TY - JOUR
AU - Daniels, Kyrah, Malika
AB - … the dead will dwell in separate houses suitable to their status.— Joseph Roach (1996, 53) In mystical experience, the mirror is the juncture point where the visible face sees its invisible face.— Sabine Melchior-Bonnet (2005, 6063) IN HAITIAN VODOU and other African-derived traditions, sacred art objects are often used to honor the dead, connecting the living with the spirit world. This study investigates the religious importance of Black Atlantic mirrors and reflective surfaces in mortuary rites. I begin by analyzing mirrors as symbolic of sacred waters and residence of spirits and ancestors. Secondly, I examine the use of mirrors on gravesites as portals to otherworldy dimensions, and consider mirrors as mystic “eyes.” Lastly, I explore notions of “brokenness,” offering a ritual studies analysis of shattered mirrors in a Haitian initiatory society (Bizango) and in commemorative earthquake art of 2010. As such, I highlight Haitians’ “religious unexceptionalism” as they employ ritual arts to honor the dead. Ultimately, I demonstrate how the ritual use of mirrors as mortuary arts signals the omnipresence of ancestral spirits and the importance of sustaining lines of communication between visible and invisible worlds. RITES OF REFLECTION In her work Create Dangerously: The Immigrant Artist at Work, novelist Edwidge Danticat notes the importance of Haitian ceremonial rites for the dead and considers the role of artists whose work specifically honors the ancestors. Referencing the devastating earthquake of 2010, which Haitians have nicknamed Goudougoudou,1 she writes, “Like ancient Egyptians, we Haitians, when a catastrophic disaster does not prevent it, recite spells to launch our dead into the next world, all while keeping them close, building elaborate mausoleums for them in our backyards” (Danticat 2010, 17). It is true that Haitians share with ancient Egyptians an intimate and elaborate series of rituals for their dead, with chosen mourners in both societies serving an essential role as public voices of loss and remembrance. These “spells” for the dead take alternate forms: poems or songs, cries of lamentation, dress for ritual mourning, or, at times in the case of visual artists, the inclusion of broken pieces of glass, metal, and other shiny bits of debris. It is these forms of honoring spirits and the dead—through mirror divination and communication with the spirits, the integration of mirror or glass in sacred arts, and commemorative ritual art forms—that will provide the basis for this analysis. Traditionally within Haitian society and in Vodou communities in particular, it is said that when a mirror cracks or splinters, a loved one is departing from the world of the living, or alternatively, returning from the land of ancestors and spirits. As Vodou initiate and ethnographer Maya Deren has explained, this journey serves as a return “home” for Haitians as well as for foreigners who have become devoted to the tradition (Deren 1953).2 In both instances, an exchange of souls is made between the world of mortals on earth and the spirit realm beneath the ocean, recognized as the cosmic homeland of Afrik Ginen.3 For many initiates then, the reflective surface of mirrors represents a point of access into Ginen, the cosmic homeland where all elders will eventually return, and from where all infants ultimately emerge. In the spring of 2011,4 I completed a creative piece with my own two broken mirrors, entitled “Mirrors are Memory-Laden” (Daniels, forthcoming 2017). This ultimately led to the development of a larger study grounded in comparative religion, as I began investigating reflective ritual objects of the Black Atlantic and the use of these sacred arts in Haitian mortuary rites in particular. Reflecting on loss and legacies provided insight into the importance of mortuary arts as well as an opportunity to think critically about the ways that mirrors work ritually to reflect, attract, and house sacred entities. A NOTE ON AFRICANA “ARTS”: RITUAL OBJECTS AS MEDIATORS In Haitian Vodou as well as in numerous other African-derived traditions, art forms and sacred objects serve as ritual implements to honor the dead and work to connect the living with the invisible world of spirits. In the context of this study, I will use the terms “ritual objects” and “sacred art” interchangeably to refer to implements that have been fashioned with divine intention or divine inspiration. Similarly to the notion of “religion,” the very terms “art” and “aesthetics” persist as socially constructed terms with no direct translation in many African indigenous languages and no easily identifiable analog in many traditions of the Black Atlantic. Importantly, anthropologist Wyatt MacGaffey (2000) notes that historically, Europeans did not believe that Africans (or members of the African Diaspora, we might add) could be capable of producing “art,” as they regarded most statues, masks, and ritual implements as “fetish-power objects” or strictly utilitarian devices. Not until well into the nineteenth and twentieth centuries did ritual objects of Africa and the African Americas begin to be regarded as “art” (albeit crafted in a “naïf” style, as perceived by many Westerners). In fact, much of what we now refer to as the arts of Africa and the African Diaspora serve as aesthetically designed functional devices, often embedded with ritual purpose and divine signification. In hopes of highlighting such cultural nuances and imperfect linguistic translations, I will alternate between the use of the terms “ritual objects,” “sacred art,” and “ritual healing arts.” Congolese philosopher V. Y. Mudimbe (1998) has further insisted that what the Western world classifies as “art” must be understood in its native or indigenous context. Indeed, many Black Atlantic “art” forms—including colorful, protective healing bundles (such as Haitian pakèt kongo and Congolese minkisi or bankisi5 ), rhythmic rattles decorated with bones or seeds (for instance, Cuba’s chekeré or aggué and Benin’s assan), veiled and intricately beaded crowns (in particular, Brazilian chorão and Yorùbá ade), and finely painted, sequined, or papier maché masks (as found in Puerto Rican carnaval and New Orleans Mardi Gras)—operate first and foremost as sacred objects and ritually effective instruments. As explained by art historians (Thompson 1983, 1993; Blier 1995; Martínez-Ruiz 2013) as well as anthropologists (Deren 1953; MacGaffey 1986; Brown, 1991; Ochoa 2010), Black Atlantic art forms principally perform ritual work to invoke the spirits for counsel, to ward off negative energy, to address spiritual or physical ailments, and to protect an individual or the community. Historians of religion Mircea Eliade (1958) and Charles H. Long (1986) further remark that many sacred art forms in fact operate to maintain order and balance in the world. These ritual objects regenerate the cosmos in times of crisis and also honor the natural rhythms of the universe during important rites of passage, such as birth, puberty, marriage, procreation, and death. This knowledge allows us to better understand the way in which ritual objects serve as communicators and mediators between mortal and divine realms, particularly during life cycles in which so much is at stake spiritually speaking. In our study of religious arts more generally, and mirror mortuary arts in particular, it will become evident how these works come to serve as active ritual “participants” and what I refer to as sacred entities6 in Black Atlantic religious spaces. Indeed, employing what phenomenologist of religion Jacob K. Olupona (2011) refers to as indigenous hermeneutics, it is of the utmost importance that we move beyond perceptions of superstition and “the fetish” to understand the contributions of ritual art forms to religious experience. Historian of religion and phenomenologist in her own right Jennifer Scheper Hughes further elaborates on the ontology of sacred art forms and their mode of “being.” Without suggesting that ritual art entities mirror human-like qualities, she explains, “The religious objects