Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Is agbada now the equivalent of a suit?

Sir:

Should people go to office as if they are going to parties?

TF

 

From: 'Victor Okafor' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Date: Tuesday, March 28, 2023 at 10:20 AM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Is agbada now the equivalent of a suit?

As you all know, like a 3-piece woolen or fabric suit, the Western legal regalia was a product of a particular geo-cultural and largely temperate environment. Within the African geo-cultural environment, there are attires that are environmentally-friendly, physical health-friendly and much more amenable to both a modern office setting and a modern courtroom. And yes, lots of people do wear the latter to work.

But I usually laugh and shake my head in silent pity whenever, in a typical tropical setting, such as Nigeria, I notice an African professional on his way to work (including work in the courtroom) adorned in a 3-piece suit and sweating profusely. (I used the possessive pronoun "his" because I hardly see any woman in a 3-piece suit although I may be wrong on this score.) I pity the fellow and wonder silently whether with all his sweating under a blazing sun, he could still think clearly when he arrives in the courtroom. Inside a typical molou passenger bus, one tends to encounter similarly dressed fellows, sweating even while the fully-loaded bus is in motion. This is an example of a geo-cultural fashion mismatch adorned as an adopted mode of dressing, adopted wholescale without, in some cases, being adapted to suit the geo-cultural environment of the cultural borrower.

In a variety of ways, we have not adequately decolonized our aesthetics, our axiology, our minds, and our self-conception though I acknowledge that our mixed heritage (what Ali Mazrui called the Triple Heritage) includes our colonial past. Against the backdrop of that mixed heritage and a contemporary world marked significantly by cultural adaption and cultural hybridization, it's inevitable that we cannot and need not forsake everything that derived from our colonial past and its concomitant tools of indoctrination. At the same time, as we keep all that is valuable and useful for a healthy society from our mixed heritage, let's also preserve, refine and valorize the functional elements of our own indigenous cultural heritage—elements which sustained our forefathers and foremothers without whom we would not have had a past, any past of the cultural dimension of our being, to stand on in the comity of the human cultural landscape.  

 

On Tue, Mar 28, 2023 at 9:55 AM Dr.Iwalodu. SIA Odutola <dr.iwalodu.odutola@gmail.com> wrote:

A welcome development to indigenous Culture, heritage and traditions.

Intune with the climate too.

 

Why wear the Suit?

Same as the legal regalia for the Court room.

In  Monaco / South of France, it is super simplified.

 

How come such ridiculousness are retained surpassing those that colonised You?!

 

Dr. ODUTOLA

 

On Mon, 27 Mar 2023, 01:16 'Emeagwali, Gloria (History)' via USA Africa Dialogue Series, <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> wrote:

Clarification 

multilayered embellishments 

 

 

Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU
africahistory.net; vimeo.com/ gloriaemeagwali
Recipient of the 2014 Distinguished Research
Excellence Award, Univ. of Texas at Austin;
2019 Distinguished Africanist Award
New York African Studies Association

---

From: 'Emeagwali, Gloria (History)' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Sunday, March 26, 2023 4:00 PM
To: Toyin Falola <toyinfalola@austin.utexas.edu>; dialogue <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>; Yoruba Affairs <yorubaaffairs@googlegroups.com>
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: Is agbada now the equivalent of a suit?

 

EXTERNAL EMAIL: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click any links or open any attachments unless you trust the sender and know the content is safe.

A very welcome development,

if you ask me. Multilatered

embellishments would be fine

for social events-  and sack cloth

for church😂

 

 

Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU
africahistory.net; vimeo.com/ gloriaemeagwali
Recipient of the 2014 Distinguished Research
Excellence Award, Univ. of Texas at Austin;
2019 Distinguished Africanist Award
New York African Studies Association

---

From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Toyin Falola <toyinfalola@austin.utexas.edu>
Sent: Sunday, March 26, 2023 3:22 AM
To: dialogue <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>; Yoruba Affairs <yorubaaffairs@googlegroups.com>
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Is agbada now the equivalent of a suit?

 

EXTERNAL EMAIL: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click any links or open any attachments unless you trust the sender and know the content is safe.

Addicted to watching events in Nigeria, I am fascinated and impressed by the attire. Sometimes I wonder how big the wardrobe is. One question that keeps bothering me: are they now wearing agbada as white people where suits to offices? If so, what, then, is the social function dress code?

I now see people wearing agbada to offices. What do they wear for Sunday services and social events?

TF

 

--
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue+subscribe@googlegroups.com
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialogue+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/PH0PR06MB90044D81B6A3EA63AE74EB09F88A9%40PH0PR06MB9004.namprd06.prod.outlook.com.

--
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue+subscribe@googlegroups.com
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialogue+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/BL0PR01MB4514CF7D05836BCCFA931897DE8A9%40BL0PR01MB4514.prod.exchangelabs.com.

--
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue+subscribe@googlegroups.com
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialogue+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/BL0PR01MB4514CF2B7478B8090612D5A4DE8A9%40BL0PR01MB4514.prod.exchangelabs.com.

--
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue+subscribe@googlegroups.com
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialogue+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/CAF9%2BgbM1epKfHX3jxxgoBCU%3D6E9keLC7Qzwewm9n1p6_x9KDzw%40mail.gmail.com.

 

--

Sincerely,

 

Victor O. Okafor, Ph.D.

Professor and Head

Department of Africology and African American Studies

Eastern Michigan University

Email: vokafor@emich.edu

https://www.emich.edu/aaas/

https://www.facebook.com/DAAASEMU/

Tel: 734.487.9594 

 

 

--
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue+subscribe@googlegroups.com
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialogue+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/CAO3oEcxw73SrDwZw3PkPQG-1cDJaCi11V8y8SSjYkHphCrWnHQ%40mail.gmail.com.