Welcoming Spirit Home: Ancient African Teachings to Celebrate Children and Community [Hardcover]

Sobonfu E. Some (Author), Eagle Brooke Medicine (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1999

A natural sequel to Sobonfu Som's book on ritual and intimacy, Welcoming Spirit Home draws on the wisdom of the African ancestors to show how to build communities where children are not only welcomed but prized. The author demonstrates how ritual and the spirit can be used to enrich daily life.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

On a spiritual and global level, readers would be hard-pressed to find a better book on family values than Welcoming Spirit Home. Author Sobonfu Some, whose name means "keeper of rituals," narrates this collection of stories and traditions from her native tribe--the Dagara of Burkino Faso, Africa. Children are considered the soul of each village, according to the Dagara people, and as a result the tribe has numerous rituals that celebrate the arrival and raising of young ones. Page by page, Some explains these many exotic and loving rituals--from helping grandparents and babies bond to activities that support a "child's sense of worth." Even a woman's conception is cause for enormous community pride. Elders bathe the mother-to-be, dress her up, and then "introduce her and the incoming soul to the community." Everyone kisses her belly and sings songs of welcoming and joy. The tribe's simplistic lifestyle and genuine happiness seem to stem from its strong connection to the earth as well as the honoring of all tribal people--even the unborn.

"This is a teacher who can help us put together so many things that our modern Western World has broken," according to jacket quote by Alice Walker. This is, in fact, Some's underlying mission--with the entire back section devoted to how readers can adapt these beautiful Dagara rituals into a Western lifestyle. --Gail Hudson

Product Details

• Hardcover: 141 pages
• Publisher: New World Library (September 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1577310098
• ISBN-13: 978-1577310099
• Product Dimensions: 7.2 x 5.4 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #796,827 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #6 in Books > History > Africa > Burkina Faso

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

18 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Sacred New Tools from Ancient Cultures, October 5, 1999

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[e-mail] (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Welcoming Spirit Home: Ancient African Teachings to Celebrate Children and Community (Hardcover)

This book has placed Sobonfu on my list of truly inspirational leaders. I was inspired, impressed and entertained by the concise, vivid and useful information provided in this book. It provides a vision of spiritual community, plus a few simple techniques for those who are ready to make their first steps in that direction.

Principles like the ones outlined in this book will help improve our communities, and put spirituality back into its place as paramount to our well-being.

A must-have for parents, teachers, midwives, family counselors, and administrators who want to improve the quality of life for the children they take care of.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Reading this book will make life better, more meaningful, April 10, 2003

By 

Phil Rogers (Ann Arbor, Michigan) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Welcoming Spirit Home: Ancient African Teachings to Celebrate Children and Community (Hardcover)

The people of the Dagara culture relate to us that children have themselves recently re-emerged (via being born) from the world of the spirit, of the ancestors. They are fresh and full of wonder at being here, still very expressive of the spirit of the other world in all its truthfulness and spontaneity.

Sobonfu's husband [Malidoma Patrice Some] has covered very incisively the funeral and male initiation ceremonies in his three books; Sobonfu, by contrast, goes much more than he (given the stated topic) into such things as the pre-conception naming ritual. Then there is the ritual asking the child [before birth] what he/she is coming to life to be, to accomplish within the community. Then everyone in the community will be able to help the child in every way possible to grow into the person that he/she would be.

And there is the welcoming ceremony done for every child, each who has come on this long journey from the land of the ancestors to the land of the living. One beautiful feature of this is that the other village children (standing together in the next room) imitate the newborn child's first cry as accurately as possible to let the newborn know he/she has come to the right place.

Sobonfu goes into exquisite detail describing the bounteous relationship between children and their grandparents. The old ones are all getting closer to the world of the ancestral spirits, as they are approaching closer to the time they leave this world, whereas the young ones are most familiar with that world, having recently returned from there.

In another chapter she discusses how and why miscarriages occur, how strongly they affect the community (especially the mother and other close relatives), and what this has to do with the world of the ancestors. Then she articulates, once again, the rituals which attend the phenomena to help the grieving process that occurs as a result of this emotionally and spiritually traumatic breach [in the thin, permeable barrier between village life and that of the world beyond].

And there is the bonding ritual [re-commitment between husband and wife], the fertility ritual, and the bonding ritual between the child and its grandparents, as well as other ancillary activities.

Through all these examples she effortlessly and courageously articulates the vision the Dagara have of their life and community, so seamlessly it astounds you - the dawning of this worldview almost sneaks up on one as it gradually takes shape, almost from within the reader's subconscious. Her writing is the equal of that of her husband, as she dynamically melds all aspects together into an interpenetrating, wondrous whole.

"Children are the life-givers, the healers, the messengers of the ancestors. They bring out the spirit of the community - they bring spirit home. Children are embraced, celebrated and supported, for without them there would be emptiness in the hearts of all villagers." [p. 85]

In her last chapter, she recapitulates and outlines in detail how to perform all of the rituals previously mentioned, for the benefit of those here in the West who would like to transit to this most humanizing and spiritual form of community in their own lives. She first gives a summary of how to set up a ritual in general (and how it usually should flow), after which she tells about how dreams and/or storytelling can have a role, as well as how and why healing and integration can take place. For healing of hearts and souls in the community is, if not the primary focus for a given ceremony, always [at the very least] a significant by-product.

For more on the subject of African childrearing and educational practices (as well as how this affects an economy in which women do all the farming), this time from a Kongolese (central African) point of you, be sure to check out the slim volume by Fu-Kiau and Lukondo-Wamba, titled 'Kindezi - the Kongo Art of Babysitting', available at a number of fine university libraries around the world.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The gift of children truly appreciated!, June 24, 2000

By 

"blvdcaroln" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Welcoming Spirit Home: Ancient African Teachings to Celebrate Children and Community (Hardcover)

I loved reading this book! It helped me to understand so much about my life. The since of community and love that is transfused into the children that are cared for by the methods in this book is a story that needs to be told.The rituals sound wonderful and I only wish that I had this knowledge prior to the birth of my children.This is a book about healing as well as love and honor for all of nature.This book gives wonderful information to instill pride in my African heritage. Prayer and intent are also stressed in this book and I find both to be very powerful forces in my life.