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The Role of Women in Sundiata
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The Role of Women in Sundiata
The story of Sundiata was a legend that was passed down generations by word of mouth in Mali, Africa. The story is about the young prince Sundiata who was treated as an outcast at a young age but later came back to reclaim his place as the rightful heir to the throne. The book Sundiata: An Epic of Mali has different sections that suggest the different roles of men and women in the culture it is set in. Most examples show how women were subordinates, inferior members of the society treated like a commodity that could be given away as wives regardless if their opinion. Despite all these odds, these women go on to achieve greatness.
Throughout the book, men hold all positions of authority and included kings, rulers, hunters, warriors, and griots (Gries). Men held the most prestigious roles in society and were considered household heads. Men in this Mali society made decisions, went to war, and hunted for food. Women, on the other hand, would handle tasks such as gardening, gathering and preparing meals, and looking after homes. They had no much influence in decisions that affected their lives. They were considered a commodity by means of which they were treated. However, women in stark contrast to another side of this epic were depicted as powerful. The buffalo woman who has been terrorizing the village has a lot of power and influences the kingship of Mali. Sogolon, Sundiata’s mother, is not an ordinary woman. She does not bow to the wishes of the king to have her after the hunters gift her to him (Niane). It is not only when she gets unconscious that the king takes her and consummates their marriage. The act was cruel and showed how devalued women were in this kingdom and ascertained to the cruel treatment of women in this epic.
John Milton’s Paradise Lost, similar to Sundiata, tries to depict women as inferior to men. Eve in paradise lost is considered inferior because she was made out of Adam’s image. Milton looks into the Bible to draw the depiction of the women in the holy book (Milton). The Bible, according to Milton, speaks of women as subordinate to man the way man is subordinate to God. In the same way, women in Sundiata are considered inferior and of service to men as if they were created to serve their desires regardless. Paradise Lost also tries to depict a woman as inferior of mind. The author says that Eve leaves the conversation between Raphael and Adam because she is too shallow-minded to comprehend what the two men are discussing. The book continues to suggest that she would rather wait for Adam to explain to her and help her decipher their “thoughts abstruse” that she cannot fathom unless “intermixed with grateful digressions” and “conjugal caresses” of her partner (8.39-57).
Unlike Paradise Lost, Women drive the story in Sundiata. Although they are treated as a commodity and considered the weaker gender, their presence in the epic is apparent. In the beginning, the hunters would not be successful at slaying the buffalo is she did not let them and told them about the prophecy. Sologon would not have been the mother of a king if she did not resist the hunters. If she did not pressure Sundiata to walk, he probably would have remained a cripple. Sassouma also plays a part when she plots against Sundiata and Sologon, causing them to flee to exile. Nana also becomes the reason why Sundiata is king and helps him in his conquest for the throne.
Although Sundiata has countless instances of women being mistreated, they still stand out, by the way, they conduct themselves. They are exceptional mothers that are loyal to their families and culture. Sogolon does everything in her power to ensure the safety of her son from those that mean him harm (Khan). Sassouma is also an indication of power as she is able to send witches after Sundiata for she considered him a threat to the throne she considered her son’s right. Nana also proves loyalty to her brother and family by faking marriage and pretending to denounce his brother in order to learn the secrets of Soumaoro. The harsh treatment of women in this epic does not stop them from finding ways to stand out and show their heroic personalities. In the end, they appear majestic despite being condemned to a narrative of inferiority and dependence.
Works Cited
Gries, William. “The Role of Griots in Sundiata: An Epic of Old Mali.” The Histories 2017 (complete volume) (2016).
Khan, Roshan Benjamin. “Images of mother in Ramayana and Sundiata. A comparative critique.” International Journal of English and Literature 3.4 (2013): 123-128.
Milton, J. (2005). Paradise lost. Hackett Publishing.
Niane, Djibril Tamsir. “Sundiata: An Epic of Old Mali. 1965.” Trans. GD Pickett. Edinburgh: Pearson (2006).
Three Cognitive Functions
Three Cognitive Functions
Attention is the cognitive process and ability to ignore other environmental distractions while at the same time giving full concentration to a particular aspect or aspects within the environment. It can actually be viewed as the ability to allocate the processing resources by an individual. Development of attention as part of the human development from birth to adulthood can be placed within the stages of human development that were extensively studied by researchers such as Piaget and Erikson. Attention and cognition in general was studied by entirely different individuals either taking a philosophical view or psychology. Attention is a major cognition resource that provides us with the ability to organize ideas and minimize or avoid confusion. It can generally be categorized into three. We have selective attention and divided attention. The former constitutes focusing on one aspect while ignoring all the rest while the latter comprises focusing on more than one aspect within the environment. The third category is sustained attention, which is the ability to focus on an aspect for extended period (Clive et al 2003).
