NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR HOSPITALITY AND TOURISM MANAGEMENT (NIHOTOUR LAGOS)

HAKEEM ISHOLA OLAONIPEKUN - HTI/LOS/PGD/11/043

ASSIGNMENT ON

HERITAGE TOURISM - TTS 606

TOPIC:

IDENTIFY THE VALUES OF AFRICAN CULTURE THAT CAN PROMOTE AFRICAN DRESS ANDDRESSFASHIONS ABOVE FOREIGN ONES

LECTURER: Mr. Frank Ogundana

AFRICAN CULTURAL VALUES The African continent is richly endowed in cultural values well and above most continent of the world. This has been the driving force that has for so long shape the behavioural pattern of an average African since creation. Africans as people cherish their culture and heritage and hold sacred the custodian of these institutions. CULTURE Culture is the totality of thought and practice by which a people create itself, celebrates, sustains and develops itself and introduces itself to history and humanity. Culture is the peoples belief and traditional ways of life as inherited from previous generations. It is the peoples behavioural pattern, thinking, as well as methods and approaches to issues, one another, the community and intra and inter communally. Our culture as Africans provides us with an ethos we must honour in both thought and practice. African culture encompasses and includes all culture within the continent of Africa. The Africans and the western world are quite distinct in culture, values, dressing and fashion. The immediate reason that attributed to these differences is the disparity in life style, location, climate, belief, observation and recognition of particular cultural heritage, hereditary amongst Africans which is down play by the West and other foreign tribes. WHAT ARE VALUES? Values are those items and institution of culture, thoughts, and acts that are so highly revered and cherished by the people and these can be broken down into; 1. Sense of community 2. Sense of good human relations & marriage 3. Sense of the sacredness of life 4. Sense of dressing / fashion 5. Sense of hospitality 6. Sense of sacred and religion

7. Sense of Moral and decency 8. Sense of respect for authority and elders 9. Sense of humility and shyness 10.Sense of habit and character 11.Sense of courage and hard work 12.Sense of time 13.Sense of language and proverbs Africans have strong respect and value for their culture especially the old generation of Africans and this truly and willingly reflects in their behavioural relationship with others and their ways and manners of dressing and appearance in private and public. The advent of colonization, westernization and globalisation by the West has played a major influence not only on the minds but also on the physical being of Africans and their culture. During the colonial era, the European possesses attitudes of superiority and a sense of mission. Africans are expected to give up their cultural beliefs and value in preference to foreign European culture. The import of globalization and technology have also influence the African culture and traditional ways of doing things especially the dressing and fashion sense. The above have seriously influenced and eroded the African dressing and fashion code through the underlisted factors; 1. Colonization 2. Cost and economic influence 3. Accessibility 4. Industrialization 5. Western education 6. Imitation 7. Cross fertilsation of culture 8. Foreign aids and donations 9. Foreign associations 10.Poverty

AFRICAN CLOTHING AND DRESSING FASHIONS Pre colonial era, Africans are naturally fashionable with diverse means and ways of dressing and looking good based and inferred from the rich African cultural heritage, the statement still holds, only that colonization have had its impact on our dressing and fashion. African culture has always placed emphasis on personal appearance and jewelry has remained an important personal accessory. Many pieces of such jewelry are made of cowry shells and similar materials. Similarly masks are made with elaborate designs and are important part of African culture. Masks are used in various ceremonies depicting ancestors and spirits, mythological characters and deities. Tattoo has also ever since been part of African fashion as it was done at first to identify with ones lineage or tribe and later as a mode of fashion. Africans have diverse clothing and fashion sense which predate the colonial era. There exist different types of clothing in different part of Africa, theses differences starts from the Stone Age up to the middle ages which has experience a lot of transformation. Wearing cloth started among Africans around 180,000 years ago soon after Homo sapiens evolved. That was the ice age when there is need to keep warm for survival. The earlier dress worn by Africans at this time was made from the peeled bark of tree and pounded until the fiber becomes soft and sewn together. The people of Uganda, Central Africa used the bark of fig trees and this type of bark of trees may be related to development of Egyptian papyrus. Raffia palm were also pounded in that era by the Persian explorer Sataspes as reported by Herodotus. The first clothing was made from the animal skin leather and fur, shawls and loin clothes, and the first jewelry was probably made of seashells and feather glass.

After many thousand years, people began to make lighter, less sweaty kinds of clothes. Post Colonial Era The advent of colonization, globalisation and westernization has eroded our dressing cultural value with its advantages and short comings. The most prominent of the short comings of the foreign fashion is encouragement of nudity, through macro mini skirts and skimpy tops by our ladies, while the boys and most unfortunately some men now engage in the sagging of their trousers displaying their under wear , a culture quite alien to Africa. The foreign influence also is impacting on our economy as millions of our foreign reserve is now being expensed on importation of clothing and clothing materials, ordinarily that could have been invested in our economy through the patronage of our local garment and sewing or tailoring industries. Another very disturbing side effect is the negative impact the western fashion is having on our collective psyche as we are made to belief that anything western and foreign especially in dressing is better than our own natural wears. This inform the wearing of jacket and knocking tie in a hot weather climate of Africa in the name of looking smart and trendy.