under consideration here are better comprehended… as vital, dynamic, and even agentive members of the communities we study. They are material manifestations of the sacred, to whom devotees and practitioners attribute animus—existence, being, desire, and potency” (Hughes 2012, 16). As such, it is only when examined within their broader religious and ceremonial context that we might better understand the multi-faceted roles of mirrors and other sacred art objects as mediators between visible and invisible worlds. This allows us to more deeply appreciate divinely inspired art works as religious entities in rites of divination with the ancestral world, and as symbols of renewal in commemorative arts. In his work on African indigenous religions, historian of religion Jacob K. Olupona has drawn parallels between the role played by healers and artists in African (and African-derived) societies. He discusses these specialists’ work to mediate relationships between divine and mortal worlds, explaining that, “practitioners of African medicine… are regarded as sacred and as intermediaries between their clients and the divinities. Less conspicuously, artists play important roles since they provide the plastic and performance media that express the meaning, the essence, of belief systems” (Olupona 2000, xvi). In each of their own domains then, Black Atlantic sacred healers and ritual artists have traditionally functioned as cultural arbiters within civil society. Highly regarded in the community, they participate actively in matters of religious concern in their respective arenas of health and well-being, ritual expression, and performance. In thinking more expansively about healing traditions, we are reminded that acts of mourning—whether through the private shedding of tears, the piercing wailing of lamentation, the public funerary dance, or the inauguration of an ancestral shrine—function dynamically as acts of healing, renewal, and ritual expression. THE WORK OF MORTUARY ARTS Many Western journalists, religious fundamentalists, and even certain researchers may interpret Haitian rites of mourning as illusory acts and at times regard these rituals as “superstitious.”7 However, it is imperative that we come to consider these ritual practices that lovingly tend to the dead as part of a wider cultural philosophy. Haitians are neither unique nor exceptional in their desire to honor their ancestors (also referred to as “the living dead”8 ) with ceremony, pomp, and circumstance. Furthermore, it is only by placing Vodou’s artistic and mortuary rites in a broader, comparative context of Black Atlantic religions that we might replace these notions of Haitian “superstitions” with more complex understandings of Haitian religion and other African-derived traditions.9 The frequent use of mirror and glass in Haitian ritual figures and public art forms includes everything from their incorporation in the healing bundles of pakèt kongo10 crafted by priests and priestesses to the reflective metal and ironwork of the artist collective Atis Rezistan (Benson, 2013; Cosentino, 2012; Smith, 2012) in Port-au-Prince. The persistent presence of mirrors, glass, and reflective surfaces embedded within these various media provides a glimpse into an invisible world, invoking what art historian Robert Farris Thompson has so aptly called a “flash of the spirit.” As evidenced in many reflective ritual objects—the looking glass as the spirits’ sacred implement, divination mirrors used to announce spirit travel between realms, and ornate art mosaics which glint, shimmer, and shine in the light—mirrors produce dynamic accounts of Vodou religious expression. Ultimately, they offer pivotal new narratives (often nonlinear ones) about the mourning rites and mortuary arts of Haiti. In this study, I offer several readings of the religious importance of Black Atlantic mirrors and other sacred objects more generally, beginning first with the notion of mirrors and reflective waters as residence of the Lwa (the spirits) and zansèt, the ancestors.11 Secondly, I consider the use of mirrors on gravesites as portals to otherworldy dimensions, and examine their inclusion in sacred art forms as “eyes” that function in both visible and invisible realms. Lastly, I expand upon notions of “brokenness” with a ritual studies analysis of shattered mirrors used in a Haitian initiatory society and in commemorative art for the 2010 earthquake. These ethnographic examples help us to identify the way that fragmented pieces may come to comprise a newly negotiated whole. In this way, I demonstrate how the ritual use of mirrors often accompanies rites of the “living dead” in Africana religions. While not present in every funerary practice, I assert that as mortuary arts, these reflective surfaces nevertheless present a tireless reminder about the omnipresence of ancestral spirits in everyday life and the importance of sustaining our lines of communication between worlds. Indeed, by familiarizing ourselves with the ways that sacred art forms themselves participate in the rites of Vodou lakou,12 what might we learn from these mirrors, couriers of the ancestors? ANBA DO MIWA13 / THE WORLD BEHIND THE MIRROR In considering the ritual power of mirrors, we might begin by examining the reflective properties of water—however rippled their reflection may be. Comparative religion scholar Kimberley C. Patton suggests that within the scope of human evolution—from fishy presence to amphibious creature and later, land mammal—all of us long for the primordial home in the sea (Patton 2006). This can certainly be observed in the myths and rituals of African descended populations in the Americas. As Africans crossed the ocean during the trans-Atlantic slave trade, many of their spirits, ritual traditions, and religious beliefs accompanied them. Though these philosophies and cultural modalities encountered significant transformation in the Americas (Heywood 2002; Warner-Lewis 2003; Thornton 1992), it is important to recognize notable parallels in Black Atlantic cosmologies (R. M. Brown 2012; Young 2011; Sweet 2006; Diakité [Stewart] 2005). This is especially true with regard to notions of a spirit realm located in a reflective surface, within or under the water. In particular, citizens from the ancient Kingdom of Kongo14 (one of the largest African populations to arrive in St. Domingue)15 believed that the ancestors and the unborn lived beneath the waters in a realm known as Kalûnga (MacGaffey 1986). Today in certain regions of southwestern Congo, there are several residences of the spirits, most notably below the earth where the ancestors reside (known as nsi ya bafwa in KiKongo, literally, world of the dead or world of the ancestors).16 River spirits known as Lasiren or elima ya maza (spirits of the water in KiKongo) all live in the surrounding rivers, also connected to the ancestral watery realms.17 Certain ritual specialists further maintain that particular river spirits, notably Mami Wata and Tati Wata, can capture a person and take them below the river, where at times, healers’ initiations may take place.18 In parallel fashion, other ethnic groups such as Mende nations of Sierra Leone historically understood women’s Sande initiation rites to be held in a sacred grove they called Kpanguima, which was situated underwater. Art historian Sylvia Ardyn Boone has explained that Kpanguima “…is a world apart… [the women say] kpanguima is not of this earth but is located in the paradise of the river depths where spirits enjoy a divine existence of beauty and peace” (Boone 1986, 50). From this cosmological perspective, it is understandable that underwater spirits of the Black Atlantic must have followed the shadows of slave ships carrying their devotees to another side of the world. Portrayals of water and spirits of the sea constitute a recurring element in many art works of the African Diaspora, and these works frequently include creative allusions to mirrors as corresponding reflective surfaces. Education specialist Charlene Désir muses about the persistent theme of water, ocean, and ships in many of her sketches, noting: “Coming