Factors that enhance development of attention include presence of appropriate stimulus such as loud noise, appropriate colors and aesthetics. These are external factors that enhance attention. Childhood experiences can affect and deteriorate attention. For instance abusive upbringing may make an individual to fail to focus on the intended aspect but rather retreat to their inner self. The state of the mind also affects attention. A tranquil individual has higher likelihood of paying attention than another person who is disturbed. Environmentally or in terms of the external immediate environment, presence of many conflicting stimuli can affect or slow attention. Diseases and mental disorders impair this cognitive function (Medalia & Nadine, 2012). Such diseases include schizophrenia, trauma, TBI, and brain infections among others.
Memory is the cognition process that provides the ability to store and retrieve ideas about experiences and interactions with the environment. It could either be short-term or long-term with the former constituting the ability to retain information while using it. The latter type of memory is the ability to store and retrieve information for later use (Medalia & Nadine, 2012). Memory has been found to decline with age (Medalia & Nadine, 2012). People at an advanced stage in life are easily confused since their working memory is reduced at that age. Even the long-term memory is also reduced at the advanced ages. Other factors, besides age, that affect memory include emotion and odor. Emotion enhances memory especially autobiographical memories. Odors also enhance memory. Memory has been found to be hampered by previous knowledge due to retroactive interference. State of the mind, especially stress, also affects memory. While stress negatively impacts memory, memory can be enhanced by linking the material or aspect to the stress or stressor. Even though there haven’t been long-term follow up studies that investigated effects of various factors on memory, various research studies have shown that fatigue, nutrition, lack of body exercise, intellectual inactivity and emotional instability all deteriorate memory function. Substance abuse and drugs can impact negatively on memory. Therefore, improving memory based on these observations would entail being physically active, staying intellectually active, eating healthy nutritionally, avoiding depression or emotional instability and maintaining sleep time regularly (Shinjini & Sunita 2001).
Cognitive thinking is the process in which an individual uses reasoning time after time to reach a logical conclusion. Cognitive thinking is basically a learned process. While thinking is generally the generation of ideas, cognitive or logical thinking involves reasoning hence effective establishment of structure in the facts of the ideas being generated and organization of these ideas into chains that make sense. Therefore, as a learned process, thinking level advances with age as experience in the sequential use of reasoning increase. In addition, training also improves thinking process as one learns how to use logical thinking to reject quick answers and employ a step-by-step thinking process top arrive at a solution. Cognitive thinking can be impeded by inherent biases such as fallacious beliefs and dogma. An individual with dogmatic ideas may fail to think properly and brush off some things rather than applying reasoning to evaluate them. Biasness also can make an individual to lack a balanced approach in the thinking process by thinking that the biased stance is the absolute solution to the particular situation. Since thinking is a learned process or function, learning disorders can also impede the ability to acquire proper thinking. Drugs and substance abuse can impair thinking capacity as well as memory and attention. With respect to the relationship between substance abuse and thinking, consider a drunken person walking wobbly on a street. This individual may fail to think properly to know that it is not only indecent to make call of nature in public but may actually go ahead and do it on the wall nearby and at the same time hurl insults at people.
In comparison for differences and similarities in factors that boost and impede the three cognitive processes, one major difference found was that while memory declines with age, logical thinking improves with age. This might explain the fact that old age people are associated with wisdom and short memory or memory lapses. Attention also declines with age. In addition, as a learned process thinking level improves with consistent exposure to training. On the contrary, it was established that prior knowledge or exposure to an aspect messes up memory in the current learning process and that is why it becomes easier to train a child who has never had any exposure than an adult who has some prior knowledge since the prior knowledge of the adult will cause retroactive interference.
On the part of similarities, it was found that all the three cognitive functions are impacted negative by mental diseases, disorders and drugs or substance abuse (Phillips & Bernhard, 2003). Training and cognitive intervention can also boost the efficacy of the three cognitive functions. Culture is another notable similarity in the factors that impact cognitive ability. For instance, culture of certain communities enables individuals to effectively concentrate on more than one activity. That is attention. The same culture allows these people to have superb memory and think logically to draw the difference between facts and opinions or illusions and reality. Such professions and communities include cryptologists (or investigators) and Mayans respectively.
Reference:
Medalia, A., & Nadine, R. (2012) Dealing with Cognitive Dysfunction Associated with psychiatric disabilities: A handbook for families and friends of individuals with psychiatric disorders. Walter Boppert, OMH Bureau of Public Information
Clive Ballard, Elise Rowan, Sally Stephens, Raj Kalaria, Rose Anne Kenny, (2003) Prospective Follow-Up Study Between 3 and 15 Months After Stroke Improvements and Decline in Cognitive Function Among Dementia-Free Stroke Survivors >75 Years of Age. Journal of Stroke (34): 2440-2444 DOI: 10.1161/01.STR.0000089923.29724.CE
Shinjini Bhatnagar & Sunita Taneja (2001) Zinc and cognitive development. British Journal of Nutrition 85 (2): 139-145
Phillips, K. A & Bernhard, J (2003) Adjuvant Breast Cancer Treatment and Cognitive Function: Current Knowledge and Research Directions. Journal of the National Cancer Institute 95 (3): 190-197. doi: 10.1093/jnci/95.3.190.
