會說話的鼓

2024-01-22 11:43:22山東李全忠

瘋狂英語·新悅讀 2023年12期

山東李全忠

主題語境：語言與樂器篇幅：331詞建議用時：6分鐘

非洲有一種鼓，它不僅是樂器，可以演奏，還可以精確模仿當地的約魯巴語，所以它被稱為“會說話的鼓”。

1West African talking drums known as dùndún can accurately copy speech with a remarkable level of detail, new research found.The study compared 30 verbal recordings—both spoken and sung—in the Yorùbá language with excerpts of drumming performed by professional dùndún drummers in Nigeria.

2The new research found that the drums mimic (模仿) the spoken word closely when they're played in a“talking”mode,but not when they are used for purely musical purposes.“The talking drum is unique.For one thing,it has a foot in both language and music camps.For another, its existence reminds us of the thin boundary between speech and music,”said the lead author,Cecilia Durojaye.

3Yorùbá is a tonal language that uses three distinct tones at different frequencies.Similarly, the drums have three main tones, using rising and falling pitch to reproduce speech sounds.This allows the instruments to imitate Yorùbá oral literature, including the emotion of spoken words.

4In a previous paper, Durojaye and her colleagues noted that Yorùbá drummers use the dùndún as a“speech surrogate (代替)”to communicate announcements, warnings,prayers, jokes, proverbs and poetry.According toEncyclopedia Britannica, skilled dùndún players use the instrument to offer up ritual praise poetry to a king.

5Durojaye's paper,completed at the University of Cape Town in 2019,won the African Studies Review's 2020 annual prize for the best Africa-based doctoral dissertation.Her graduate work focused on the dùndún's role in conveying emotion and information.

6“This speech surrogate functions in the spread of Yorùbá oral history, recitation of various forms of Yorùbá poetry,saying proverbs and even informing a king about the arrival of guests,”Durojaye said.“The drum texts can also be humorous and they can be a form of advice or prayer.”She added that when the drums are used as speech surrogates, they're performed without accompanying songs or vocals.When played alongside vocal music or poetry,however,the instruments are performed in a purely rhythmic fashion.