also a new wave of dancing in Europe—this had much to do with the rise of the African slave trade and the entry of Africans into European society. Another form of creolization that took place in the New World was in a musical culture known as Bantu. Specifically, Sublette mentions zarabanda, which is a high-energy dance that originated from the Congo. According to Budasz, “some of the most interesting and puzzling 18th-century guitar sources are the Portuguese codices at Coimbra and at the Gulbenkian Foundation, which display a fair amount of music of supposed African origin” (Budasz 5). Budasz also talks about the influence of Europeans in the African culture. In the West African religion of Santeria, we see an incorporation of Catholicism. He also discusses how in colonial Brazil, quicumbis and cucumbes—likely variants of the cumbe, were related to the King and Queen of the Congo. These processions were organized by the black and mulatto Catholic brotherhoods. From the beginning of the slave trade in Europe, there have been many ways in which creolization has been made evident between the Africans and Europeans.

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  14. The readings demonstrate that creolization goes ways; that both African and European cultures influence each other. Sublette discusses how the use of African drums spread from Spain to European regions during the slave trade. With increasing slave trade, the spread of African drumming also increased as the slaves maintained their tradition of drumming and dancing. Although the Church banned any sort of dancing and instruments because it was believed to be the devils music, African movements of dancing moved its way to upper class. In particular, Sublette talks about how a Bantu cultural dance, Zarabanda, made its way to Spanish colonies in the New World and eventually into Europe. Although Zarabanda, overtime had different names and lost its African flavor and became integrated into classic music, it traces back to Congo. Similarly, Budasz talks about how African culture had influence on the guitar in Europe. Although both African traditions played with a different flavor, it shaped how guitar was played. European cultures also influenced African traditions, black actors and musicians combined elements of Iberian rhythms with that of Central and West African styles. Europeans also adopted aspects of African traditional practices, for example, they used rituals of possession called calundus for variety of reasons. In addition to their religion, Europeans used calundus to cure their slaves and undo witchcraft acts performed on them.

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  15. We have so often discussed the ways in which African culture was influenced by European and Indigenous cultures when slaves came to the Americas, but this is the first time we have seen specific examples of how creolization was not a one-way process; during the time African culture was evolving, traditional African customs were morphing European culture all the way across the ocean on the Iberian Peninsula. For example, as the Sublette reading explains, the drum was a new instrument in Europe in the 16th century, and one that the church disapproved of because of its African heritage. The church fought against cultural shifts with African roots, like the drum, constantly during this time period. However, they were largely unsuccessful, as African culture was ultimately able to extend its influence into religious services. In the “Black Guitar Players” reading we see examples of this, as African dances ultimately became a part of many Brazilian Catholic feasts. Dances like these seemed to climb up the so-called “racial hierarchy”, as slaves introduced them to the lower classes, and then the noble Europeans eventually adopted them. As the 1758 Portuguese pamphlet describes the African-Brazilian music and dance “arrive[d] barefoot” to Europe, and these adopted cultural practices became quickly popular. This simultaneous, reciprocal creolization of cultures in Africa, the Americas, and Europe gives important perspective to the topic of creolization, which is often viewed solely from the side of European culture influencing African culture. It was clearly an comprehensive process from which no culture was isolated.

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  16. Rebecca Centanni

    The two readings provide many examples of creolization, not only in the form of African’s adopting European culture, but also Europeans adopting slave culture. One example is the Zarabanda. This dance began in Cuba/Panama and was practiced predominantly by blacks. Europeans originally frowned upon this high-energy dance because they found it to be highly sexual. However, Zarabanda then became popular in Spain in the Corpus Christi festivals, spreading from black to white culture. Part of the reason it was able to gain popularity within European society was because of its use of the guitar. Whites in Spain adopted the dance and its guitar, spreading the music between high and low culture classes. This is an example of creolization not only because Europeans molded elements of the Zarabanda to form new culture, but also because the Zarabanda was never static in either Europe or the New World: it was constantly being practiced in both nations, with each cultural group making changes as they participated. Eventually, this music became translated into what we now recognize as European classical music. While the two forms do sound different and are used in different contexts, the Europeans maintained the structural elements of the original form.

    Another example of this creolization is the relationship between Portuguese cumbés and the African calundus. The calundus were rituals of possession and divination frequently practiced by slaves in the new world, as they retained their religious practices from Africa. Whites occasionally attended calundus when their own religion was unsatisfactory, and from these experiences they adopted some elements of the calundus. They took the music and transformed it into format for the guitar, with the tone of the music mimicking the dance movies and attitude of the participants. However, Europeans also incorporated their own elements of strumming and other guitar techniques while still retaining African polyrhythm. By changing certain features (and the contextual practice) of the African music, Europeans distanced themselves from the negative connotations of African traditions. This creolization and infusion of European features to mask the indications of “blackness” was a large factor in allowing such forms to spread from the lower classes to the elite.