Three Artists Peter Paul Rubens, Diego Velazquez And Rembrandt Van Rijn
Three Artists Peter Paul Rubens, Diego Velazquez And Rembrandt Van Rijn
Peter Paul Rubens
Born in Westphalia in the year 1577, Ruben was a Flemish painter and draughtsman. Before his death in 1640 Ruben had become one of the most versatile 17th century Baroque painter in Northern Europe. He was well educated and worked as an ambassador for the Southern Netherlands leaders as well as a painter in the courts of Europe. His works prominently took features of Italian High Renaissance that he had picked during his stay in Italy. The works however retained his northern realism that significantly portrayed a love for landscape. Ruben was well versed with classical works including art and literature and could transform complex themes into clear flesh and blood images. He was an ardent collector of 16th century Italian art.
As one of Baroque old masters, his fine art works accentuated movement and color to create sensual paintings (Martin, 1977). He illustrated themes related to the Catholic faith and was a proponent of the divinity of kingship. His altarpieces which included landscapes, ceiling paintings, and portraits reflected his counter-reformation philosophy.
Among his works were altarpieces which included The Raising of the Cross done in the year 1610 and The Descent from the Cross which he worked from 1611 to 1614. Though these works were done after his return from Italy, they established Ruben as one of the leading painters in the Flanders. An analysis of The Raising of the Cross, for instance shows a combination of Ruben’s style with Michelangelo’s dynamic figures and especially Tintoretto’s painting titled Crucifixion. Ruben’s The Raising of the Cross is still considered as one of the leading paintings from the Baroque religious style of art. His other famous works included Samson and Delilah, Judgment of Paris, and The Exchange of Princes among others.
Diego Velazquez
In the same way Ruben represented the height of Baroque style of painting in Netherlands, Diego Velazquez was one of the prominent of the golden age of art in Spain. He was born in the city of Seville in 1599 and belonged to a family that was socially of lesser nobility. He studied art with the famous Francisco de Herrera at an early age of twelve. He never had the advantage of being famous in Europe early in his life like Ruben did. For a long time he was unknown beyond his country. Unlike Ruben who painted historical large scale altarpieces that depicted strong emotions, Velazquez painted compositions that can only be described as depictions of calm but mysterious everyday nature. However, he still ascribed to the Baroque standards of color and movement.
Velazquez painted at a time when the Catholic Church was at its height of reinforcing anti-protestant stance by demanding that artists produce realistic art that could easily be appreciated by the masses. It was also a time when art was freeing itself from the limitation of literal and historical subjects by discovering its own creative potential. This was the kind of modernity artists like Velazquez found himself in. his work was so exceptional that the famous Edouard Manet called him the painter of painters.
Two of his prominent works include The Old Woman Frying Eggs and Three Men at Table. The first one is dated 1618 and depicts an elderly cook making eggs on a charcoal fire with a clay vessel. She portrays a serious and meditative quality that combines with the boy next to her with a melon under his arm to give a clear picture of the distinction between youth and age (Brown, 1986). The dark and indistinct background is in contrast to he cluttered scenes common in portrayals of Dutch kitchens. Done in 1617, The Three Men at a Table is one of Velazquez’s earliest works. It characterizes traits of men of different ages who are painted at half length and three quarter lengths. The subjects of the painting show a sense of self-sufficiency and the ordinariness of the average men in the street.
Rembrandt Van Rijn
Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (1606-1669) ranks as one of the most prominent Dutch Baroque artists in the entire history of Western art. His deep understanding of human nature combined with a highly skilled technique in painting, etching, and drawing not only made him the best among his contemporaries but left a lasting influence on the style of many later artists. In the use of the chiaroscuro effects, Rembrandt still remains unequaled.
Rembrandt was born in the city of Leiden. His father who was a miller took him to the school of Latin and later to the Leiden University. He left the University due to lack of interest in Latin and studied art under the tutelage of art masters like Jacob van Swaneneburch and Pieter Lastman. He was so exceptionally regarded that at the age of twenty two he had taken his own pupils including Gerrit Dou.
Most of the works he did in the 1640s depicted a stylistic influence of classicism. A good example is the self portrait done in the year 1640 that was largely based on the style of Italian Renaissance painters like Raphael and Titian. The self portrait shows the way he had assimilated classicism and organized it formally to express inner calm. In The Supper at Emmaus, Rembrandt uses light to convey movement and the meaning of the painting. His most famous paintings were done during his last two decades. His portraits depicted solitary figures or groups with special emphasis on qualities like mood and spirit. In the Renaissance tradition, his paintings exhibited extensive use of colors and bold brushwork. For example in the single portrait of titled Stitching Jan Six, he uses a semiabstract style that uses light playing on Six’s face to depict a calm meditative mood. His other biblical works include Potiphar’s Wife Accusing Joseph and the Return of the Prodigal Son (Clark, 1978).
References
Brown, J. (1986) Velázquez: Painter and Courtier. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Clark, K. (1978). An Introduction to Rembrandt. London: John Murray/Readers Union.
Martin, J. R. (1977). Baroque. New York: HarperCollins