Praise Poetry Research Articles

Post-Second World War praise poetry, lament and a Utopian treatise in Morocco: historical literature on the theme of the Second World War

ABSTRACTThis paper reviews ten historical-literary Judeo-Arabic and Hebrew works written late in the Second World War in Morocco: eight works I refer to as praise poems, by Moroccan Jews; one work I refer to as lament, written by a Jewish European refugee who found a safe wartime haven in Morocco, and another work, which I refer to as a utopian treatise, by a local Jewish man. All ten works were inspired by the war and recount its course in Europe, Asia and North Africa, while some also engage with the Holocaust. The comparison drawn here between the works – praise poetry, lament and utopian treatise – allows us to examine the authors’ various outlooks on the war, informed by their personal, familial or communal experience. These outlooks assume an actual form in the literary patterns of the authors’ works, as well as in the narratives, contents and ideas selected to feature in them. The reception varied among the Judeo-Arabic and Hebrew speaking community, in which a Jewish religious and modern national presence was predominant. Therefore, contents that had a universal concern were pushed to the margins of the local discourse.

Narrative, Authority, and Blame

In a world where song had an embedded social position, poetry had a vital role to play in constructing and confirming or destabilizing and destroying reputation and social standing. Though Pindar, for his own programmatic reasons, chooses to see poetry of praise and blame (reified for him in its most famous exponent, Archilochos) as fundamentally opposed (Pythian 2.54–6), they share certain needs. My interest here is poetry of blame. To express hostility at the most basic level, all that is needed is the terminology of personal abuse, an approach in which Alkaios is particularly inventive. The problem is that abuse is ultimately limited both aesthetically and in terms of impact. It can briefly unite speaker and audience at the expense of the person or group held up to ridicule. But it neither engages the imagination nor reaches out beyond the already committed. To be effective, blame, like praise, needs to speak from a position of authority if it is to achieve its pragmatic goal. This article looks at one means of generating authority, narrative. It looks at the construction of characters and events in straight storytelling and the use of paradigmatic narratives of the physical and animal worlds and examines the way in which archaic blame poetry uses these to construct a social, moral, natural, and religious order as a means of positioning speaker, audience, and target. This construction of authority is important for the vertical as well as the horizontal positioning of poetry of blame, in that it eases the movement of poetry and poetic reputation into the Panhellenic mainstream.

Textual migration in Ebenezer Obey’s juju music

ABSTRACTThis study examines textual migration as one of the principal sources of Ebenezer Obey’s juju music in the framework of free borrowing that characterised the oral composition and performances of Yoruba traditional chanters. In indigenous Yoruba societies, in which there was no patent law governing artistic productions, free borrowing allowed chanters to pick song items from different sources within the context of performance to deck up composition. Obey has expertly made use of this artistic graft herein referred to as textual migration. The study has identified three major sources of textual migration deployed by Ebenezer Obey. The first is from Yoruba oral genres such as oriki (praise poetry), incantatory poetry, festival songs, itan (story) and myths. The second is from Christian oral genres and heritage such as hymnal composition and Christian sermons or evangelical discourses. Obey’s third textual migration derives from Yoruba folk music and older forms of popular music in Yoruba and other parts of the world. Intertextuality and the concept of polyvocality would be used to analyse Obey’s song-poetry. Intertextuality studies interactions between and among texts with a view to establishing the modality of relationship between such texts. Polyvocality is a conceptual notion that posits that individual speakers’ utterances are overpopulated and are largely drawn from various sources that individual speakers might not consciously notice. These theories are therefore appropriate analytical tools to study the artistic graft that operates in Obey’s music.

Venantius Fortunatus, Poems, edited and translated by Michael Roberts. Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library 46. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2017, pp. 944.