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  17. Creolization occurred both ways, as evidenced through the reading. Creolization can be found in slave and maroon populations due to the integration of European elements as well as in European music, as a result of dance and drumming being brought via the slave trade.
    Dancing was prohibited in Christian Europe until roughly the 14th century, the slave trade brought dancing and the drum to Europe. A major component of slave culture was musical expression, through dancing and drumming. The unknowing traders and sailors that came into contact with slaves saw themselves catching on to melodies and techniques they encountered. In this way the slave population brought their own flavor to the European continent, soon enough the African musical methods were being incorporated into the European compositions.
    Another example of the creolization involving African music took place when both free and enslaved blacks, working as dockhands, came into contact with blacks from other regions, including those that have already absorbed the Iberian culture. The musical customs were mixed into a new creolized form. One facet of European music that was incorporated was the guitar. Just as the blacks brought the drum to Europe, the Europeans were responsible for the African’s introduction to the guitar.

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  18. Creolization is a two-way street: African musical elements influenced European music just as much as European elements affected traditional African music. Much of this interchange of elements was facilitated by the slave trade and the Portuguese ships that were mainly responsible for this commercial activity. These ships were literally the vessels by which cultures were introduced into new areas. As analyzed by Sublette, the zarabanda was a type of music that originated in the African Kongo but gained in popularity in Spain, which received African slaves from the Portuguese. He comments that “during its period of vitality, it likely went back and forth, over and over again, in an open circuit between Spain and various points in the new World, but always passing through Sevilla and Havana” (81). The case of zarabanda therefore provides an example of how creolization is a process resulting from the interface and interchange of multiple cultures, with syncretism going in both directions.
    The trans-Atlantic slave trade connected the Iberian peninsula, the New World, and Central and Western Africa, and through the forced migration of African slaves these cultures came into contact. As such there was a “combining of the structures, rhythms, and timbres” (4) of these different regions, what Budasz refers to as a “cross-fertilization” (5). He notes that in Brazil it was hard to differentiate between the music of traditional African religions and that of the Catholic church, showing the extent to which musical elements of each had been shared. But music and dance was being adapted and created not only in the New World; music back in Europe was also being transformed as a result of the slave trade. Some Brazilian composers and musicians even moved to Portugal, bringing with them the African-Brazilian genre that had been developing there. As Budasz notes, “creating art was a way of surviving in a racist and cruel society while expressing an identity that was neither African nor Portuguese” (19). The music evolving reflected the mutual exchange of elements between European and African tradition.

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  19. William Ho

    Europeans wouldn't even have music if they weren't inspired by African cultures. JS Bach and classical music often times was a slowed down melodramatic version of something an African tribe invented. They didn't even have a drum until the late 1500's when slavery was at its peak. So European music owes a lot to African innovation. Really, European Music is a creolization of the two cultures.
    With the guitar no one in Europe was really that good at it other than Africans who took it and creolized it to its full potential. Techniques and styles flowed across the Atlantic and creolized along the way, showing that the world is really more interconnected than one would think.

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  20. Though we have read about many ways in which European cultures had influenced Africans, these two articles provided examples of the effect that African culture has had on the Europeans. For example, as Sublette suggests on the first page of his article, the introduction of drumming to Europe is a result of creolization. While the Church considered the "black drum" to be an "instrument of the devil" until the sixteenth century, it became a part of European music as a result of creolization. Conquistadores began dancing to drums and other instruments during their time in Cuba, while the Ottomans introduced the military drum to Europe during the fifteenth century. Eventually, Europe began to incorporate different instruments, including drums, into their music.

    Another example of this type of African --> European creolization has to do with the Zarabanda dance. It originated in Latin America and was not well received among the Europeans. However, over time, it became incorporated into certain Spanish communities, mainly due to the use of the guitar. The Zarabanda dance was underwent subtle chanes as it was transferred from Latin America to Spain but now constitutes a large portion of classical European music.

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  21. We have seen that creolization is present in African music in the sense that they contain varying degrees of European influence, yet these examples show that European music has also been influenced by African culture. Sublette makes reference to how in Sevilla Africans whore their own costumes and danced their own music, zarabanda, and it was very popular for thirty years. He also notes how the white language first began to incorporate the words drums into it, depite the opposition of the church to keep these influences out of white culture. Budasz makes note of how whites and mulattos were going to dance with blacks to the sound of drums, and how the institutional orders were breaking down with more mulatto going into higher classes. We can see that the white assimilations into black culture lead to creolization in which both parties fused with each other.