here from Haiti, I crossed the waters… there is danger when you cross the waters and a new way of thinking. And then there is the question of who survives in this boat” (Désir 2011b). Here, she speaks about a second diaspora, during which Haitians traveled en masse to North America and Europe to seek better opportunities, especially in the wake of the twentieth century.19 She further acknowledges the radical transformation of thought that often takes place in migrations and relocations, even as one carries the inheritance of family spirits.20 Jerry Philogène’s work further demonstrates how critical a role the ocean (and spirit) continues to play in her art and that of other African Diaspora artists today.21 Another interesting rendition of this motif can be found in Danticat’s moving short story, “Children of the Sea,” in which several ill-fated travelers rejoin the Lwa at the bottom of the ocean floor following an unsuccessful journey from Haiti to the United States.22 This persistent theme of the ocean as reflection (and refraction) of one’s current reality seems to resonate deeply with the narratives of enslaved peoples who jumped overboard to join spirits beneath the waters during the horrors of the Middle Passage. In these instances, it is difficult to discern whether the decision to jump into cold, churning waters was one of trusting welcoming spirits below or despair at the gods’ abandonment above. In Vodou, the realm of Afrik Ginen might best be understood as a legendary homeland—what I call a mythic geography (Daniels 2017)—not unlike the mythic spirit home Aztlan for Chicanos/as in the Americas.23 Here, Afrik Ginen doubles not only as the spiritual realm below the waters, but also as embodiments of Mother Africa and the ancestral homeland itself.24 Just as so many Haitian diaspora communities abroad in Canada, France, and the United States make plans to be buried in their Ayiti chérie, their beloved Haiti, Vodouizan25 similarly understand that their departed souls will find their way “home” to Ginen, the physical place and spirit realm from whence they first entered this world.26 This leads us to consider yet another critical component of Africana spirit realms: their extraordinary physical dimensions and directionality. Describing the landscape of spiritual worlds, historian of religion Mircea Eliade has noted that for many civilizations, “the otherworld [serves] as an inverted image of this world. Everything takes place as it does here, but in reverse… In the underworld rivers flow backward to their sources” (Eliade 1972, 205). Comparably, religion scholar Simon Bockie (1993) and anthropologist Wyatt MacGaffey (1986) reveal that BaKongo peoples understood the spirit realm of Kalûnga to be a reversed reality of the physical world. Just as a mirror reveals what appears to be the inverse of the action taken (you raise your right arm, the reflection raises its left), the realm of spirits mimics the world of mortals, as the spirits witness one action and subsequently perform the inverse. Noting the common theme of this spiritual “inversion theory” in popular Western culture, archaeologists and cultural historians Elizabeth Wayland Barber and Paul T. Barber cite examples from “the superstitions that breaking a mirror is bad luck (mirrors ‘collect’ spirits) to fortune-telling with crystal balls (which transmit images both upside down and backwards)” (Barber and Barber 2004, 172).27 What then, strikes us as different about Africana cultural perceptions of mirrors as spirit domains? One distinction that becomes clear is that while European artifacts seem to “collect” spirits in reflective surfaces (as if swept up along the way), many Black Atlantic communities regard reflective surfaces as a familiar residence of spirits or ancestral beings. Making the connection between the spirit world and water, humans came to associate spirits with a downward divine realm, as bodies of water are typically ground-oriented (such as oceans, lakes, rivers, ponds, and even waterfalls, which fall downwards). Barber and Barber offer key insight into this downward association, noting that, “when you gaze into pools of water—the first reflective surfaces known to humans—there are the doubles, staring back up from below” (Barber and Barber 2004, 175). This must have produced a startling realization that while reflections may reveal one’s physical presence, they cannot successfully represent one’s essence (as a reflection may be altered or transfigured with a splash or a ripple). In this way, mirrors and bodies of water act not solely as a reflection of the self, but also as an extension of the self28 —the embodiment of a doubled, spiritual self located in the “primordial home” of an ocean’s (or mirror’s) reflective surface, as described earlier by Patton. Such a reflection, inverted in form, quietly demands attention as a peculiarly familiar face peering back at us from below. As such, we are reminded that bodies of water likely served as humans’ first concept of “mirror.” Eliade also reflects on the use of shadows in ritual iconography, and in noting their shared ephemeral quality and precarious (even mischievous) nature, one might substitute the word shadows for that of reflections. Linking the concept of shadows with waters, he asserts that waters express “the pre-formed, the unmanifested” (Eliade 1985, 6). In this layered interpretation, Eliade establishes the primal importance of reflective surfaces as regions of divine energy and ritual potential. With the spiritual traffic of births and deaths, one cannot help but note mirror and water’s corresponding work as visible realms that echo physical worlds even as they host invisible beings. This reveals a pattern in several Africana traditions (Métraux 1946; Deren, 1953; MacGaffey 1986; Ochoa 2007, 2010; Bockie 1993)29 which regard ancestors and the unborn as parallel beings and co-inhabitants of the afterlife. Further, we come to understand how it is that the pre-living dead exist side-by-side the post-living dead in a sea of uncharted waters. However, unlike churning ocean water and rushing rivers, the permanence of mirrors permits a remarkably consistent view into the world of ancestors and spirits. And, as we shall see, this may in part explain mirrors’ continued presence in Black Atlantic spaces dedicated to memorializing the dead. THE “FLASH” OF THE GRAVEYARD A most important site to consider in investigating the ritual importance of mirrors is the graveyard. Herein lies a realm in which broken bits and pieces and reflective shards of glass render a burial ground into a mirror mausoleum. Engaging the work of anthropologists Grey Gundaker and Judith McWillie (2005) as well as the works of art historians Robert Farris Thompson (1993) and Suzanne P. Blier (1995), we might regard the “flash” of broken mirrors on graves first, as signals of alertness and heightened vision and second, as gateways to the sacred realm of ancestors and spirits. This appears particularly true within central African derived sacred art traditions of ancient Kongo and the African Americas. Material culture historian Benjamin Goldberg explains that in ancient Kongo,30 initiates in training for indigenous priesthood were presented with a mirror and a set of bones. Students were expected to use the mirror to develop their sense of perception and describe the features of the bones’ original owner. These remains would have belonged to deceased members of the community whom initiates could in no way have known, and as Goldberg contends, “[otherwise] he was not allowed to proceed with the remaining tests awaiting him before initiation” (Goldberg 1985, 19–20). Historian Vincent Brown (2008) asserts that investigating the garden where ancestors are buried provides a way in which to understand the process of a spirit’s renewal. Barber and Barber also point out that, “most cultures bury their dead in the ground, hence ‘down’ is the realm par excellence of departed souls… a realm reversed in space and time (day/night) as well as function” (Barber and Barber 2004, 175). These works all suggest that the graveyard presents an excellent