Towards a Type Classification of Ẹwa-ọma Festival Performances of Nkporo, South-Eastern Nigeria

Abstract

Much classificatory work has been done on the African festival performance. However, such work largely has to do with identifying and classifying the continent’s performances in general. Some, but not many, of the individual festival performances have received classificatory attention. However, for the purpose of systematic documentation it is desirable to classify the individual performances where it is possible to do so, particularly when pioneering work on them is involved. This is the motivation for this study, a pioneering work on the Ewa-oma festival performances of Nkporo. The multiple-criteria approach is used, and narrowed down to five criteria: duration, plot, style, theme and character. Fifty-two (52) Ẹwa-ọma performances recorded in an audio-visual device during the 2000, 2001 and 2002 editions of the festival are used for type classification. Four types of Ẹwa-ọma performances are identified: the song-dance drama (subclassified into long song-dance drama; short songdance drama; song-dance drama with represented action; song-dance drama with narration; and poetic narrative song-dance drama). Another is the solo drama (subclassified into narrated solo drama; solo drama with represented action; narrated solo drama with represented action). The third is the declamatory drama (subclassified into solo declamatory drama with represented action; pure declamatory drama; and declamatory drama with song-dance and narration). The last is the represented action (subclassified into long represented action; short represented action; episodic represented action; and organic represented action). Six thematic thrusts – moralistic, gender, religious, incongruous, ideological, and the eclectic – are also distinguished. Similarly, two character types, stock and round, are identified. This classification is based on the enacted performances. Future classification may focus on the Ẹwa-ọma songs.