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  22. Creolization is the process that occurs when two or more cultures are exposed to each other and a new culture forms. While creolization is often thought of as the combination of cultures, it includes the separation of customs, as well. Europeans showed opposition to African cultures before slavery. The Church disapproved of African drumming, and drums in general. Europeans associated drums with the devil, and this contributed to their negative attitude towards Africans. Dance and dance music was banned form Christian Europe for many years.
    During the 16th century, the Portuguese began bringing slaves from West Africa to Europe. This is when creolization took off between Europeans and Africans. Drums started showing up in Europe, and dances that originated in slave communities would spread throughout the social hierarchy.
    Africans also adapted customs from Europeans. Slaves began speaking Portuguese, the language of their masters, and some started playing guitars. The guitar was originally known as a viola in Portugal and Brazil.


    Hannah Wurgaft

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  23. Stephen Sullivan

    Creolization is generally spoken in the context of the New World. Here, we see that these fusions can go both ways, between Africans and Europeans. One of the articles talks about how “sea, sailors and dockworkers played an important role in this cross-fertilization between the sounds and rhythms of three continents” (5). Many of these African and European influence emanated from this trade circle and facilitated creolization in these countries.
    In Europe, specifically Sevilla, we see African influence in Spanish threatre. We also zarabanda music and dance that comes from the Congo. It “mimetic dance that simulated sexual action, with hips swaying and breast touching” and was so different from the Spanish culture that the clergy attempted to suppress it. People of color were popular entertainers their thus had a huge role in forming the culture there. Slave trade brought dance to Europe and many rhythms that were later infused in their culture. In theatre, the article states that blacks were “more than figures of the figures of the background; they were also musicians, dancers, singers, comedians, and even authors.”

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  24. Sublette and Budasz illustrate that creolization encompasses interdependence, rather than simply European influences on African and African-derived cultures. One of the main components of these two readings was that the slave trade allowed for Africans (specifically coastal Africans) to have an influence on European culture and music. In particular, the slave trade allowed for African cultural influences on the Iberian region of Europe. The creolization process, then, took place in Iberia, and permeated the cultures of Latin American and Caribbean countries like Cuba and Brazil. For example, particular African drumming and guitar-playing techniques infiltrated the existing norms of Iberian culture. The rhythmic structure, as well as an emphasis on rhythm in general, also became a part of European musical forms; these forms were incorporated into Latin American and Caribbean culture as well.
    Nonetheless, such African and African-derived musical elements that were present in European forms were significantly altered to fit into existing norms. Particular musical practices, for example, might be more European linguistically but more African rhythmically. Just as many primarily African-derived musical forms modified European forms when they employed them in their own music, those African-derived forms were also then adapted to primarily European-derived ones. This interdependence displays the intricacy of creolization, and shows how mixtures of different cultural elements can rely more or less on the norms of particular regions.

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  25. Creolization can surely go both ways in terms of cross influence between European and African art forms like music. The creation of new styles and forms has been demonstrated in classical pieces as well as more modern works, where complicated rhythmic cells characteristic of African inspired music have enchanced and been fused with harmonies highly characteristic of European inspired music. However, a quick way for further creolization to spread was through the sharedwork experiences of blacks and working class whites who toiled at physical work at ports and among sailors, who shared their musical and dance forms with one another. One culture was pass off something like a guitar to the other, and the other would learn it (as the black folk did) and improve upon it, passing it back to the originator. In this case, the creolization led to the development of an instrument called the Zarabunda. Eventually, it was integrated back into the guitar, but the new styles that arose from this melding was certainly a good example of cross creolization.

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  26. The guitar and the drum represent two instruments whose evolution has been affected significantly by more than one culture. In general the word Creole, when used in context of the African Diaspora signifies cultural blending between Africans and Europeans. In most cases, this fusion is the result of the Europeans imposing themselves on black culture via slavery. However, Ned Sublette demonstrates a contradictory argument. Very frequently Europeans, or wealthy upper class citizens would adopt original dances of the slaves and free blacks; however, only after the dance or music has slowly grown and risen through the ranks of the social hierarchy. Sublette explains, “This came in marked contrast to the notion that art descended from the nobles to the masses…it was an early indicator of the changing social dynamic…” (74), revealing that Europeans were just as receptive and prone to acquiring new social norms as the African “crowds”. Sublette also delves into the evolution of the drum, an instrument despised by Christian churches. In fact, for roughly a thousand years the drum was prohibited from use. Even after the ban was lifted, the typically black drums were abolished, and replaced with drums that had been “thoroughly whitened”. This whitening of the drum depicts the concept blanquemiento, where people tend to associate with the class of lighter skin in order to avoid racial discrimination.