It doesn’t pay to sing about the poor! Literary patronage in the Middle Ages is as old as poetry itself. The aristocratic context guaranteed a rich intellectual focus, whether we consider the poetry of praise or blame, and whether fulsome or just simple. Authorized compositions offered to a patron implied a hope for favorable compensation, and with his (or her) audience assured, the ceremonial promotion of the kingdom by the poet brought glory to the sponsor. Following a benefactor’s tastes within a cultural climate of liberality and magnanimity might bring unimaginable rewards to a court poet. A quick example from the life of Fortunatus: the renowned Gregory of Tours rewarded the poet with gifts, such as an estate on the Vienne River.

Community Translation and Oral Performance of Some Praise Psalms within the Zulu Community

There is a strong history among the Zulu community of performing praise poetry, and a passion for composing and performing poetry continues among Zulu youth today. On the other hand, the current Zulu Bible is considered by many young people to be irrelevant or difficult to read and understand. With these two factors in mind, I conducted a study in which Zulu youth were invited to participate in basic training, after which they made their own translations of various praise psalms and then performed them before a community audience using song, rap, or spoken poetry. This paper looks at the process and benefits of inviting “ordinary speakers” to participate in the translation process, and of communicating the message through oral performance. The results are encouraging and suggest the methodology could be extended to other genres of biblical text and other language groups.

Against Stanley Fish on Ben Jonson and the Community of the Same

In his classic essay “Authors-Readers: Ben Jonson and the Community of the Same,” Stanley Fish argues, primarily on the basis of a series of close readings, that (1) Jonson's poetry of praise hints at a community in which everyone is the same; (2) Jonson's poetry of praise is nonrepresentational, while his poetry of blame is representational; (3) Jonson's poems of praise and the members of the community mentioned in them are largely interchangeable; and (4) Jonson writes nonrepresentational poetry of praise in which everyone is the same in order to maintain his independence in a patronage society. I argue that these four theses are false. Part I argues that Fish's equivocation on the crucial word identity and his misreading of “In Authorem” undermine his claim that there is a Jonson community in which everyone is the same. Part II argues that Fish's reading of Epigrams 63, “To Robert, Earl of Salisbury,” on which reading rests his claim that Jonson's poetry of praise is nonrepresentational, introduces several textual errors, and that, once these errors are corrected, the poem no longer supports that claim. Part III argues that an awareness of Jonson's poetic art, especially his use of puns, shows that his poems of praise are not interchangeable, while an attentiveness to the “signs of specificity” (38) in the poems of praise shows that the people discussed in them are not the same. Since the truth of the fourth thesis depends on the truth of the others, it is largely ignored.

“TO BE OR NOT TO BE, THAT IS THE QUESTION”: THE CASE OF LITHOKO VS PRAISE POETRY.

For a long time, lithoko have been understood and so referred to as not just poetry but praise poetry. This is evidenced in some of the classical lithoko analysts such as Damane and Sanders (1974), and Kunene (1971) in their texts: Lithoko sotho Praise poems and Heroic Poetry of the Basotho respectively. The same perception still prevails in the eyes and minds of many modern and oral literature analysts even today. Hence the question this paper poses: whether lithoko are to be or not to be perceived as praise poetry. This paper therefore sets out to pursue this critical question regarding lithoko. In order to answer this question, the following aspects: definition, classification, functions and poetic aspects such as metre and rhyme of both lithoko and praise poetry are considered. It is observed that lithoko as a literary oral genre, are neither poetry nor praise poetry but lithoko, as praise is one of the many elements contained in lithoko.

Sinhala Buddhist Appropriations of Indic Cultural Forms

The development of Sinhala literature and Buddhist culture in Sri Lanka between the tenth and sixteenth centuries ce reveals a complex negotiation of appropriating elements of Indic culture and distinguishing their Sinhala variants. Vernacular traditions of writing and worshipping emphasized the island’s differences from the mainland, despite (or perhaps because of) the invasions and cultural imports from South India. Examining the use of a literary vernacular, praise poetry, and messenger poetry in Sinhala, this article explores medieval Sri Lankan efforts to appropriate and ultimately rival the literary and religious cultures from the neighboring subcontinent.

