Reflection on Dogon lecture

Our discussion of the Dogon challenged notions of ethnicities and isolation of ethnicity, and this is what most interested me about the discussion. If the Dogon are a population of amalgamated peoples who fled from persecution by the state of Mali, how long was it until they went from being a community to being a definitive "tribe" or "ethnic group"? These are terms that I would appreciate discussing and clarifying -- what is the definition of a "tribe", and how is it different from an "ethnic" group, a population, a culture, a community, or a race? Furthermore, what is the evidence of cultural overlap between them in their art?

I was also interested in the evidence that Dogon art supplies regarding early African interaction with Europeans. For me this recalled previous studies, particularly with Professor Abilola Irele in his class "Africa: Between Tradition and Modernity." Telling works by authors like Wole Soyinka and Chinua Achebe provide literature's perspective on these early interactions, and it is interesting therefore to see it from art's angle.

As we move from culture to culture throughout the course of this class, the challenge for me, I think, will be recalling the lessons from cultures past and realizing the thematic relations between them. Once our second lecture began, I realized that this would be the case, and I look forward to determining the related significances in everything we learn.