site of mirror-study to pose larger questions about how the dead journey to the afterlife, how they communicate with relatives after their departure, how they might become transformed in their new state of being,31 and the ways in which they make their presence known even in the silence of the cemetery. The ritual placement of broken artifacts and mirrors on burial grounds is deeply rooted in many west and central African communities (Norman 2009; DeCorse 2001), as well as in the African Americas (Marrow 2002; Singleton 1995; Ferguson 1992). In their extraordinary examination of African American yard work, Grey Gundaker and Judith McWillie quote Robert Farris Thompson in his contention that “broken pottery alludes to the world of the dead, where broken things are made whole again…”32 (Gundaker and McWillie 2005, 121–22). Gundaker and McWillie elaborate further on this observation, noting that between the mid-1800s through the 1960s, “many rural African American grave mounds contained glittering shards of broken glass, inverted bottles, bits of tin, mirror, and shell to light the way to the other world as brightly as possible… some broken, some left intact” (Gundaker and McWillie 2005, 186). Used not only to indicate ancestral departure, these reflective surfaces provided a footpath of sorts for stumbling spirits to find their way back home. “Home,” in this instance, refers to the site of the tombstone, conveniently providing access to the afterworld in addition to revealing the path to return to the mortal realm. Much in the same way that a mirror reflects the inverse of what stands before it, a number of ritual objects placed on gravesites tend to be turned over in order to most effectively translate greetings and messages. Green felt and foil coverings of flowers placed in African American graveyards are often turned inside out (another allusion to the inversion of worlds) so that the metallic foil shines more brilliantly (Gundaker and McWillie 2005, 188). Gundaker and McWillie do not hesitate to note that this crinkling of silver foil produces a “flash” of brilliant light and suggests dynamic movement, which “also brings it into the orbit of references to water… the Jordan River over which the Christian soul crosses to Heaven [for Black Americans], and in earlier times the passage over, under, and across the water of the Atlantic ocean, the Niger River, the Bantu Kalunga water, and a host of local sacred springs, streams and lakes” (Gundaker and McWillie 2005, 188). In this manner of mourning the dead, a community conjures the ritual power of sacred bodies of water even as its congregants remain bound to the human dimensions of land and soil. The graveyard that is filled with mirrors in Haiti and elsewhere in the Afro-Atlantic world becomes doubled as a sacred homeland. Embodied in both earthen mounds of greatly revered bodies and coursing, reflective “rivers,” the ancestral spirits all seek the most direct routes “home” to their mortal families in the physical realm and to their spirit families in the invisible world. If mirrors function as realms of spirit and portals between the living and the dead, their “flash” might equally be understood as a heightened sensorial experience. This type of supernatural vision delicately borders the physical boundaries of sight and the “sixth sense” of intuition, particularly within the context of the graveyard. In her work African Vodun, art historian Suzanne P. Blier considers sculptures adorned with mirrors as having the power to both attract positive energy and dispel negative energy. Discussing the significance of bocio, sacred bundles from Benin placed on burial grounds, she explains their work as ritual art forms that resolve conflict (not unlike Haitian pakèt kongo and Kongolese minkisi [Thompson 1983]). Blier also notes that these sacred statues frequently include mirror-eyes, which help “… both in ‘seeing’ danger and in ‘turning it back’” (Blier 1995, 106). Such mirror-eyes see with hyper-clarity not only things that take place in the physical world, but also provide vision within the realm of spirits. As a reservoir of spiritual power, these mirrors act as watchful eyes that counter the forces of negative energies and absorb positive energy for the client who has sought out ritual protection or divine retaliation. This is of particular importance in the cemetery, where descendants wish to ensure the safe passage of their dearly departed to the afterlife. For instance, Egyptians’ use of metal mirrors from the Fourth Dynasty onward (circa 2613–2494 BCE) became closely associated with the dead and the reflected light of the sun. As Goldberg further explains, “This connection with their sun-god, Ra, made the mirror a religious symbol, and it was used during festivals and on ceremonial occasions. Mirrors were placed on the tombs of the dead, often before the face or on the breast of the corpse, to assure the presence of Ra and to provide for the retention of the soul in the resurrection” (Goldberg 1985, 26). I employ this example not to suggest a direct influence of ancient Egyptian thought on West African or Caribbean religious understandings of the mirror. Rather, from a comparative religion perspective, I wish to highlight the common religious trope of mirrors and the “flash” of reflective surfaces used in graveyards across the world as ritual anchors for the spirits. These reflective surfaces of the graveyard function doubly as protective agents of the living and the living dead, and further act as tools of communication for those intending to maintain their connection with the interred (though equally present) family members of the lakou and communal home. The “flash” of a mirror experienced in walking past a reflective surface might equally be regarded as a moment of transcendence. Maya Deren, Vodou initiate, ritual dancer, and filmmaker, has further remarked that the mirror serves as meeting point for the living and the “living dead.” In Divine Horsemen, she muses thoughtfully that mirrors embody the most intangible aspects of the invisible world, noting, “The metaphor for the mirror’s depth is the cross-roads … a figure for the intersection of the horizontal plane, which is this mortal world, by the vertical plane, the metaphysical axis, which plunges into the mirror” (Deren 1953, 35). It should be noted that in the early stages of initiation for many African and African Diasporic traditions, mirrors are covered in one’s house as new initiates remain vulnerable to spirit contact. Deren continues to note that even modes of interaction with the spirits model that of reflective surfaces (Deren 1953, 34). The Lwa are served, saluted, and act themselves in mirror terms, so that when a spirit ritually mounts an oungan or manbo (priest or priestess), devotees face the spirit directly in order to mimic the hand gestures and foot patterns of the visiting spirit (Deren 1953, 34). Haitians respectfully approach the Lwa as if advancing towards elders: with earnestness, much reverence, and a cautious sense of humor. Most importantly, every ritual step taken is performed in mirror fashion. In this way, mirrors provide personal access to Ginen, the world of the dead and the ancestors, thereby offering a source of communication through mystic translation. THE FASHIONING OF BROKENNESS The notion of broken mirrors possessing prophetic or regenerative properties suggests far more than an irrational or naïve belief. Indeed, what happens when glass shatters, when a human soul departs from the mortal world to enter the spirit realm, or when a spirit returns here to earth from the world of ancestors? Goldberg offers several explanations in his study of world religious beliefs and “superstitions” surrounding the fracturing of mirrors. In eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Europe, for instance, the reason for seven years’ bad luck after breaking a mirror stemmed from the idea that the reflection one sees in the glass is actually one’s soul. Goldberg elaborates on the implications of such an infraction, claiming, “This [brokenness] angers the indwelling spirit so much, because it