INDEGENOUS PERFORMANCES AND ECONOMIC RECESSION: IKEJI ARONDIZUOGU FESTIVAL AS A PARADIGM

Abstract

The need to uncover the dramatic elements in a traditional festival and to expose the rich cultures of Arondizuogu is the pivot of this paper. Festival is a product of culture. Culture is the totality of the way of life of a people. Culture and festival are intertwined and inseparable as festival touch all aspects of the people’s life and is not restricted to any particular sphere of their living. Drama is the representation of life; it mirrors life. Therefore, drama as embedded in festivals is used as a machinery to portray the culture of the people through the particular festival being celebrated. This work examined the Ikeji festival of Arondizuogu, which is a traditional festival that necessitates the renewal and group reenactment of the shared past experience of the life of the people of Arondizuogu with a view to uncovering the dramatic performances in the festival. It used the ethno research method of participant observation as well as the library to explore the dramatic elements and contents in the performance of Ikeji Festival. The research is hinged on Joseph Pieper’s theory that festival takes place through the arts as festival is the celebration of existence under various symbols through the arts which is a medium and contributor to the joy of festival. The paper acknowledges that Ikeji Festival embodies dramatic elements and contents of dance, costume, setting, properties, languages, make up and also attracts large audience from far and near to make it a total theatre; and concludes that in an economic recession period, these dramatic elements and their appurtenances could be exploited for economic gains by the people to fight recession. The paper recommends that more studies be carried out on Ikeji Arondizuogu to expose grey areas particularly in tourism development as this will lead to the provision of more jobs for our teeming youths as well as raise the internally generated revenue of Government.