LATIN ACROSTIC POETRY IN ANGLO-SAXON ENGLAND: REASSESSING THE CONTRIBUTION OF JOHN THE OLD SAXON

Other than charters, only a handful of Latin texts from Anglo-Saxon England can be conclusively dated to the ninth and early tenth centuries. Remarkably, of these, not one but two are sets of acrostic poetry in praise of West Saxon royalty: the first in honour of King Alfred and the second in honour of his grandson, AEthelstan. Modern understanding of these poems has been defined almost entirely by a seminal article by Michael Lapidge, who in 1980 argued that both are likely to be the work of a single individual, John the Old Saxon, one of the continental scholars named in Asser’s Life of King Alfred who had joined Alfred’s court in the 880s. Lapidge’s thesis is highly persuasive and, indeed, many scholars have accepted his interpretation, despite the direct challenge of Gernot Wieland in 2006. There are, however, important aspects of these verses that have hitherto been overlooked and which have significant implications for their authorship. In the present essay, therefore, I seek to reappraise Lapidge’s argument. I also wish to go beyond the question of authorial identity, to begin to consider these texts within a broader cultural context: comparatively speaking, why might this literary form have been so popular with Anglo-Saxon audiences at this point in time?

The poetics of wisdom divination: renewing the moral imagination

This article makes a critical contribution to interpretive anthropology by recovering its interest in the moral imagination, while linking this to the poetics of wisdom divination, primarily among Tswapong of Botswana and more widely across a vast part of Southern Africa. This mode of divination appeals to imaginative moral reflection and ethical deliberation along with practical wisdom in the quest for well‐being. The esoteric oral literature in wisdom divination is rich in cross‐cultural understandings, transmitted over considerable barriers, and re‐created over centuries. Its evocative praise poetry, having no known author, is archived in the memories of experts, the diviners, and is recited and interpreted selectively during diagnostic séances. Yet anthropologists and literary scholars have not paid serious attention to the oral poetry and its remarkable wide‐ranging archive. Against that, this article documents the acrobatic stylistics of the divinatory poetry and shows how it appeals artfully for reflexivity, for heightened consciousness, and for unmasking the hidden in everyday life. The main analysis carries forward an anthropology of ethics that overcomes the usual division of labour between the study of ethics and aesthetics.

Ecological and Social Wisdom in Camel Praise Poetry Sung by Afar Nomads of Ethiopia

Abstract Understanding environmental philosophies and wisdom of tribal communities provides insights into sustainable ways of living and conservation. Many tribal communities rely on oral traditions for storage and communication of ecological, cultural, and religious wisdom. An evaluation of the Gāli Sāre, or the camel praise poetry, practiced in the form of sung poetry by the Afar nomads of the Horn of Africa, revealed that as well as being praise of the camel, the Gāli Sāre poems are oral eco-poetry and reflect biophilia. Issues such as biodiversity, environmental crises, livelihoods, clan politics, and landscapes are addressed in the poems, while conveying themes of abundance, drought, changing landscape, and livestock raids. In these oral poems, the animate and inanimate environment, including rangeland plants, mountains, rivers, lakes, animals, the weather, and spirits, are used in metaphoric, symbolic, and realistic expressions. Embedded in these poems are the ecological and social philosophy and wi...

Tragedy and its Cathartic Effect in Tiv Praise Poetry: A Reflection on Misery and Death in the Praise Poetry of Obadiah Kehemen Orkor

<p>There is an ironic sense of fatalism in the Praise Poetry of the Tiv people which is created to elicit honour, heroism and success. It is an art form that evokes extreme emotions but also purges them in a manner that puts the reader or hearer in control of himself.</p><p>This paper examines a selection of oral poems by Obadia Orkor from Ukum district of Benue State to prove that Tiv art is a secular craft that seeks rational interpretation of man’s tragic fate in the same manner Greek tragedies did in classical times.</p>

