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ARCHITECTURE AND IKWERRE CULTURE: HIDDEN DIMENSIONS
Napoleon Ono Imaah
; Rivers State University of Science and Technology, Department of Architecture,
Sažetak
The culture of a people determines their architecture. However many circumstances obliterate some vital aspects of their culture and invariably their architecture. This situation leads less critical
historians to an erroneous conclusion that some people, particularly
Africans, south of the Sahara, do not have a history. The reasons for these risible conclusions represent the absence of visual
information about the concrete records of achievements. Visual
absence is often confused with virtual presence on the premise that
seeing alone confirms believing. Generally, people measure the
history of world science, technology, and the arts in artefacts and
architecture; hence, they regard any culture lacking documented
physical and visual evidence as primitive. Happily, historians are
now becoming more informed as science and information
technology now reveal what was invisible. Our attention focuses on
Ikwerre people generally, but particularly on those who are resident
in Evo/Apara, Rebisi/Port Harcourt, and Obio/Akpor kingdoms,
whom the unbridled expansion eroding the building culture of the
Ikwerre people, mostly challenges. Since the Ikwerre people,
according to Woke et al. (1993:20), Prof. Echeruo (1993), and
Chief Ichegbo (1992:14) respectively, have several versions about their origins and times of arrival at their present abode, there are bound to be marginal variations in their customs according to communities. According to Ogwutum, S. (1996), these variations do not change the fact that "iwhuruoha bu otu" or "Ikwerre bu otu" which means that the Ikwerre people are always together as one indivisible people.
Ključne riječi
Ikwerre people; folk architecture; cultural heritage; community; custom and tradition
Hrčak ID:
24610
URI
Datum izdavanja:
23.6.2004.
Posjeta: 10.308 *