Motifu ya sanaa za maonyesho ya jadi katika tamthilia ya kiswahili: mfano wa mashetani, pungwa, ngoma ya ng’wanamalundi na mashetani wamerudi

Abstract

This thesis is the result of an investigation into the use of devices of African perfomance drama and cultural heritage in the constructon of the Kiswahili play. The research was based on three objectives. First, the identification and analysis of the use of different forms of traditional African perfomance drama items. Secondly, the research sought to establish themes developed by the African performance drama items used in constructing the selected Kiswahili plays. Thirdly, the research sought to establish the generational changes and developments that may have manifested in the Kiswahili play in the almost fifty years of its existence. In the investigation, the researcher analyzed four Kiswahili plays which were sampled purposively for the use of African performance drama as an archtype used in designing and constructing the modern Kiswahili play. The reseacher used purposive sampling technique in selecting four Kiswahili play texts published between 1971 and 2016 (almost fifty years), which through pre-reading depicted the use of drama items, themes, characterization, styles and methods only found in the various traditional African performance drama. The play-books analysed were Mashetani, Pungwa, Ngoma ya Ng’wanamalundi and Mashetani Wamerudi. The research took a descriptive format. Data collection was done through intensive reading where different texts and literature related to the research topic were read and analyzed to identify and establish different forms of African performance drama devices used in constructing the Kiswahili play. Data was analysed and presented descriptively based on the three objectives of this reseach. The analysis was guided by two theories namely; New Historicism by Greenblatt and the theory of Inter-textuality by Julia Kristeva that enabled the researcher to identify the different African performance drama items, their style and methods adopted by Kiswahili playwrights in constructing a typical modern Kiswahili play. The inter- textuality theory enabled the researcher to comparatively identify texts and the history of the themes adopted from African performance drama by the playwrights in a span of almost fifty years of the construction of a typical modern Kiswahili play. The inter- textuality theory also enabled the researcher establish the freedom of the Kiswahili play author in making reference to African performance drama items in their plays and in analyzing their style, methods and themes like the use of story telling techniques, dancing and singing skills, reciting of oral poems, oratory, characters, and themes adopted from African performance drama to reconstruct and realize a new and typical modern Kiswahili play. The research findings revealed that Kiswahili playwrights had defied the adoption of the Aristotolian style play and adopted inter- textually the use of many different items, styles, forms and themes borrowed from traditional African performance drama to construct a hybrid typical form of the Kiswahili play. It also emerged that the adoption of the use of items of traditional African drama in the construction of the typical hybrid Kiswahili play contributed to the opening up of new styles of creating a Kiswahili play, that have enhanced the aesthetics of the play and that have brought out the themes of the author. It was concluded that traditional African drama has been used creatively in the construction of the Kiswahili play and that its use in the Kiswahili play has also contributed to the preservation and maintainance of the African culture.