The Yorùbá Dùndún in Local and Transnational Perspective: A Cosmopolitan Tradition in the Making

TL;DRAbstract

The dùndún, or "talking drum," of southwestern Nigeria is a versatile speech surrogate used to reproduce the tones and inflections of the Yorùbá language. Through their daily recitations of history and oral literature, dùndún musicians have for centuries played an integral role in the social, religious, and political life of Yorùbá-speaking peoples. In an environment where oral performance is a predominant feature of social interaction, talking drummers control a key mechanism of public discourse. While enmeshed in hierarchies of title and seniority, as well as in inherited ideas of personhood and community, Yorùbá drummers exercise considerable influence over the discursive construction of daily social life. As their economic support system weakens, however, talking drummers and those who advocate for them are today presenting and representing the dùndún tradition in ways that maximize opportunities for translocal patronage. In their bid to find new patrons in the Nigerian government

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