    Another important factor that played a role in the diffusion between cultures was the assimilation of the slaves. Adhering to the norms of their oppressors, black slaves were “socially accommodated”, thus allowing them to impose their cultural music on their European oppressors.

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  27. There were several occurrences that show how creolization ensued between Africans and Europeans. First, Africans and Europeans prompted religious and musical inspirations within both of their cultures simply through their interactions along the slave trade. For example, Budasz describes how sailors and dockworkers played important roles in the cross-fertilization between the sounds/rhythms of Congo-Angola, the Iberian Peninsula, and Latin America (5). A creolization example of African influence on South America and Europe, was the umbigada, or belly blow, that was a “basic feature” of dances imported to Brazil and Portugal from the Congo-Angola region (8). In a more specific example, lackeys gathered in Lisbon, Portugal where they sometimes sang/danced African-influenced pieces called amorosas (song or guitar work) that can be associated with another dance of African influence, the paracumbé. A significant case of European influence on African culture can be seen in the appearance of common European-style dress among slaves and free-blacks. This is shown in the watercolor painting, Cortejo de Rainha Negra na Desta de Reis by Carlos Julião, that displays several black women dressed in European-style dresses, stockings, and shoes (11). One last important note from the Budasz reading describes how certain African-Brazilian dances and choreographic drama (e.g. congado, candombe, moçambique, and catimbó) still represent important features of many Catholic feasts in Brazil (13). This is just a simple representation of how European religious influences affected similar religious practices in Brazil where African influence was also prominent.
    An important example from the Sublette reading was that of drumming. The Church highly disapproved of African drumming; they considered the black drum to be the instrument of the devil. However, the instruments and drum-oriented musics did propagate through Europe. Drums were frequently used in military settings, for example, as well as in Moresque (Morrish dance) that appeared in England (74-75).

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  28. These readings emphasize an important aspect of creolization—the inherent influence of African cultural forms on those of Europe. In many instances, Africans, considered to be the group with less prevalence and agency, are viewed as adopting numerous aspects from Europeans. Africans were submerged in the culture and lifestyle of Europe; it was inevitable that their culture would be overwhelmed and inevitably be infused with various European elements. Lesser discussed is the intrigue and influence of African art forms. Budasz cites a Jesuit who recognizes that “Without Angola there is no Brazil. In this instance, Africa is fundamentally creating and changing a New World locale; the European influence is not as profound as the African one. Tastes grew accustomed to African beats; “Pereira’s host could not hide his enthusiasm for those sounds” (Budasz, 12). Europeans enjoyed the African melodies and dance forms, so much so that they partook in blatant nationalization of them. “The masters, not the slaves, wrote the history: the slaves’ culture was invisible, even as it transformed that of the masters.” Regardless of the transformative power of African music, for example the zarabanda and the chacona providing Europeans with a music of dance, the master still claimed his power. Associations with Africa were minimized, such as the transformations or rejection of the drum. At the same time, however, “the negro and the mulatto…were something more than figures of the background; they were also musicians, dancers, singers…” There appears to be an interesting dichotomy between the acceptance and rejection of African influences. Even when unrecognized or modified, Africans had perceptible and lasting effects on much of European culture, circumventing the Church’s restrictions.

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  29. Rodolfo Edeza

    Creolization is the mixture and blending of two cultures and follows the model of continuum. In the articles we read we can see that there has been a great share between African and European musical elements. Sublette describes how the drum made its way to Europe through the slave trade and the effects it had on European culture. This invasion of rhythm was Iberia, where black people served as drummers and were an important part of the social life in Europe. Europeans love of dancing invaded Europe with diverse African rhythms. In Sublette’s article we can see that creolization goes both ways because many of the slaves that came from the Congo to Cuba had already accepted Christianity. Settlement policies forbade Muslims, Jew, and everything else that was non Catholic in Cuba.
    In Budasz article we can see that sarambeque (dance with swinging motion of the hips) has been the most common dance of African influence in the Iberian-American world. Whites also resorted to the calundus when their own religion seemed ineffective. Calandus were rituals of possession and divination accompanied by dances and drumbeats by African-Brazilian that whites attended to undo some feitico or witchcraft cast upon them. Black actors and musicians who were trained in the Iberian tradition faced possibilities of combining the structures, rhythms and timbres of Iberian, Central African, and Western African musical styles. This type of interactions appear to have pushed creolization further, thus the clash between African and European culture influenced new music styles.

