Songs and dances in Zambia: familiarity

Songs and dances in Zambia: familiarity. Chibale is a relatively small area, which most of the inhabitants consider to be a single, Lala, culture. And, it has many musical occasions. Still, little more than 25% of all musical genres are generally known.¹‘All musical genres’ meaning: all genres still there and still remembered.

Familiarity with musical genres

Songs and dances in Zambia: familiarity. See List 6.

We see that almost everyone knows (mentioned or recognised) 9 (27%) names of song and dance genres. Quite some people know the next 12 (36%) names and only a few know the remaining 12 (36%).
Many will classify a song and, to a lesser extent, a dance by referring to the occasion or to the purpose it has or its context has. This may explain why names of musical genres are not as well-known as the names of musical instruments.

The general public is not very familiar with some of the names that specialists consider very important. 42% (1980s) resp. 30% (2000s) of the population do not know cinsengwe, 67% resp. 55% cimbwasa and 88% resp. 88% cinko.

Changes in familiarity over the years

Songs and dances in Zambia: familiarity. The area opened up in the period between the first two and the third surveys. It saw a large growth in christianity and more wealth (less poverty). Nevertheless, the familiarity with musical genres did not change very much.
The number of times that women sang together decreased considerably in the course of the 20th century. And people stopped performing the Cisungu around 1950. This makes cimbwasa and the names of many of its subtypes among the least known types of music in the 1980s surveys. In the 2000s, with the reviving of cisungu and women’s music, we see next to the familiarity with the maenge, an increase in the familiarity with kaonge and cimbwasa. The familiarity with other names of women’s songs and dances almost, but typically not completely, dropped to zero. This is not related to the extent to which women’s music was appreciated. For instance the two women’s songs in Survey 1987 were very highly appreciated by the respondents.