Handwoven fabrics with decorative woven borders

Women's traditional clothes in Ethiopia are made from cloth called shemma and used to make habesha qemis: it is basically cotton cloth, about 90 cm wide, woven in long strips which are then sewn together. Sometimes shiny threads are woven into the fabric for an elegant effect.

An Ethiopian model at the Ethiopian Fashion show at the 2008 International Festival in Texas

Men wear pants and a knee-length shirt with a white collar, and perhaps a sweater. Men often wear knee-high socks, while women might not wear socks at all. Men as well as women wear shawls, the neTela. In West Africa much of the local dress is influenced by Islamic traditions. Zulus wear a variety of attire, both traditional for ceremonial or culturally celebratory occasions, and modern westernised clothing for everyday use. Traditional male clothing is usually light, consisting of a two-part apron (similar to a loincloth) used to cover the genitals and buttocks. The front piece is called the umutsha (pronounced [umuta]), and is usually made of springbok or other animal hide twisted into different bands which cover the genitals. The rear piece, called the ibheshu [ibeu], is made of a single piece of springbok or cattle hide, and its length is usually used as an indicator of age and social position; longer amabheshu (plural of ibheshu) are worn by older men. Married men will usually also wear a headband, called the umqhele [umle], which is usually also made of springbok hide, or leopard hide by men of higher social status, such as chiefs. Zulu men will also wear cow tails as bracelets and anklets called imishokobezi [imioozi] during ceremonies and rituals, such as weddings or dances.

Benefits Inspite of the above, there have also been tremendous improvement and transformation of the African dress and fashion as the application of imported western technology in the production and processing of our dress and clothing material has further validate the natural beauty that comes with the African fashion. The earlier raw animal skin, raffia and bark of tree have since given way to a more modern local cotton design and fabrics all over Africa. The Textile industries too have witness tremendous improvement and have boost employment. A good example is the Ghana Textile industry, the Akosombo Textile and the Republic of Benin, Cotonou where quality Ankara materials are produce comparable to the Holland Dutch Textiles. The Aso-oke, Etu, and Damask fabrics of Nigeria origin have also been transformed to International acceptable standard and are being exported as a mark of cultural export. Amongst other African clothing style of modern transformation and explosion are; - Senegalese Boubou and Kaftan - Kente cloth of Ghana - Ethiopean Suit etc.

The beauty of the African fashion

THE AFRICAN VALUE OVER THE FOREIGN DRESS FAHION With all the advantage of the West and Foreign fashion over the African fashion, the core value of African culture that can promote the African dress and fashion well and above the foreign ones are; 1. Sense of Value of Pride an average African is proud of his culture and that has informed the burning desire to adorn our local dress inspite of the foreign influence, especially at our traditional ceremonies. We need to do more by adorning our local dress at all time depending on the occasion and time. 2. Sense of Value of Moral decency Africans cherishes their sense of decency and decent dress. Upholding this value will discourage the

wearing of absurd and half nudity dress that exposes the sensitive part of our female body, a trait of the West style of fashion. 3. Sense of Value of relationship people in relationship should embrace the traditional idea of adorning local dress that will express their status and discourage the vices of harassment by men. 4. Sense of Value of religion our religion house should preach the benefit and advantages of our traditional dress and encourage their congregation to embrace the wearing of our local dress as against the wearing of provocative dress to religion houses. 5. Sense of Value of humility and shyness by embracing this African virtue, the preference for African dress will be over and above the foreign dress and fashion. 6. Reorientation - the indulgence in the use of western fabrics and materials has relegated our age long cherished civilization as a deception for imposing other cultures in Nigeria and Africa at large. There is need for re-orientation and resuscitation of our indigenous and ethnic values which are embedded in our dress culture. 7. Rebranding - rebranding should start with us. We should note that our dress culture defines our individual personalities and by extension, our national identity. We should not have our cultural attires display only when occasion demands. The prevailing appetite for western dress pattern is a trend that has contributed to the eventual death of local textile industries as Nigeria became a dumping ground for western textile materials. The government of African countries should proclaim our rich cultural heritage and embed the African value in the constitution to the extent that the citizen will have cause to respect their cultural belief and value through the constitution. The foreign dress and fashion, especially the Western Europe and America have tremendous bearing and influence on African fashion due to their

highly developed nature and the use of technology couple with their strong economic base. It will take the combination of the African strong cultural value and commitment on the part of Africans and African government to over turn the influence.

REFERENCES: 1. National Institute for Cultural Orientation Seminar on Indecent dressing 2. Google documents on Differences in Culture