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  30. Up until this point, most of our readings have focused primarily on the creolization among African cultures and creolization between Africans, Europeans, and indigenous groups that impacted African-derived cultural elements. The readings for today, however, show that contact with African culture in Africa and in Latin America and the Caribbean resulted in creolization in the other direction as well (i.e. African cultural traditions found their way into European cultural traditions). As the focus of both authors’ articles makes clear, music provides one of the clearest examples of creolization affecting European cultural traditions both in Latin America and the Caribbean and back in Europe. Sublette, for example, discusses how African-derived dance (such as the zarabanda) and African-derived rhythms became incorporated into European musical traditions, which, at that point in time (16th and 17th centuries) was largely controlled by the strict rules of the Catholic Church (Sublette).

    It is interesting to note how creolization occurred, particularly in light of some of our other readings. Sublette discussed how African-inspired music filtered up the social ladder, starting with servants and other lower class citizens before being adopted by the higher social classes. Budasz also discusses how mulattos (those of mixed race) were able to bridge the division between the enslaved Africans and the elite European whites, writing “it was through the mediation of mulattos… - to whom creating art was a way of surviving in a racist and cruel society while expressing an identity that was neither African nor Portuguese – that lunduns and modinhas brasileiras could be accepted by white elites to the point of being recognized as the most characteristic late 18th-century genres of dance and song in Portugal and Brazil” (19). I found it interesting that those racial and social classes in the middle of the racial and social hierarchy were best positioned to facilitate the spread of African-inspired music within European communities. In addition, Moore’s classifications of parody (European music “distorted exotic elements” to demean African-derived musical traditions [Budasz 4]), nationalization (incorporation of African elements into the national conscious of European nations), and exclusion (the Church treated African drumming as if it were “an instrument of the devil” [Sublette 74]) were all found in the Europeans’ reaction to the African traditions.

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  31. Many of the readings and much of what we discuss in class illustrates the huge influence that the Europeans had on blacks, mostly because of the enslavement that occurred to the Africans. Africans were forced to adapt to the European culture, often times even the religion, stripping them of their own. However, such creolization was not simply a one-way street. Though the Europeans may have tried to avoid African influence, creolization between Africans and Europeans was inevitable. According to Sublette, Europe was “the last place on Earth to get a drum” because the church disapproved of what they viewed as the “devil drum” that represented polytheism. Despite this supposed refusal to incorporate African traditions into their culture, the music history of Europeans shows the influence on rhythm and timing that African music had. Though many Europeans would have hated to admit it, creolization had caused black people to become “an important part of the social life” (75), with their “wave[s] of rhythm [sweeping] upward from Iberia into Europe, inflaming the Europeans’ love of dancing” (75). Dance would start among the lowest social group, usually the blacks while enslaved, and work its way up the social ladder until it reached the highest socialites and ultimately was incorporated into European culture, even though it has African roots. In particular, the zarabanda, or “the rock and roll of Spain in the sixteenth century” (80), has been creolized because of how far it has travelled through Europe and because it continually moves back and forth between Spain and parts of the New World.

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  32. Dominique Johnson

    In the Budasz reading, the author speaks about the assimilation of free blacks and slaves working as sailors and dockworkers into Iberian culture, mixing musical practices, leading to musical creolization as well as the incorporation of the guitar {an instrument with European elements} into dances of African influence like paracumbé. The author does note that there was a difference in playing techniques of the guitar with African technique being more percussive than the European technique. Budasz also speaks about the incorporation of the umbigada {pg 7}, or belly blow, which was a basic feature of various dances that were imported to Brazil and Portugal from the Congo-Angola region. There was a mention of whites and mulattos attending calundas to dance with black people, but not in any effort or desire to incorporate any of the moves into their respective culture. I thought it was also interesting to note, the spread of calundus in European culture. As we know Santeria is known for incorporating of Catholic practices, but with calundus, Europeans utilized African rituals commonly associated with witchcraft in addition to their Christian practices. In continuing with religion, in the Sublette reading, the author subtly implies that some African people were already “Christians” when they first reached the Caribbean, highlighting another example of religious exchange between the two groups. Furthermore, in the Sublette reading, there is a focus on the introduction of the “drum” to the European continent and the introduction of meter, aiding in musical notation and adding to dance and performance in general. The slave trade resulted in the drum traveling from the Atlantic to the Americas. Sublette also speaks about the dance zarabanda {first danced by blacks in Cuba} originating from the nasala-banda in the Congo, and how it appeared in European colonies in Latin America before making its way back to Europe also through the slave trade, with slaves and servants passing it to the upper echelon of European society.

