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Textiles texts and symbols : women dyers and symbols in the Indigo textile dyeing production process in Osogbo Nigeria

Despite the emergence of narrative and humanistic anthropological perspectives on thriving indigenous textile technologies, indigo dyed textile products are often read as homogenous products, devoid of Yoruba women-dyers' symbolic narratives. This ethnographic research on indigo textile dyeing in Osogbo examines the relationship between textile production and ritual by focusing on how indigenous peoples are stimulated to create what they make and the textile makers' unit of expression. A key argument throughout the thesis is that the dyeing act is a ritual performance by women dyers in Osogbo a re-enacted symbolic performance of the formation and evolution of human sociality and the socialization of human beings. It is also a symbolic representation of motherhood (parenthood when it comes to the societal level) a process of inscribing the kadara (destiny) of a child and the development of iwa (character) and ewa (beauty) to be an omoluabi (good and cultured child) in Yoruba ontology. The thesis also explores alkaline water production processes as part of the indigenous indigo textile dyeing processes and the use of adire textile for communication in Osogbo the notions of colour and colour symbolism and the use of texts, proverbs and images on dyed textiles as communicative tools specifically to show the transformatory nature of rituals in indigo textile dyeing. / Thesis (DPhil)--University of Pretoria, 2017. / Anthropology and Archaeology / DPhil / Unrestricted

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:netd.ac.za/oai:union.ndltd.org:up/oai:repository.up.ac.za:2263/62653
Date January 2017
CreatorsOwoeye, Omotato Idowu Oke
ContributorsMcNeill, Fraser G., OWOEYETAYO@GMAIL.COM
PublisherUniversity of Pretoria
Source SetsSouth African National ETD Portal
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeThesis
Rights© 2017 University of Pretoria. All rights reserved. The copyright in this work vests in the University of Pretoria. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the University of Pretoria.

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