has been hurt, that it takes vengeance on the offender by punishing him” (Goldberg 1985, 6). As such, the spirit of the mirror itself curses the culprit, and there are only a few ways ritually speaking to make amends with the looking glass, and ultimately, with one’s self. Interestingly, Goldberg asserts that one ritual practice enacted by African Americans in the US South was to bury mirror fragments in the earth, or alternatively throw shards of glass into a river (Goldberg 1985, 6); as such, one dynamic, reflective surface begets another. This reveals the Black Atlantic notion that new growth might sprout from the earth where brokenness has been buried. It should be noted that “fracturing” as part of a regenerative process has been deeply formative of Black Atlantic thought. Particularly among postcolonial and “post-post colonial” generations of the twenty-first century, writers and cultural critics such as Audre Lorde (1984), bell hooks (1995), and M. Jacqui Alexander (2005) have relied upon countless metaphors and allusions to notions of rupture, regrowth, and assemblage in their work. Further, this example highlights the Africana religious notion that a body of water might welcome a kindred spirit in the form of a shattered, reflective surface. As noted earlier, a fracturing process does not prevent pieces from becoming a whole. A mirror often reveals more than its reflection, and a shattered mirror indicates far more than impaired vision. Certainly, in losing a loved one to the other world, one’s reality and worldview shatters in this life. In this sense, ritual work serves a critical role in restoring order, balance, and rhythm to the world, and helps to mediate an individual’s and a community’s experience of grief, mourning, and even, celebration of life. Vincent Brown and Edwidge Danticat echo these discussions about the dual importance of death rites: first as a mode of paying tribute to the dead themselves and second as a mode of renewal for those who remain stationed in the mortal world. Returning once again to the link between the living dead and the sea, Vince Brown offers an analogy of crossing the ocean to explain the way that ancestors enact consistent, dynamic dialogue with the living, as he asserts: “In such periods [of difficulty], the dead are used less as an anchor than as a rudder, offering the weight of precedent not merely to sustain a ‘cult of continuity,’ as some would have it, but to animate a politics of regeneration for a fluid world” (Brown 2008, 261, my emphasis). Thus, mourning the dead is not an act of senseless pining to reside exclusively in the past. Rather, remembering the past is an art of recognizing the narrative possibilities of history. It is in recalling the sacred past and naming one’s legacy that one revitalizes the energies of the world in this moment. In several Central African and Caribbean traditions, mirrors and water have served as divination tools in ritual settings, whether in rites of initiation or for insight into the most troubling of mysteries. One such example is the mpaka or the vititi mensu of Palo, a Kongo-derived tradition of Cuba. Described as “a horn of mystic vision,” (Thompson 1993, 63)33 the mpaka is comprised of a bullhorn filled with sacred medicine, and at times may be ornately decorated with beadwork (María Teresa Vélez 2000, 198). When the horn is topped with a mirror (suggesting its links with Central African minkisi [Palmié 2002]), the mpaka becomes vititi mensu/menso, which may evocatively translate to “leaves-in-the-eyes,”34 an appropriate title for a newly indoctrinated healer and ritual specialist. Traditionally, the mpaka or vititi mensu is revealed to the new initiate following her welcome into the spiritual community (Palmié 2002). In this moment of self-actualization, the mirror functions as both witness and reflection of the initiate beginning life anew. As anthropologist Stephan Palmié explains, “Like water gazing, possession trance, and other forms of contemporary Bantu-Cuban divination, the mpaka reveals intelligence unavailable to the normal sensory range of its user. It is used, for example, to monitor the nfumbi’s [new initiate] progress when sent out on mystical errands or to enable the tata nganga [priest] to see with the spirit’s eyes” (Palmié 2002, 336, my emphasis). In this way, the mirror becomes a pair of otherworldly, ancestral eyes, used to protect and watch over new initiates. This notion of the mirror as an invisible set of “eyes” also emerges in certain regions of southwestern Congo today. Indeed, the mirror can also be used to determine the cause of someone’s death in a divination ceremony known as kutempa in KiKongo (kotempa in Lingala). The divination rite can only be performed by an especially skilled nganga ngombo (indigenous priest or priestess),35 one with especially clear sight into the invisible world of the bankaka, the ancestors. During this ceremony, the culprit and/or cause of death will appear in the mirror to the diviner, before counsel is sought as to how the client might move forward with knowledge that is heavy, yet offers closure.36 In Haiti, one of the ritual art traditions that most frequently involves mirrors (and mirror shards or broken glass) is that of the Bizango, a parallel initiatory society to Vodou.37 Many Bizango initiates credit their ritual knowledge to dreams and exchanges with spirits. Appropriately then, anthropologist and manbo Rachel Beauvoir-Dominique notes that, “The mirrors integrated into numerous Bizango pake [pakèt kongo] are associated with the spirit world. Protective channels, they connect that world with the world of humans.” 38 This ritual use of mirrors forms an eye-catching aspect of Port-au-Prince artist Ronald Edmond, who specializes in large Bizango statues, also known as gàd. In Ronald’s commissioned ritual arts and statues for the society, embedded mirrors may adorn the core of gàd bodies, descending like a line of military buttons down the center of the sewn uniforms. Other times, mirrors take the place of eyes, much like the Central African figurines known as minkisi nkondi that have become so representative of BaKongo ritual arts in museums (see figure 1). These mirrors allow for the transmission of messages (via dreams), providing a flash of visual “noise” from the spirits, who may at times insist on avenging justice against wrongdoers in Bizango societies.39 Figure 1. Open in new tabDownload slide Bizango statues with inlaid mirrors (fabric, horns, cotton, mirrors) by artist Ronald Edmond, founder of studio Atelye Deliverans, September 2015. Photographs courtesy of author. Figure 1. Open in new tabDownload slide Bizango statues with inlaid mirrors (fabric, horns, cotton, mirrors) by artist Ronald Edmond, founder of studio Atelye Deliverans, September 2015. Photographs courtesy of author. WHEN CRACKS ARE MADE WHOLE: MAUSOLEUMS FOR THE DEAD What happens in the event of rupture? What might mirrors and reflective surfaces illuminate about mourning and caring for the living dead as acts of commemoration, as rejuvenation of the cosmos? Perhaps such a reflection might begin with an eradication of the myth that brokenness necessarily indicates futility. Mirrors may also be included in public mortuary memorials, such as those dedicated to victims of the 2010 earthquake in Carrefour, Haiti, referred to as Goudougoudou. Such a task of memorializing the dead en masse in respectful, creative fashion became increasingly urgent following the earthquake. One of the most moving “mausoleums” is the Martissant Park’s mirror-tree memorial near Carrefour. The 42-square-acre park has been designed to serve as a communal space, recreational area, and botanical garden in addition to its role as a cultural heritage site for the Katherine Dunham Cultural Center (Pierre-Louis 2013). Deeply tucked in the grove stands a towering tree widely known in Haiti as a mapou, a silk cottonwood tree of great mystic significance for Vodouizan. Encircling the perimeter of the large tree trunk, it becomes clear that the tree is host to an array of dazzling mirror pieces. Suspended from the branches of the mapou