Functions and Relevance of Costume in Ngwas Ekpe Festival
Chapter One
OBJECTIVES OF THE RESEARCH
- To identify, describe the various costumes associated with the Ngwa-Ekpe Festival.
- To find out the roles specific costumes play in the celebration of the festival.
- To establish the educational values of the Ngwa-Ekpe festival and its art Elements.
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
INTRODUCTION
Nigeria offers variety of festivals with sound and rich cultural heritage. The evidences of these festivals are found in all the geo-political zones in the country which serves as veritable instruments of national integration, peaceful co-existence and cultural possibilities.
A number of cultural activities exist in Nigeria, which create unique creative spaces for producers of the arts as well asconducive interactive spaces for tourists and connoisseurs. Many of these cultural activities have been in practice fromtime and have given the country an acclaim as being culturally super-active. The cultural activities in Cross River State are particularly outstanding from those in many other states of the federation as they showcase diverse creative packages. The state is renowned for its festivals of songs, dances and masquerades at coronation, marriage, burial, naming, planting and harvesting ceremonies. Cross River State is also popular for its hospitality and its culinary productivity – many Nigerians would want to have a taste of ‘Calabar’ food. Tourists also like to visit the numerous cultural and historical sites in Cross River State. While these ceremonies, tourism potentialities and locations have ever been present with the people of Cross River State in Nigeria, not much was done to formalize and organize their presentation to diverse international audiences until the year 1999. The administration of Donald Duke at the inception of Nigeria’s 4th democratic era evolved a dynamic policy to develop the tourism sub-sector as an area of alternative revenue for the state. Part of the plan was to develop a rich tourism calendar to accommodate more (existing) cultural events and in some cases rebrand and repackage them for better appeal. The plan was also to accommodate new events that would appeal to the emerging consumerist culture of the 21st century. So, in all parts of the state there are cultural festivals and artistic practices that appeal to diverse audiences. There is mountain tourism and recreation in the mountainous region of Obudu; there are new yam festivals in the agricultural belt; maiden outing ceremonies, water sports and other art-related events in many communities of the state.
THE CONCEPT OF COSTUME
Costume is part of actors’ apparatus. It refers to all clothing an individual performing wears in a show, festival or movie. In a broader sense, costume can be applied in many kinds of performance or media like drama and dance. The orchestra players wearing white shirt and black suit to perform in the concert hall, they are also wearing ‘costumes Theatre, television and movie are the medium often showing costume.
Indeed, costume is not garment merely. Jeffrey Kurland (2004), the governor of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, claims that “costume dominate the foreground action throughout a film, shaping the characters and thus helping to move the story forward with what one could describe as the visual narratives”. This explanation fulfills the basic definition of costume. Everything wears by the actor will count on costume? This is another issue, to distinguish the accessories belongs to props or wardrobe is quite confused. Nevertheless, costume designer is often much more tend to practical-oriented. The main purpose of wearing costume is to shape and to enhance the character. Costume is not meant to cloth. Unlikely to fashion, costume is not need expensive to show how glamorous or fabulous of the people who wear it. Costume is needed to have such glamorous feeling on screen but it could cost not much. This explains the apparent difference among both of them.
Fashion works on our three-dimensional world but costume is not; film Costume visualizes the actor and helps them to create their character. There are three key qualities in designing the film costume. Color shows the mood and taste; texture shows the economic status; and style shows personality and occupation. Audience get signal from the costume by the shape and color that can be revealed as welcome dor feared. A good costume is able to show the mentality of the character.
CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY
This chapter is concerned with the methodology used in achieving the objectives of the study. It covers research design, study area, population of the study, sample size, sampling techniques, instrument for data collection, sources of data collection, validity of research instrument, reliability of the instrument, administration of the instrument, method of data analysis and decision rule.
Research Design
This study employed the use of survey research design. The choice of this research design was considered appropriate because of its advantages of identifying attributes of a large population from a group of individuals. The design was suitable for the study as the study sought to examine subject matters using The Abia State Ministry of Culture and Tourism as a case study.
The Study Area
This study was conducted in The Abia State Ministry of Culture and Tourism. The choice of this study area was informed by its involvement in the subject matter in the state.
Population of the Study
The population of this study consisted of thirty (30) staff of The Abia State Ministry of Culture and Tourism.
CHAPTER FOUR
PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS OF RESULTS
This section presents the results of the field study; it shows the descriptive information of the respondents, the results of each of the research questions
CHAPTER FIVE
SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION
Summary
This is a study of the costumes of the Ekpe Festival and its relevance now. The study tried to answer three research questions which include identifying and describing the various costumes in NgwasEkpe festival; findings the roles of the costumes and establishing the education value of the festival. Based on these objectives, group oral interview(focused grouped discussion) was carried out among 28 members of staff of the Abia State Ministry of Culture and Tourism who are from Ngwa land and the following findings where made:
- The costumes of the Ekpe festival include: the George wrapper, Ishiagu, OkpuAgu, loin cloths, beads, ichaka and the masquerades.
- That the George is won by men to play complementary role, the Ishiagu depicts bravery and honor for ancestors and that masquerades which is the centre of the festival shows communion between the ancestors and the people of Ngwa land.
- That the festival teaches the young generation of the Ngwa people the history and bravely of an Ngwa man.
Conclusion
This study traces the functions and relevance of costumes in Ngwas Ekpe festival of Abia state. The festival which is one of the major festivals of the Ngwa people in reach in cultural and are usually adorned with different cultural attires. The attires have much significance and lessons to be learnt from. The need to let known these significance and lesson motivated this study.
The study has three objectives which include:
- To identify, describe various costumes associated with the Ngwa-Ekpe festival.
- To find out the roles specific costumes play in the celebration of the festival and
- To establish the educational values of the Ngwa-Ekpe festival and its art elements.
Based on the objective, group oral interview (focused group discussion) was conducted among 28 selected staff of the Abia state Ministry of culture and tourism who are from Ngwa land and a summary of the group interview was taken by the researcher.
Based on the findings of the focused group discussion (FGD), the following findings were made:
- That the costumes of the Ekpe festival include: the George wrapper, Ishiagu, OkpuAgu, loin cloths, beads, ichaka and the masquerades.
- That the George is won by men to play complementary role, the Ishiagu depicts bravery and honor for ancestors and that masquerades which is the centre of the festival shows communion between the ancestors and the people of Ngwa land.
- That the festival teaches the young generation of the Ngwa people the history and bravely of an Ngwa man.
Recommendations
Based on the findings of this study, the following recommendations are made:
- That the festival as whole is not all that relevant to today’s reality, therefore, it should be aligned to any of the Christian celebrations.
- That the use of masquerade for the celebration should be abolished.
- The history should be introduced and taught in schools as way of educating the young generation not through a masquerade celebration.
- That some of the costumes which are locally made can be harnessed and produced in commercial quantity to create revenue for the government and the people.
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