The Light Inside: Abakuá Society Arts and Cuban Cultural History. By David H. Brown. (Washington and London, Smithsonian Books, 2003, xviii+286 p., black/white photographs, colour plates, index, ISBN 1-58834-123-2)

Since Cuba became a major tourist destination in the 1990s, much has been written about society and culture on the island, but few serious studies have appeared. For that reason alone, the publication of The Light Inside is a welcome event. Among the various manifestations of Afro-Cuban culture, the Sociedad Abakuá is perhaps the most difficult to study because of the secret nature of some of its rites, and also because of its controversial history. Since the early part of the nineteenth century, the Abakuá Society has functioned as a kind of male fraternity, and although it has not been considered as a criminal organization since the mid-twentieth century, it is still viewed suspiciously both by the State and by the Cuban people in general, who either fear the brand of brujería [sorcery] practised by the adepts, or simply resent the commitments required from initiates. David Brown takes a novel approach in his study. Rather than beginning with a general description of the Society and its practises, he adopts a micro approach, bringing the reader right into an Abakuá lodge in Havana, in order to begin working towards his goal of understanding the Abakuá through its art forms. His two principal informants are the late guardian of the lodge’s objects, and the recent renovator of the objects. The study is both historical in that it observes the changes in Abakuá arts since the nineteenth century, and ethnographic in its detailed analysis of objects presently found in the lodges. The fieldwork carried out with Jesús Nasakó, the objects’ renovator, is particularly relevant, because the informant was willing to explain the meanings he ascribed to the objects he modified. The first part of the book is an in-depth study of “things Abakuá”: banners, staffs, costumes, masks, drums and various altar objects, including a historical account of how the objects have been viewed at different times. The second part examines the “changing discourses” (8) surrounding Abakuá arts in Cuban society. Separating the two parts are 29 colour plates that beautifully illustrate Abakuá arts. Readers who are mostly interested in the place occupied by Afro-Cuban culture in the dominant discourses in Cuban society as the country evolved from colonial to neo-colonial status and finally through a Revolution in two phases (before and after the collapse of the Soviet Bloc) will no doubt be interested mainly in the second part of the book. The first part, in which entire chapters are devoted to topics such as the forms of drums used in Abakuá lodges and the types of costume worn by the íreme figure in Abakuá ceremonies, will be of particular interest to students of Afro-Cuban artistic practises. As the author states, “Previous treatments of Abakuá art and ritual have limited their interpretations to the level of generalized symbolic meanings” (4). David Brown’s intricate ethnographic analysis of Abakuá objects intends to uncover the meanings of particular objects, and to frame these within the context of Cuban cultural history. In order to arrive at a historical understanding of the Abakuá phenomenon, Brown dwells heavily on earlier studies, and in particular on the works of the two figures who are, arguably, the most important Cuban ethnographers of the twentieth century, Fernando Ortiz and Lydia Cabrera. The latter is a figure reminiscent of Carmen Roy and Helen Creighton in Canada, while the former, whose work spans a period going from the beginning of the century until the 1960s, contributed greatly to changing attitudes towards Afro-Cuban belief and culture. One of the lasting effects of the publication of The Light Inside will no doubt be the attention it will …