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  33. Thusfar in the course, many of the examples of creolization have been swung in the directions of Europeans to Africans (ie. European styled dances performed by Africans). In these readings, through use of examples, it is clear that creolization can go both ways. One example from bundasz is the passing of Iberian guitar practices onto slave culture that then traveled back to Africa and the Americas. Another, by sundette, is the passing of African rhythmic practices in music and dance that traveled to Europe via European contact with slaves.
    I think the example of the Zarabanda is particularly interesting in that the creolization of this dance into European culture follows the pattern of the slave triangle. The slave triangle was an abstract image of the African trade system between three points (Europe, Africa, and the Americas). Europeans would travel to Africa to get slaves, bring the slaves to America to work, and bring slave made products (textiles, sugar etc) back to Europe. The Zarabanda followed the same pattern of Europeans bringing it from Africa to the Americas, and then returning to Europe with it where it would become part of their culture.

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  34. Through both of these articles it is evident the creolization goes both ways to a greater extent than I thought. Within the Budasz article there is a lot about how there was a great influence of blacks in the Portuguese culture. I thought it was interesting that Budasz pointed out that blacks were assimilated into the Portuguese culture. He also pointed out that a lot of cross-fertilization between Africans and the Iberian Peninsula happened with sailors and dockworkers. The Portuguese adopted a lot of rhythms from the African string instruments, and it became a prominent part of Portuguese culture. In this way creolization has an influence on Europe. In the Sublette article there is an emphasis on how creolization affected the instruments of Europe. It is mentioned that there were no drums present in Europe until contact with Africans happened and although the drums were adapted and changed it is clear that the origins are in Africa. Sublette also mentions that the dance called zarabanda has African origins and although many scholars didn’t make this connection initially it is now known that zarabanda originated with an Africa dance called the nsala-banda. Finally I think it is important to point out the role that religion played in the creolization between Europe and Africa. Catholicism definitely had a major influence on Africans and influenced many of their religious practices, which in turn influenced their music. However, Africans in Europe practicing their own religions, which inspired their music, had a huge effect on the musical practices of countries such as Portugal.

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  35. Sam Bonnel

    Creolization is a bi-directional process because even dominant cultures are malleable and can be influenced by the cultures they encounter. Sublette and Budasz explain that not only did African culture become creolized, but European culture, too, adopted some elements of African culture.

    We've discussed several ways in which African culture has been creolized by the imposed European culture. Budasz explains how Catholicism had a major impact on religion for these African descendants, as Catholic saints, hymns and prayers were woven into their worship of orixas.

    The drum, for example, was transplanted from Africa to Latin America and the Caribbean. Sublette explains that the Christian Europeans had considered these drums and accompanying dances to be instruments of the devil. For the slaves, though, this music was an important aspect of their culture, crucial to their worship of African deities. After prolonged exposure to drums and rhythms used in the music of African descendants in Latin America and the Caribbean, it moved up the social hierarchal ladder and became more acceptable. The drums were brought to Spain and Iberia and used widely throughout Europe. The rhythmic structure of African music, as well as dances like the Zarabanda accompanied by percussive guitar-playing, were adopted by Europeans and incorporated into their culture.

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  36. Creolization is a process of cultural blending or mixing. In the context of this class so far we have primarily discussed the ways that European and Indigenous cultures influenced African traditions in Latin America. However, just as the cultures of Europe blended with African cultural elements in music, religion, and language in Latin America, cultural elements derived on the African continent and reconfigured in the New World also found their way into the practices of Europeans. It was the slave trade that precipitated this exchange of cultures. The African influence on European dance and music is a prime example of this form of creoliziation. Due large in part to the repressive nature of the Church, dance and instrumental music (ie not liturgical a capella) was highly repressed for centuries in Europe, only emerging at times among the lower classes. However, with the advent of the slave trade and the cultural mixing that occurred thereafter the sixteenth century on began to see a more diverse musical repertoire. In many cases colonizers would encounter a music or dance form in the New World and overtime it would make its way back to the Europe. Literally this creolization can be seen in the new usage of rhythmic drumming in Europe and the new-found prominence of a guitar like instrument. Speaking more broadly though, this creolization and the subsequential instrumental and rhythmic adaptations can be said to have contributed, though slowly, to the evolution of music and dance on the European continent.