“Patterns of Thought and Feeling” in Herbert’s Easter Poems

“Patterns of Thought and Feeling” in Herbert’s Easter Poems Chauncey Wood In John Drury’s biography of George Herbert he describes his interpretive strategy in terms of his subject’s inward and outward worlds: The circumstances of a poet’s life and times are the soil in which the work is rooted – not just the outward and material circumstances but also, and still more, the inward patterns of thought and feeling prevailing in the poet’s world. (emphasis added)1 This essay proposes a reading of Herbert’s Easter poems that will emphasize Herbert’s relationship with other contemporary poets; the ways in which his Easter poems reflect his consciousness both of what he picks up from these other poets, and what he gives back. While Herbert undoubtedly hoped his poems would reach a wider audience, nevertheless it is illuminating to look closely at both his awareness and appreciation of the fashionable poetic activity of his day. “The poet’s world,” for Herbert, was both spiritual and secular; both rooted in faith yet responsive to poetic fashion. In 1609/10, when the youthful George Herbert wrote his New Year’s Day sonnets to his mother, he made use of the fashionable, secular sonnet form to turn that form against its fashion. Using the sonnet form to argue against its widespread usage for romantic love poems is an unmistakable gesture, turning his opponents’ poetic strength against them, which is part of Herbert’s assertiveness about his purpose: to turn poetry in praise of earthly matters into poetry in praise of things divine. When his speaker asks God “Why are not Sonnets made of thee? And layes / Upon thine altar burnt?” (ll. 5-6).2 Herbert embeds the question [End Page 135] in a sonnet addressed to God – the very kind of poem the absence of which he bemoans. By so doing he metaphorically lays his own poem on God’s altar, thereby accomplishing what he announced should be accomplished. It is all quite effective and admirably witty. The sixteen-year old boy at once announces and demonstrates his intention to write poetry about God’s love, not human love, and does so in two quite competent sonnets. While the sentiment was scarcely new, the young man’s expression of it not only declared his position to his mother, but may have been intended to establish his poetic coming of age to his family, their friends, and perhaps to a wider literary circle. Even in that age of precocious literary development these poems are quite remarkable. Herbert set out to use this fashionable secular poetic form for what he here alleges are less fashionable divine subjects, and he goes on to pursue and to widen this goal in full measure throughout his life. In The Temple Herbert more than fulfills his promise to transform the popular love sonnet into sonnets with a divine orientation; there are fifteen of them in The Temple. Cristina Malcolmson has noted that Herbert’s New Year’s Day sonnets were written immediately after the publication of Shakespeare’s sonnets in 1609, and she shrewdly observes that the young Herbert was also very much aware of the sonnets of his kinsman, Sir Philip Sidney. Even more importantly she follows up Arthur Marotti’s characterization of John Donne as a coterie poet to emphasize that Herbert, too, wrote with a coterie group very much on his mind. In George Herbert: A Literary Life she devotes the entire first chapter to “The Sidney-Herbert Coterie” – a coterie that of course included John Donne.3 When Herbert writes he may not write directly to a coterie, but he is very much aware who some of his readers will be, and he is equally aware of what those readers have been writing. Before attempting an analysis of Herbert’s Easter poems we may profitably study some of the kinds of things the mature Herbert does with the conventional love sonnet in order to prepare for his dealing with other fashionable poetic forms and practices. The first sonnet in The Temple is “The Sinner,” in which Herbert upends several commonplaces of the love sonnet in order to change the commonplace Lover of...