are ten to fifteen sculpted heads made of plaster and cast iron. Slices of mirror adorn the androgynous faces, which gaze hauntingly at visitors who see themselves reflected in the mirror shards. Tour guides explain that the artist, Pascale Monnin, designed the work to honor children who perished during the earthquake of 2010. As hand-crafted mausoleum, the tree effectively serves as an otherwordly graveyard for all of those children who remained unnamed, and unclaimed, at the time of their transition to the spirit realm (see figure 2). Figure 2. Open in new tabDownload slide Full tree and close-up detail of the floating heads of the Martissant Trees Earthquake Memorial (plaster, metal, glass, found objects) by artist Pascale Monnin June 2015. Photographs courtesy of author. Figure 2. Open in new tabDownload slide Full tree and close-up detail of the floating heads of the Martissant Trees Earthquake Memorial (plaster, metal, glass, found objects) by artist Pascale Monnin June 2015. Photographs courtesy of author. Hundreds of thousands of survivors were unable to provide final rites of service for family members whose lives had been extinguished during the rupture of the earth and the splitting open of the cosmos.40 As poet and playwright A-lan Holt (2010) poignantly mused, “I have never seen Haiti, but I have felt more than ever what it feels like to break/ To be broken, then to break open the universe….” Simply the logistics of clearing the rubble to locate and remove people’s bodies proved impossible for the under-equipped task force in Port-au-Prince. This act of properly blessing, baptizing, beseeching, dressing, kissing, caressing, mourning, burying, and naming the dead must be understood religiously and socially speaking as anything but luxury. Rather, these ritual actions performed for the dead must be regarded as a necessity for all religious communities, if not a basic human right in particular for devotees of Africana religions such as Vodou. These burial rites allow devotees—whom I refer to as religious citizens—to stabilize the universe following the ricochets of a natural disaster. Such rituals enable a community to assure the ancestors that they will be taken care of as tenderly and devotedly as possible by the family members who could not protect them from (super)natural disasters, the subsequent negligence of the state, or the inadequacies of foreign interventions. TO REFLECT IS TO REMEMBER It is my hope that the reader will recognize the ways in which sacred objects from other cultures of study (or even one’s own culture) may parallel the ritual work of mirrors and reflective surfaces in rites regarding the dead. Whether contemplating the solid globes of crystal balls from European séances in Spiritualism, the terracotta funerary statues of eastern Asia, or the elaborate, precious stone jewelry of MesoAmerica and South America, such ritual totems connected with rites of mourning, burial, and invocation narrate the incredible religious variety of humans expressing devotion for their departed. Similarly, reflective surfaces such as the brilliance of bronze and copper reflective disks in India, the polished shine of warriors’ obsidian blades in ancient Mexico, and the glittering glass shards on African American tombstones have long played ritual roles of importance in everyday acts of beautification, extraordinary feats of war, and commemorative acts to honor the dead. Indeed, there is nothing exceptional about Vodouizan notions of mirrors as portals to the invisible world, as mediators between realms, and as prophetic sacred objects that foretell news of death and return. Religious communities all over the world perform similar rites of divination to prepare themselves for this transition and passage. As sociologist Robert Hertz remarked of many indigenous societies, and African derived religions especially, death may be more appropriately considered an initiation rather than a termination of life (Hertz 1906). However, in a nation like Haiti with such a high infant mortality rate and low life expectancy, it is certainly understandable—religiously logical even—that for Vodouizan, the specter of death is often spotted right around the corner. As such, whole mirrors and fragments of glass represent a cornerstone of Vodou religious belief and Black Atlantic religious thought more generally. These reflective surfaces remind us how to properly honor the spirits and the living dead in their arrival and transition to Afrik Ginen, and just as importantly, how to maintain lines of communication between worlds. By fashioning mosaics of mirrors and broken glass, by including mirrors for eyes in sculptures or incorporating the reflective sequins of pakèt kongo, we come to recognize how Vodouizan create various paths to the mythic homeland of Ginen. Such an interpretation of mirrors urges us to challenge our assumptions about Vodou “superstitions.” It encourages us to more deeply understand the ritual and artistic incorporation of mirrors and reflective surfaces not as indicative of Haitians as “exceptional” in their rituals for the dead. Rather, we might regard these mirror-mourning-rites as testament to African-derived communities’ commitment to squarely facing the most challenging aspects of life and death. As Vince Brown has stated of invoking the dead, “Especially in the midst of crisis, flux, and chaos, people ‘anxiously conjure up the spirits of the past to their service,’ in order to navigate through a turbulent present” (Brown 2008, 261). With these rituals, they effectively work to orient themselves in a world of inevitable mortal demise and further prepare themselves for an afterlife—recognizing the possibility of regeneration. As Edwidge Danticat has so eloquently stated, it is in creating such “elaborate mausoleums” in the form of ritual art and sacred objects that the spirits may be assured of their relevance in mortal dimensions. These insights reveal the respectful, creative approaches that the living take to communicate with the invisible world, which for Vodouizan remains eternally present, and to pay ritual tribute to the ancestors, whom they eventually will become. Footnotes 1 Anthropologist Gina Athena Ulysse offers a thoughtful reflection on why the term Goudougoudou might well be referred to as a “nickname” for the January 12th Haitian earthquake. Here, I quote from her at length: “Goudougoudou – that's the affectionate moniker that Haitians have given the disaster. Everyone uses the term… An onomatopoeia, Goudougoudou mimics the sound that the buildings made when the earth shook everything on its surface and leveled those that were not seismically proof. The mere mention of the word is sometimes followed with a smile or even bits of laughter. Goudougoudou doesn't sound nearly as terrifying as the experiences that most folks will recount when you ask them where they were that afternoon when it happened 1969” (Ulysse [2010] 2015a, 24). 2 For more on the initiation of foreigners who have become integrated into Haitian religious communities, see Zora Neale Hurston’s Tell My Horse: Voodoo and Life in Haiti and Jamaica, 1938; Maya Deren’s Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti, 1953; Katherine Dunham’s Island Possessed, 1969; and Karen McCarthy Brown’s Mama Lola: A Vodou Priestess in Brooklyn, 1991. 3 Ginen signifies a mecca and cosmic homeland not simply for African ancestors and descendants living in the African Diaspora, but also for those of various ethnic backgrounds who have become initiated to Haiti’s national religion of Vodou. 4 In the spring of 2011, my Haitian grandmother made her transition from this life to the realm of Energies and I also shattered two, tall-standing mirrors in my home. That year, I embarked upon a research and visual arts project about the ritual importance of mirrors as mortuary arts in the Black Atlantic. Through these research findings, I have come to regard the passing of my grandmother and the shattering of these mirrors as intricately linked. 