At the Back of the Black Man's Mind
by R. E. Dennett (1906)
This book is by turns detailed, incoherent, and frustratingly
colonialist. Nevertheless, it is written by an intelligent
and sympathetic European observer who spent many
years studying West African folklore, culture,
and religion at the turn of the 19th century. It is useful
because it goes into much greater detail than any other book
from this period about Bantu and Yoruba
spiritual practices and philosophy.
The problem is that it presents some very half-baked theories as
to the significance of this data, which should be treated with
great caution.
By reading this book critically we can glimpse
a system of nature worship,
sacred kingship, and shamanism from before the colonial era,
and get a hint of a very complex philosophy of
esoteric corespondences which rival the better documented systems
(e.g. the Upanishads, the I Ching and the Qabalah). - JBH.
