| The events of colonization, Western education and global cultural transformation have contributed to the separation and fragmentation of African cultural elements including the arts. These phenomena continue to undermine the integrated nature of African performing arts and their interweaving into the entire cultural fabric. The Western educational system that has become dominant over the past thirty years has increased the problem of separating African performing arts under subjects such as music, dance and theatre, and the reproduction of new and individual professional artists. This educational system intensifies the alienation of African youths and their ambivalence toward African traditional cultures, including the arts. In addition, the mass commodification of the arts in this contemporary era has affected the educational, communicative and cultural functions of African performing arts and continues to reduce them to a state of entertainment. Furthermore, the growth of evangelical churches and their continuing rejection of African performances in their cultural context are contributing to the decline of the traditional art forms. Moreover, the intensified global cultural interaction has created problems of cross-cultural art education and aesthetic evaluation.;These issues pose a most difficult challenge to African art educators who interact with the young generations. What is needed in this situation is a new curriculum for the African youth, which both reintegrates the African performing arts and places it within a larger cultural fabric. It is not sufficient to base the African performing arts curriculum on the European specialized forms such as music, dance, theatre or visual arts since this approach continues to undermine the integrated and multidimensional nature of African music and dance. Such a curriculum must use African epistemic, aesthetic and pedagogical bases for its development.;In order to propose this alternative curriculum, I investigate Western and African philosophy, arts, aesthetics and education. This curriculum is proposed for the University, Bachelor of Arts, Bachelor of fine Arts, Bachelor of Education, degree programs within and outside Africa, and can be adapted and implemented by elementary schools and colleges, music and dance specialists and any interested people in the arts. I utilize the Eupsilone music and dance as the basic framework for this curriculum and draw from other West African music and dance forms, taking into consideration the African pre-colonial, colonial and postcolonial experiences. |