5 During the course of fieldwork between 2014 and 2015, it became clear that healers, priests, and priestesses in Kikwit most commonly use the term bankisi (plural, nkisi, singular) to refer to “sacred medicines.” This differs from the historical literature, which typically classifies these sacred art forms as minkisi (plural, nkisi, singular). Most likely this is due to a difference of regional dialect, as minkisi is used in the southwestern KiKongo dialect of the Kongo-Central province (formerly known as Bas-Congo province), and differs slightly from the creolized KiKongo of Kwilu province (formerly part of Bandundu province). To avoid confusion, when referring to the historical literature, I will use the term minkisi, and when referring to my fieldwork interactions, I will use the term bankisi. 6 Cultural theorist Patrick Sylvain argues that it may be more helpful to regard ritual arts not as “objects” but as “entities” with their own ritual contributions to ceremony. I further assert that by conceptualizing sacred arts as “entities,” we might better position them along the spectrum of “personhood,” somewhere in between understandings of immaterial spirit, material object, and physical human. Personal communication with cultural theorist Patrick Sylvain, August 3, 2016. 7 Consider, for instance, the words of television personality Pat Robertson shortly after the 2010 earthquake when he announced, “Something happened a long time ago in Haiti, and people might not want to talk about it…[Haitians] got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, we will serve you if you'll get us free from the French. True story. And so, the devil said, okay it's a deal” (Shea, 2010). For more on negative perceptions of Vodou in Haitian history, see also Elizabeth McAlister’s “From Slave Revolt to a Blood Pact with Satan,” 2012. 8 This term, “the living dead,” signifies that while the dead may not remain physically present on earth, they continue to play an active role in the visible, mortal world. See Vincent Brown’s The Reaper’s Garden: Death and Power in the World of Atlantic Slavery, 2008 and Dianne M. Diakité [Stewart]’s Three Eyes for the Journey: African Dimensions of the Jamaican Religious Experience, 2005. 9 In his work, The Faces of the Gods: Vodou and Roman Catholicism in Haiti (1992), Haitian scholar Leslie Desmangles has provided perhaps the first work on Haitian Vodou written by a specialist trained in religion. This text serves as a model for the way that future scholars of religion ought to pursue the topic of Haitian religion in conversation with other world religions. 10 Decorative, medicinal healing packets fashioned in Haitian Vodou for protection and fortification following one’s initiation and also used to address conditions determined to have a spiritual root. Pakèt kongo have likely origins from Central African minkisi (or bankisi) in traditionally BaKongo regions, West African bocio in ancient Dahomey, and indigenous Caribbean medicine bundles among Taino and Arawak-speaking nations. Most often, they are cloth-bundled roots and herbs wrapped with ribbons, feathers, sequins, and lace and can be used to heal physical as well as psychological afflictions, addressing cosmic imbalances as well as personal conflicts. See Daniels, 2009. 11 The Vodou pantheon of spirits exists as a complex matrix, including Bondyè serving as the highest God and creator, and the spirit intermediaries, known as the Lwa. The Lwa (singular and plural) are spirits akin to the Orisa/Oricha/Orixa of Yorúbà based traditions in Nigerian Ifa, Cuban Santería and Lukumi, Brazilian Candomblé, and Trinidadian Orisha or Shango worship. Each Lwa presides over various aspects of everyday life, such as love, travel, parenting, war, or healing, not unlike the domains over which other intermediary spirits (such as Catholic saints) preside. See Patrick Bellegarde-Smith’s Fragments of Bone: Neo-African Religions in a New World, 2005 and Karen McCarthy Brown’s Mama Lola: A Vodou Priestess in Brooklyn, 1991. 12 A lakou is a community or family plot of land that becomes inherited along with certain spiritual and ritual obligations to the ancestors of that territory. For more on the Vodou concept of lakou, a key religious theme in numerous Black Atlantic traditions, see Charlene Désir’s “Diasporic Lakou: A Haitian Academic Explores Her Path to Haiti Pre-and Post-Earthquake,” 2011a. 13 This Haitian Kreyòl expression means both “under” and “behind” the mirror, as the mirror provides viewers with a reflection of the spiritual self. Oungan asogwe (Vodou priest who has undergone the highest levels of initiation) and political scientist Patrick Bellegarde-Smith explains that the mirror “is reminiscent of the counter-clockwise movement in dancing for the Spirit.” Interview with author, July 18, 2014. 14 The Kingdom of Kongo, which reached its height between the late fourteenth century and mid-eighteenth century, spanned present day regions of the Republic of Congo (Congo-Brazzaville), Angola, and the Democratic Republic of Congo (Congo-Kinshasa). See historian John K. Thornton’s “The Development of an African Catholic Church in Kingdom of Kongo, 1491-1750,” 1984. 15 According to demographic research conducted by historians Philip Curtin and David Eltis, Central Africa and the Bight of Benin provided the largest source of enslaved peoples (perhaps as many as 70% of Africans) transported to Saint Domingue between the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. It is believed that Senegambians, also a significant source of Africans in Saint Domingue, arrived primarily in the late sixteenth century (Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database n.d.). 16 Interview by author with Maman Marie Mazaza, December 15, 2014. Conversation with Papa Gode Kidionga, November 2, 2014. Personal communication with Patricia Idiamin Odette Mayoko, October 28, 2016. 17 Interview by author with Maman Marie Mazaza, December 15, 2014. Conversation with Papa Gode Kidionga, November 2, 2014. 18 Interview by author with Maman Sade Kita, September 24, 2014. Conversation with Papa Gode Kidionga, November 2, 2014. 19 Of course, it is also true that many Haitians migrated as early as the late eighteenth century. Historian Nathalie Dessens notes that approximately 15,000 Saint-Domingue residents (including whites, enslaved people, and free people of color) migrated to New Orleans and Louisiana between 1791 and 1815. See Dessens’ From Saint-Domingue to New Orleans: Migration and Influences, 2007. George P. Clark has further noted that during the American Revolutionary War in 1779, between 500 and 750 Haitian soldiers fought alongside Americans at the Siege of Savannah to defeat the British. See Clark’s “The Role of Haitian Volunteers at Savannah in 1779: An Attempt at an Objective View,” 1980. 20 Désir serves as one of many academic and artistic voices that emphasize the key role of boats in African Diasporic migrations. 21 Art historian and American Studies scholar Jerry Philogène points out the prominence of ships, rafts, and boats in many Caribbean artists’ work. In her 2004 article, “Visual Narratives of Cultural Memory and Diasporic Identities: Two Contemporary Haitian American Artists,” she points out the common overlapping theme of travel and migration within the work of Haitian mixed media artists Rejin Leys and Vladimir Cybil. See also Krista Angelique Thompson’s, “Passage Through the Islands of Shallow Water: An Exploration of Migration in Contemporary Bahamian Art,” 2003. 22 In this story, the boat’s passengers understand the Lwa to reside under the waters in the realm of Ginen. See Edwidge Danticat’s “Children of the Sea,” 1995. 23 In both the cases of Aztlan for Chicanos and Afrik Ginen for Vodouizan, this locus of origin is not simply one of birth, but of birthright, death, and ritual center. See Davíd Carrasco’s “Aztec Moments and Chicano Cosmovision: Aztlan Recalled to Life,” 2003. 24 As Danticat further explains about the importance of this birthplace, “Ginen stands in for all of Africa… an ideological continent which, if it cannot welcome the returning bodies of its lost children, is more than happy to welcome back their spirits.” Danticat, 2010, 134–35. 