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  37. The two articles show that creolization can go both ways. Although it maybe seem logical that African practices and ways of doing things were influenced more by the European ways, African culture actually highly influenced European practices through these two cultures interacting. “Cuba and Its Music” discusses how the drum was missing from Europe until the 1540s 1540s because the drum was associated with the devil and the church disapproved. This is because dancing is associated with drums, which Europeans saw directly relating to blacks. However, dancing and rhythm emerged in the lower classes and gained popularity through the social hierarchy. Subsequently, a dramatic change in music and dance culture in Europe in the 1600s occurred, which was a result of the Atlantic Slave Trade. In addition, Zarabanda, which is a high energy dance originating from the Congo, first traveled over from the Congo to Havana and then back through Spain again where it became popular across Europe starting with the lower class. The music changed from being driven by the drum and vocals to a slower tempo dance played on the guitar. The importance of rhythm in European music emerged out of Africa. This is an example of how the music brought from Africa was interpreted and changed by the Spanish and then increased in popularity in Europe and the New World.

    The Budasz article also shows this dynamic at work. Music emerged that was a mixture of African, European, and the New World. Looking back at guitar sources from the 18th century, although they may be from different parts of the world, Africa, Iberia or America, there are many things in common. This is a result of the mixing cultures. Even though the viola was a European guitar, the way that it was played represented much more than European culture and much of the musical style was taken from African traditions. The blacks learned to play the viola and incorporated the musical traditions that were familiar to them on a new instrument. The dancing that occurred in Brazil had a similar pattern in which many elements from Africa could be seen in the dancing of the Spanish and Portuguese. Religion was also influenced by both European and African traditions. Although many of the times the religions were kept separate they were apt to adapt certain customs from the other religions. The whites would sometimes participate in the festivals and feasts that were part of the African religions.

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  38. In Sublette's article he talks about how creolization could be seen in Europe countries. He uses the main example of how blacks introduced the drum to many European societies. Before blacks came to Europe whether through slave trade or immigration, drums were banned by the Catholic church and not accepted into society at all. However, with the Africans so came the drum. You see this as a form of creolization, because the drum began to be seen in white society. This is a strong example of how blacks influenced white music and white society, not just vice versa.

    Budasz also talks about how creolization can be seen between whites and blacks and Africans and Europeans in his article. The viola is a strong example of how black slaves who arrived in Portugal from either Brazil or Africa influenced the white society from European countries. Beside the musical aspect, there were also dances that could be seen in Portugal as a result of black influence, some of thee include: arromba, cubanco, gandu, and a number of others. There were also a number of religious aspects that could be seen as a form of creolization between European whites and African blacks. At first African religion was referred to as witchcraft to the Europeans. However, many Europeans eventually resorted to this type of "witchcraft" when their religion was not effective for them anymore.

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  39. It is interesting to think of creolization as a process that not only shapes Latin-American culture, but also shapes European culture. Considering how much white/European culture seemed to look down upon black culture, I think it is fascinating that black cultural forms ended up in Europe. This seems almost hypocritical from the European perspective. The fact that drums did not show up in Europe until after the slave trade demonstrates creolization. African forms from “The New World” influenced music in Europe, creating new cultural forms with drums. Also, the zarabanda, a celebration in Sevilla, Spain featured black musician and dancers. Thus, this European culture adopted African elements. Interestingly, Latin-American culture would not be the same without European culture, and European culture would not be the same without Latin-American culture. Perhaps cultures are not nearly as divided as we interpret them to be.

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  40. Creolization is the incorporation and evolution of old culture traditions into the new region and its cultures. Creolization is observed to act in unpredictable ways and is intertwined within each other. It should also be noted that creolization can vary between examples. For example, some elements separate and some elements come together during creolization. It is obvious throughout previous reading and classroom discussions that creolization is exemplified by African culture being incorporated into the new world’s European cultures, but today’s reading shows that creolization goes both ways. European culture is also incorporated into African culture.
    In the Sublett article he gives a specific example of how African culture became implemented into European music traditions. This began when the slave trade became a booming industry. Eueropean sailors working on the boats and docks that carried slaves were in contact with Africans and began to pick up on their music style. Drumming and dancing are two specific things in which the slaves influenced Europeans. Before long, it was noticed that many European music incorporated the drumming and dancing styles of the slaves into their own music style.
    Budasz gives an example of how European culture was incorporated in African culture when he explains the uptake of Catholic characteristics into African religion, specifically, the West African religion of Santeria. Santeria, an African religion was soon noticed to have elements of Christianity, such as the incorporation of Catholic saints. A more general example of European influence on African culture is the loss of culture by slaves when their white owners banned their traditional African dress, drumming, and rituals. This caused slaves to take in cultural practices from the environment that surrounded them, the European environment.