Transient Workspaces: Technologies of Everyday Innovation in Zimbabwe by Clapperton Chakanetsa Mavhunga (review)

Reviewed by: Transient Workspaces: Technologies of Everyday Innovation in Zimbabwe by Clapperton Chakanetsa Mavhunga Heather J. Hoag (bio) Transient Workspaces: Technologies of Everyday Innovation in Zimbabwe. By Clapperton Chakanetsa Mavhunga. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2014. Pp. xi+ 296. $34. In Transient Workspaces: Technologies of Everyday Innovation in Zimbabwe, Clapperton Chakanetsa Mavhunga examines the role of hunting among the vaShona and maTshangana of Zimbabwe in order to show how ordinary people responded to new technologies and incorporated them into their existing practices. The book contributes to the sparse but growing scholarship on the history of science and technology in Africa. Mavhunga argues convincingly that Africa was not just a recipient of outside technologies; rather, African people were “designers” of technology in the innovative ways they chose to use technologies they found valuable (p. 16). Drawing on praise poetry, proverbs, colonial archives, interviews, ethnographic sources, and his own experience, Mavhunga historicizes hunting practices and shows how people pragmatically took advantage of the new technology and colonial context. Using the frame of “mobility,” he effectively shows the ways in which mobility and work were interrelated in people’s lives. Through a detailed discussion of what he calls “the professoriate of the hunt,” Mavhunga argues that rather than displace existing beliefs, Africans incorporated guns on their own terms, and in turn shaped colonial attitudes and policies. After a brief prologue and introduction, chapter 1, “Guided Mobility,” lays out the spiritual world of the vaShona and maTshangana people and the important role of hunting within it. All movement was “guided mobility” in that ancestral spirits were actively involved in all aspects of life. Chapter 2, “The Professoriate of the Hunt,” analyzes the role of forests as sacred, transient spaces in which work, in this case hunting, took place. A successful hunt relied on a combination of spiritual assistance, a detailed knowledge of nature, and the application of appropriate technology. The focus then shifts to the ways in which guns were incorporated into this spiritual landscape and the complex relationship between African hunting practices and those of encroaching Europeans. Chapter 3, “The Coming of the Gun,” shows “how the professoriate of the hunt provided an anchoring structure through which incoming things like guns found salience among maTshangana, and vaShona” (p. 96). Hunters still sought spiritual guidance and assistance for a successful hunt. But they now chose particular guns for specific reasons, for example the availability of ammunition. Chapters 4 and 5 explore the impact of an increased colonial presence on hunting practices by examining the “pestiferous mobilities” of the tsetse fly and the colonial reaction to the outbreak of trypanosomiasis in the early twentieth century (p. 102). Whether an “invasion” or a “return,” concern over the disease led colonial authorities to hire African hunters to kill trypanosome [End Page 1002] -carrying animals. For these hunters, this was less about wiping out a disease, and more about procuring meat to feed their communities and bolster their social identities. Chapter 6, “Poaching as Criminalized Innovation,” focuses on the life histories of particular hunters to show how the establishment of game reserves influenced views on African hunting practices. Ultimately, “indigenous hunting was systematically suppressed as criminal acts” (p. 168). The final chapters carry the story of hunting through Zimbabwe’s war of liberation (Chimurenga) in the 1970s and 1980s to present-day concerns over ivory poaching. Chapter 7, “Chimurenga: The Transient Workspace of Self-Liberation,” shows how national resistance leaders such as Joshua Nkomo tapped into local discontent about land alienation and the criminalization of African hunting to gain support. Nkomo used elements of the “professoriate of the hunt” to elevate his status and gain support; conversely, vaShona used him to voice their grievances. The 1980s brought Zimbabwean independence as well as international concern over the state of Africa’s elephant populations. Supported by international conservation organizations, the government imposed a “fortress conservation” model that cast hunters as poachers (p. 208). The key theme that runs through Transient Workspaces is African agency. Whether it is adopting technology on their own terms, seeking ways to benefit from the colonial obsession with tsetse fly eradication, or influencing policy “from below,” Mavhunga demonstrates that ordinary people adapted to and shaped the changing...