25 The most respectful and commonly used term to identify a devotee of Haitian Vodou (indeed, the way many practitioners identify themselves) is sèvite, one who serves the spirits. In scholarly communities and more recently in some Haitian and diaspora communities, people have also used the term Vodouizan (Vodouists) to identify devotees with a noun similar to that of other world religions (i.e., Pwotestan for Protestants, Katolik for Catholics). Conversation with Patrick Bellegarde-Smith, July 2010. 26 Burial in Haiti is by far the most common interment process for the dead. Cremation is typically an option only for the elite, as the cost is prohibitively expensive. Cremation rites have become more prevalent only after the toppling of the Duvaliers, when people began to desecrate and pillage the tombs of the rich. To this day, older generations of Haitians remain apprehensive about cremation and prefer to be buried (conversation with Claudine Michel, July 22, 2014). Perhaps even more importantly, however, many Haitian Vodouizan recognize the ritual significance of interring their departed in the earth from which they came. Ideally, this burial site would be in the lakou (ritual community) located on inherited ancestral land. It should be noted that regardless of geographic distance, time spent away from Haiti, or even manner of burial, among Vodouizan, one’s spirit is always able to travel (or rather, return) to the homeland of Ginen. 27 As Barber and Barber explain, readers may recall the common Western adage that breaking a mirror brings about seven years of bad luck (Barber and Barber 2004, 172). 28 One such example is the use of water glasses in a misa within the Puerto Rican tradition of Espiritismo or the Iliminasyon (Illumination) ritual within Haitian Vodou. During these ceremonies, the water may be understood as one of many ways of activating the space and inviting the spirits in its literal reflection (and refraction) of the surrounding environment. Furthermore, in Puerto Rican traditions, “one learns to ‘see’ by looking through water.” Correspondence with Yanique Hume, July 2014. 29 Anthropologist Alma Gottlieb’s research among Beng nations of Côte d’Ivoire explores this notion of the unborn residing in the same dimension as ancestors and spirits. See The Afterlife is Where We Come From: The Culture of Infancy in West Africa, 2004. This sentiment is also echoed in numerous Africana religious traditions that maintain that the “living dead” inhabit realms underneath the water alongside ancestors and unborn spirits, such as Haitian Vodou, Cuban Palo, and indigenous Congolese religions. For more on Vodou understandings of the dead, see Maya Deren (1953) and Alfred Métraux (1946); for more on Cuban Palo, see Todd Ramón Ochoa (2007, 2010); for more on Kongo religion, see Wyatt MacGaffey (1986) and Simon Bockie (1993). 30 While Goldberg does not specify the exact time frame of these particular rituals of “ancient” Kongo (as has historically been the case with scholars referring to eras of antiquity in Africa), we may make a few educated guesses. As mentioned earlier, the Kingdom of Kongo experienced the height of its empire between the late fourteenth century and mid-eighteenth century. While the reflective surfaces of water may have served as an early mirror for Kongolese communities, it is likely that Europeans first introduced glass mirrors upon their arrival to the continent. This exchange may have occurred as early as the Portuguese arrival in Central Africa in the 1480s. We may surmise that these reflective objects quickly became integrated into various sectors of life, as mirrors served as one of many popular trade goods purchased by Africans during the trans-Atlantic slave trade. See Benjamin Goldberg’s The Mirror and Man, 1985. For more on other such luxury goods such as guns, knives, beads, and textiles exchanged during the trans-Atlantic slave trade, see John Thornton’s Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400-1800, 1992. 31 MacGaffey echoes these thoughts about the ancestors’ transformation with musings on spirits who turn into river stones or large boulders, known as BaSimbi in certain parts of southwestern Congo. See Wyatt MacGaffey’s Religion and Society in Central Africa, 1986. 32 We might also note that Mircea Eliade (1951) has stated, “And everything that is inverted on earth is in its normal position among the dead; that is why objects offered on the grave for the use of the dead are turned upside down, unless, that is, they are broken, for what is broken here below is whole in the otherworld and vice versa” (205). 33 Thompson notes that mpaka means the same in KiKongo as it does in Cuba, “horn.” Other sources indicate that horn in Lingala is lipeke (sg., mapeke pl.) and in KiKongo, bibongo (sg., babongo pl.). Personal communication with Lingala language instructor Kapitain Jean-Jacques Muzasadila and KiKongo language instructor Patricia Idiamin Odette Mayoko, June 2, 2016. In his 1979 article, “New Light on Cavazzi’s Seventeenth-Century Description of Kongo,” historian John K. Thornton explains that, “In Kimbundu [a northern Angolan language closely related to KiKongo] the language of Massangano where this event was said to have occurred, mpakasa is a common wild buffalo” (Joseph Miller, personal communication, 3 January 1977). This may suggest that the horn discussed was one belonging to the wild buffalo in Central Africa. See Thornton 1979, 262. 34 Thompson identifies the Cuban term vititi’s Central African origins, as he maintains the KiKongo word vititi means “greens, and meeso, eyes.” This is quite possible historically speaking, as the current KiKongo ya Leta or Kituba dialect of southwestern DR Congo uses the term matiti for leaves [dititi, leaf (sg.), matiti, leaves (pl.)]. Personal communication with KiKongo language instructor Odette Mayoko Idiamin, June 2, 2016. Thompson further explains, “Its creole name, vititi menso, relates to ritual: when a novice is initiated into the preparation and care of nkisi and cows [sic] horn, the nganga [priest] may take leaves of the laurel, steep them in water, and wash the postulant’s eyes in the mixture to make him clairvoyant. Hence vititi menso, literally ‘green-about-the-eyes,’ or ‘leaves-in-the-eyes,’ describes this medicine of vision.” Thompson, 1993, 62–63. See also Thompson’s article, “Face of the Gods: The Artists and Their Altars,” 1995. 35 An nganga ngombo in southwestern Congo is an indigenous priest or priestess with the power of sight into the invisible world through rites of divination. Banganga ngombo (plural) have been well versed in traditions of herbalism, and possess spiritual healing powers that they have acquired through rites of initiation, apprenticeship, and/or family lineage. They typically invoke the ancestors in ritual ceremonies and have the power to treat physical, mental, or spiritual illnesses. Interestingly, banganga ngombo tend to be women. 36 Interview by author with Maman Sade Kita. Kikwit, Democratic Republic of Congo, September 24, 2014. 37 Bizango societies have long been considered as linked with the “dark forces” of Vodou. Haitian anthropologist Rachel Beauvoir-Dominique dispels this mythology, noting that part of the historical unease with Bizango emerges from their work as soldiers who developed skills in the art of poison used against slave masters during the war for independence. Interview by author with Rachel Beauvoir-Dominique. Port-au-Prince, Haiti, May 13, 2015. For more on the role of Bizango society in Haiti, see Rachel Beauvoir’s L’ancienne Cathédrale de Port-au-Prince: perspectives d’un vestige de carrefours, 1991. 38 Rachel Beauvoir-Dominique, 2013, 89. 39 Interview by author with Ronald Edmond, October 5, 2015. 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TI - Mirror Mausoleums, Mortuary Arts, and Haitian Religious Unexceptionalism
JF - Journal of the American Academy of Religion
DO - 10.1093/jaarel/lfx012
DA - 2017-12-30
UR - https://www.deepdyve.com/lp/oxford-university-press/mirror-mausoleums-mortuary-arts-and-haitian-religious-unexceptionalism-efa5VXfdKc
SP - 957
VL - 85
IS - 4
DP - DeepDyve
ER -