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  41. Vanessa Rendon
    Black Musics in Latin America
    2/17/11

    Although creolization is usually associated with the adaptation of European elements in African culture, it clearly took place in Europe with the introduction of African music and dances. The presence of black slaves brought with it a new era of musical innovation and transformation. The drum, which was originally considered an instrument of the devil by the Catholic Church, was “whitened” as it became part of military events. It took on a new status of power and prestige in the nobility, a sign of creolization in the European pathway. Apart from the incorporation of the drum into European music, blacks also had an impact on guitar playing because they added a more percussive touch to its sound. African musical styles also reached the Church through festivals such as the Corpus Christi in Sevilla and joined the theater through the zarabanda and the chacona.
    In the Budasz article, we learn of black creolization in Portugal and Brazil. Blacks were given more privileges and “social accommodation” if they assimilated into European culture and adjusted their behavior to that of their oppressors. Blacks also integrated European religious practices as demonstrated by the formation of black “brotherhoods.” On the other hand, whites resorted to African religions such as the calundus when they believed their religious systems inefficient and useless.

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  42. Creolization occurs in both Africa and Europe. In Sublette's essay he explains how the Europeans did not stand for any African culture. The "European Catholics felt the drums Africans played worshipped the devil" (pg 3). After more and more African slaves were shipped to Europe the more the African culture and European culture would be creolized.
    In Budasz essay he mentions that white Europeans would impersonate black slaves on stage, by painting their faces black. In Europe sold slaves and free black men would work as dockworkers and sailors. They would bring the African culture and musics just to get through the day. The guitar and viola was created by the Latin Americans and Africans but later creolized by the Europeans. Visa-a- Verus the Europeans created the tambrone and later the blacks creolized the tambrone also. The Europeans and Africans are both credited with creolizing and impersonating each other.

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  43. Aggie Kelly
    2/17/11

    It is often assumed that European traditions rubbed off on African cultures as these two groups came in contact. Since the Europeans saw themselves as so highly superior, instinct would suggest that they would not pick up traditions from these people who were so much lower than themselves. However, this was certainly not the case. Upon contact, creolization took effect in both directions. For example, before mixing with the African cultures, the drum did not exist in European music. Europeans were previously much more concerned with more “elegant” instruments, ones that played beautiful melodies. It was only when they came in contact with the African cultures that they saw the musical value of the drum.
    There was also a clear mixing of religions between the two groups. As we have discussed earlier in the class, practices such as Santeria and Candomblé have heavy resemblances to European Catholicism. The orisha that thse African natives were worshipping reflected a heavy resemblance to Christian saints. However, this religious blend also went both ways. In addition to their Christian practices, many Europeans adopted calundus, which were African rituals, often thought to be practices of witchcraft. So even though one may think that the African cultures only absorbed aspects from the ruling Europeans, scholars have shown that the envious adoption of practices was in fact mutual.

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  44. Laura Lewis and Mexican Morenos: The most interesting aspect of this article is that the centuries of cultural exchange or creolization, and specific historical events such as the Mexican Revolution and conquest of the ancient empires in Mexico has made the national identity mestizo. Explicitly, being indigena to some degree is a Mexican necessity. Thus the process of mestizaje in this context literally means the process of becoming mestizo, instead of simply becoming more “white.” An interviewee remarks that “Whites don’t say they’re Spaniards. They say they are Mexicans. They say that we are not from here. Well, they are not from here either.”
    The sense of belonging tied to being indio stems from a historic truth: “Indians own Mexico. That is why blacks identify themselves with Indians. Indians were vanquished but not enslaved. They fought. Blacks did not.” Indio implies belonging in its purest sense, while “black” implies slavery, which becomes “people without a country” . Indignous history in Meixco is alive and accessible, thanks to the surviving cultures and documentation by the Spaniards. On the contrary, “Only God knows if something is African”.

    The Black Guitar article (Budasz) describes the various ways in which African culture went from being prevalent to then being more palatable for the whites, and eventually modified and adopted by national identity. He cites various primary sources and lyrics expressing a range of emotions, from disgust to enchantment, concerning black music and dance, which “filled the streets”. The “live and let live” policy towards slave music and festivities resulted in more and more comfort and, sometimes, enthusiasm towards calundus or African priests and love potions. The gandus, cumbés, and cubancos of Portuguese guitar, however, are not exact transcriptions of calundu or parade music. They were based on the motifs of these dances and then combined with European technique such as strumming and harmonic progressions, and thus “tamed”. The “rescuing” of said musical origins via creolization “occurred in the hands of black or white musicians”(13).
    “By Post from the Indies” comments on the general process of “upward movement for dances and rhythms” within Europe and the New World. Although it’s often painted that art is invented by nobles and diffused down to the masses, it tends to be the opposite direction of movement. A dance started among the lowest (slaves or blacks) was adopted by poor whites in contact, was viewed as obscene until it’s popularity was secure, and at this point it was often adopted by the high white society, or as we’ve seen before, fully “nationalized. “

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