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Over-Making Nyanga: Mastering “Natural” Beauty and Disciplining Excessive Bodily Practices In Metropolitan Cameroon

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 May 2019

Jacqueline-Bethel Tchouta Mougoué Open the ORCID record for Jacqueline-Bethel Tchouta Mougoué [Opens in a new window]
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Abstract:

This study examines how Anglophone urban elites in 1960s metropolitan Cameroon negotiated local and global ideas about culturally constructed forms of “natural” black beauty. Formally-educated Christian urbanites, such as freelance female journalists, who often worked as civil servants, sought to discipline women’s bodily practices and emotional expressivity in order to regulate the boundaries of perceived feminine respectability and to define a woman’s “natural” beauty, a descriptor with both internal and external implications. The language they used included both local terms such as nyanga, a Cameroonian Pidgin English word for varied ideas about beauty and stylishness, and standard English terms. This specific use of language illustrates the hybridity of understandings of natural beauty and bodily comportment, painting a distinct African imagery denoting the social progression of black Cameroonian elite subcultures.

Résumé:

Cette étude examine comment les élites urbaines anglophone du Cameroun métropolitain des années 1960 ont négocié les idées locales et mondiales sur les formes culturellement construites de la beauté noire « naturelle. » Les citadins chrétiens formellement éduqués, tels que les femmes journalistes pigistes, qui travaillent souvent comme fonctionnaires, ont cherché à discipliner les pratiques corporelles des femmes et leur expressivité émotionnelle afin de réglementer les limites de la respectabilité féminine et définir la beauté « naturelle, » un terme aux répercussions internes et externes. La langue utilisée comprend deux termes locaux tels que nyanga, un mot camerounais en pidgin anglais pour exprimer les idées variées sur la beauté et l’élégance et des termes anglais standard. Cet usage spécifique du langage illustre l’hybridité de la compréhension de la beauté naturelle et du comportement corporel, peignant une imagerie africaine distincte et indiquant une progression sociale de sous-cultures élites camerounaises noires.

Resumo:

O presente estudo analisa o modo como as elites urbanas anglófonas e metropolitanas dos Camarões negociaram as ideias globais e locais acerca das várias expressões culturalmente construídas de beleza “natural” negra. As elites urbanas, inicialmente educadas segundo os princípios cristãos – como por exemplo as jornalistas freelance, que eram muitas vezes funcionárias públicas – procuravam disciplinar as práticas corporais e a expressividade emocional, de modo a regular os limites da representação da respeitabilidade feminina e a definir o conceito de beleza “natural” da mulher, um descritor com implicações internas e externas. A linguagem utilizada por estas elites incluía termos locais, como nyanga, uma palavra que em pidgin inglês dos Camarões significa uma série de ideias sobre beleza e estilo, assim como termos em inglês. Esta utilização específica da linguagem demonstra a natureza híbrida do entendimento acerca da beleza natural e da postura corporal, revelando um imaginário africano muito próprio, indiciador da progressão social das subculturas da elite camaronesa negra.

Keywords

Cameroongenderbeautybodily practicespan-Africanism
Type
Forum: Bodily Practices and Aesthetic Rituals in Twentieth- and Twenty-First-Century Africa
Information
African Studies Review , Volume 62 , Issue 2 , June 2019 , pp. 175 - 198
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 2019 

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