Eegun Ogun: War Masquerades in Ibadan in the Era of Modernization

When I arrived at the home of Chief Ojetunde Akinleye Asoleke at about 8:50 am on June 19, 2007, on the third day of the Egungun festival in Ibadan, Southwestern Nigeria, I was informed that the leader of the masquerade group, Olori Alagbaa1 had a very pressing emergency. Forty-five minutes before Alapansanpa (Fig. 1) was billed to appear in public, Chief Asoleke had just received a call from the Divisional Police Officer in charge of Mapo and its environs that unless the contractual papers of authorization allowing Alapansanpa to parade around the ancient city were signed, the masquerade would not be allowed to come out. Consequently, I rode on the back of an okada (a motorbike taxi), in company of Chief Asoleke, for about a mile to the ancestral home of Alapansanpa in the Kobomoje-Oranyan quarters of the old city. Close to two hundred of the teeming supporters of Alapansanpa, together with a huge contingent of policemen, armed to the teeth, were already anxiously awaiting the appearance of the masquerade, oblivious to the power tussle unfolding at the commencement of this spectacular event. It was an intensely edgy, utterly nerve-wracking festive atmosphere pervaded with a lot of anxieties. While many people were hanging together in small and large groups on the major street leading into the area, others were engaged in heated arguments and discussion about the expected appearance of their favorite masquerade. There was a lot of hand shaking and back slapping, together with heavy consumption of alcohol, which was invariably accompanied by very loud conversations layered with a curious admixture of the pungent smell of marijuana and tobacco smoke in the air. Tucked somewhere beyond the main building, in between some dilapidated structures, was a very plain, nondescript building serving as the haven (igbale) for the famous warrior masquerade. There was blood, palm oil, alcoholic beverages, and water sprinkled all over the floor (Fig. 2) at the portal of the building where the masked performer was soon to emerge for its highly anticipated procession around the city. A few feet away, a similar propitiation of oil, blood, liquor, and water annointed an elevated mound upon which the masquerader was to stand while simultaneously invoking the spiritual powers of Esu Laalu, the divinity of the crossroads and messenger of the gods, and Ogun, the deity of war and creativity and patron of hunters, warriors, and all users of iron implements. The invocation equally involves a recitation of the praise poetry (oriki) and acknowledgement of the long line of departed ancestors of this highly venerated warrior lineage in Ibadan. Alapansanpa is one of the highly revered and dreaded masquerades in the city of Ibadan. During the Yoruba civil wars (1793–1893), Alapansanpa and many other senior masquerades, including Oloolu, Abidielege, Agbo Ogede, Atipako (Fig. 3), and Obadimeji (Fig. 4), collectively accompanied Ibadan warriors on their military campaigns, particularly against the Ijebus and the Egbas to the south and their bitterest enemies, the Ijesas and the Ekitis, as well as the Fulani Jihadists stationed at Ilorin to the north (see Johnson 2006). Indeed, Ibadan was initially settled as a military outpost and frontier community from around the 1820s by various warlords fleeing the social crisis arising from the disintegration and dismemberment of Oyo Katunga, the last of the great Yoruba kingdoms. And it was from this location that these warlords began to unleash a reign of terror on other Yoruba communities for the express purpose of slave raiding and the control of the trade routes to the coast (Johnson 2006). Back to our visit; on reaching the ancestral compound of Ogundeji, the Alagbaa instantly made straight for a crowded room in the igbale to meet the masked performer, who would

Reading Psalms, and other urban poems, in a fractured city

This article was an attempt to (re-)read Psalms in the context of fractured cities, marked by socio-economic inequalities, woundedness, migration and exclusion. It explored urban motifs in selected psalms and considered their possible meanings in relation to both the socio-cultural contexts in which they were written but also how they could be read and understood today. It proposed the Psalms as urban poetry, and considered poems of praise, lament and resistance. It brought the Psalms into conversation both with �remixed� psalms and also with other urban poems. A �remix� is a technical term usually associated with altering, adding or changing songs or music into a new version more appropriate or suitable for a new context. It is essentially a genre that emerged from within urban popular culture. Finally, I suggested that an understanding of the Psalms as urban poetry of praise, lament and resistance, in conversation with other urban poems, can serve as a resource to unshackle our faith from the temple, from one city, or from human institutions, evoking a daring new imagination for a new people, new city and new creation.Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: The article explores contextual readings of the Psalms as urban poetry, and retrieves other urban poems from different genres, both in order to inform urban theological discourse and contextual theological reflections on the fractured city.

Decolonising the word: Themba Masinga and his religious poetry in Ibandla LamaNazaretha

Themba Masinga is one of the most prominent praise poets in Ibandla lamaNazaretha of Ebuhleni. He has composed a number of praise poems especially for Uthingo (MV Shembe) and the present leader, Unyazi (M Shembe). However, Masinga has also composed and performed poems that reflect on his identity as a member of Ibandla lamaNazaretha. Masinga's religious poetry borrows from a number of genres including praise poetry, sermon performance, story-telling and modern poetry. Masinga's poems are shot through with biblical references, and this article examines the ways in which he appropriates the Bible in his poetry. The author suggests that Masinga's reading of the Bible defies a simplistic understanding of the Bible as the word of God. His use of the Bible is quite complex because at one point he rejects it as a foreign text, but uses it to support his claims. He appropriates the Bible for his purposes, and uses it to define his identity as a member of Ibandla lamaNazaretha.

The commercialization of celebratory poetry: a critical examination of Zolani Mkiva's post-apartheid praise poetry (izibongo)

In post-apartheid South Africa spoken word poetry has emerged as one of the most powerful channels of expression for cultural and political criticism for performing artists (especially the younger ones). The mosaic that composes spoken word poetry is the result of the combination of several poetic languages and sub-genres, such as ‘resistance poetry’, slam poetry, rap, dub poetry, lyrical poetry. Among them izibongo (praise poetry) certainly deserves to be approached with special attention, since it represents one of the most ancient and significant forms of oral expression in the history of Southern African cultures. Presently this traditional form of celebratory poetry survives, thanks to the offerings of performing artists such as imbongi (praise poet) Zolani Mkiva, the most acclaimed contemporary performer of the art of izibongo, and the poet whose artistic activity and public profile are analysed here. This article reconsiders the ongoing process of transformation of praise poetry, it examines how this peculiar kind of poetry is performed and disseminated and the meanings which are produced by its deployment and reception in the cultural and socio-political context of post-apartheid South Africa. The praise poet in this post-colonial, urban, globalized setting is being called upon to function in a number of contested terrains that have yet to be sufficiently considered.

L’edizione completa del laudario perugino

Lauda is a type of Italian poetry in praise of the Virgin Mary, Christ, or the saints. The poetic lauda was first associated with the early Franciscan friars (the 13th-century Franciscan poet Jacopone da Todi wrote many laudi spirituali in the vernacular), then it was used in confraternal groups and for religious celebrations, and eventually became part of the Italian version of the miracle play, the sacra rappresentazione. Laude were composed either in sestina or in ballata form for recitation, their content usually consisting of exhortations to a moral life or of events in the lives of Christ and the saints. The composers were mostly anonymous. The so-called Laudario Perugino is the largest existing collection of laude. It was assembled about the mid-13th century and copied in several manuscripts. The first critical edition of this Laudario, consisting of more than 180 poems, has been published in two volumes by Gina Scentoni and Maurizio Perugi (2011 and 1012). This paper deals with the most important features of this abundant material, which will considerably enlarge our knowledge of medieval Italian language and poetry.

In Praise of the Intercessor: Mawāhib al-Nāfiʿ fī Madāʾiḥ al-Shāfiʿ by Amadu Bamba Mbacké (1853–1927)

In Praise of the Intercessor is an effort to capture in English verse an echo of the original meaning, rhythm, and tenor of a panegyric written by one of West Africa’s most famous Sufi shaykhs, Amadu Bamba. The founder of the Muridiyya wrote literally hundreds of distinct works in Arabic verse, but the piece translated here is one of his most widely recited poems, and the translation notes here expound upon the significance of some his poetic allusions for Murids. The introduction offers reflections on the role of praise poetry in Islamic scholarly culture, as well as the challenges and immense rewards in translating such works in fresh ways.