Asafa Dibaba and the Oromo Concept of Anaan’yaa / ‘Civil Imagination’

With great pleasure, we publish here a philological analysis of the Oromo term and concept of Anaan’yaa, presented by the leading Oromo scholar Asafa Dibaba. Based on Oromo poetry and literary wisdom, Asafa Dibaba analyzed the topic in a 208 pages book published before almost ten years; the fact that the author revisits the subject demonstrates its enduring radiation and fascinating impact on the Oromo Kushitic contemplative thought.

Anaan’yaa / ‘Civil Imagination’ - An insight

By Asafa Dibaba

"What is Anaan’yaa all about?" a reader asked. Yes! What is Anaan’yaa all about? I rethought. To help my reader read my poems, should I say what Anaan’yaa is or tell what it means? To say what a poem is may be as much difficult as to say what it means, my reader. Better to tell what a poem does, I thought, than what it is/means. Here you are!

‘Ana’ in Afan Oromo means ‘I’, ‘anaan’ is ‘me’. ‘Yaa’ shows interjection while referring to that someone demanding our sympathy, our care. The shift from the ‘I’ to ‘Me’ is not by simple transformation of the heroic, autonomous "I" to the accusative, receptive "ME". It is a separation of the accusative, receptive self me from the heroic autonomous self I so that the latter overflows the terms of its own empathetic identifications with the beneficiary.

In Anaan’yaa, I think, one finds important ethical considerations in regard to the moral problem of distance. It raises a core problem of temporal and/or spatial moral distance. It argues that the need to share pain or to save life, irrespective of special relationship (kinship, friendship) is a universal human character. Be it virtually by basic instinct, by an instinctive animal sympathy—note Rousseau’s "innate repugnance against seeing a fellow creature suffer"— by an elemental appeal of our animality or be it by conscious expectation of humane assistance, the action to rescue is so impartialist, so universalist a duty of mankind. As a Bad Samaritan would think today, proximity and affiliation/relation (ethnic/love) is a necessary condition for the existence of a duty of beneficence. The further away one were from a human plight, far in time far in place, the less one would be obligated to help, a Bad Samaritan would think.

Beyond the limits of linguistic and/or cultural differences it is all too human to secure those in need, say, someone slipping to fall, or someone in the house under fire. All reasoning that one doesn’t belong to one’s relation, to one’s cultural group may start to creep into our free mind after the spontaneous action to secure someone slipping to fall. That spur-of-the-moment action is accompanied by a word of concern anaan! meaning ‘sorry!’ stretching our hands to reach and to save. When everyone presses the button and cools down the break at once to save the flock of pigeons landed in the street from nowhere, is that not by the pity one can have in killings, in shedding blood, and by the instinct that turns in every one of us to save life, to save nature? It is not culture-bound for a mother to shout anaan!, seeing her child falling toddling. Every one of us, in our basic instinct, we have strong sense of concern towards others, as human, we are compassionate, kind, benevolent, and caring by nature—that is what we all need infantile, of course. And this is beyond the location of culture whatever.

At the heart of the problem of moral distance is that, Anaan’yaa argues, each generation is in a causally asymmetrical position with respect to its successors. Those asymmetrical intergenerational relations cause problem of unfairness and apathy when succeeding generations are temporally/spatially put at odds. Anaan’yaa argues that the problem is the main concern of distinctively intergenerational ethics. The relevance of this problem in the real world is not to be overshadowed by the presence of the future-oriented difficulties. In this respect, the proximity of two human beings—irrespective of their affiliations—is a better bet for a universalist / impartialist moral outlook that does not take as its starting point what we owe those we know and those with whom we already have a connection—a particularist intuition that does not appeal to a universalist foundation.

The unclothed child in the cover-page of Anaan’yaa wins our malevolent being. Children are innocent and beautiful, regardless of where they live. They are as pure and beautiful as nudity. It is easy to identify with their need. Nature is what it is in children. So Natural. But the problem of moral distance is itself problematic. In the bigger world, the needy members of humanity live far away from the affluent and the powerful. Anaan’yaa has a resolution to this: we should begin our moral response to humanity at large with those needy children in our reach, so that we can reach mankind out of our reach.

Anaan’yaa has three major parts: Introduction, Short poems (their mode of communication is monologue, except for one riddle-poem Hibboo), and Long dramatic poems, which are in a dialogic mode of communication. Anaan’yaa draws on Oromo Oral Literature for its aesthetic beauty as well as for the philosophical depth oral literature renders the content of written literature.

In the book there are 27 pieces of poems in toto. Below are some sample poems presented.

Abjuun du’uun
quufa jennaan
garaa duwwaa
diinqa darbeen
eda abjuu koon
Du’ee bule
atis naajjin duute laataa?
Sabbarimee.
Biyyi ba’ee
boo’aa bulee
boo’aa oolee
Ati hinduunee
sabbarimee
ofiis du’aa—
n ofiif boo’aa
Hammaatullee,
baguma abjuu taheef malee!

ah me! my quiet violent dream:
to die in dream is,
it is said, to eat to one’s fill;
see? one may sleep but empty belly;
and one is said to have eaten to one’s fill?
so did I retire last night
to be found dead in the morrow.
you too died in your dream?
ah me! this dream sorrow:
everyone went out to attend
one’s funeral!
forced into the greedy mouth this grave
deep me into, lower me down, force me in.
ah me! it might as well be dream,
what a quiet violent dream!

Poem 4, p42

In Oromo tradition, the death of someone in dream is interpreted as eating/drinking to one’s fill. This implies that the dreamer is thought to be filled with bless, inspiration of great social interest, optimism, and consoling message of promises. In the poem (lines 1 to 6) one can judge that the dreamer has great hope to achieve his or her predestined aspiration, though efforts to achieve his/her wish are distracted by envy, greed and ill wishes.

sareen baasa baaftee
mammaaksa mammaakte:
osuma beeknuuyyii
huubaa ‘jjin soorannaa
sifaa’eef sifaa’ee
dhiifnaan baafnee gannaa
jette jedhan warraan
huubaa wajjin soorraan.

the dog said thus:
we eat with dirt
what Others give us.
though we know it is filthy,
with dirt we eat it.
if settles in our belly,
good; if not
in their face we spit it.

Poem 18, f57

It is said that Anaan’yaa draws on Oromo oral literature for some artistic effects and for the intensity of its poetic contents. This poem is based on the Oromo proverb that When we still know it is impure, but (to survive), we eat it filthy said the dog. Proverbs are used to instruct, to guide behaviours, to comment on social evils.

In the poem above, unequal relationship is depicted by a hungry dog and its hosts who give the beneficiary soiled food. The poem shows some social evils the society is well aware of, and yet preferred to observe attentively and warily. It also sounds like William Blake’s "A Poison Tree" in which the narrator says he lives with his foe awaiting the time for judgment, for the Truth to rule over all Falsity. It points to the apathetic nature of humanity by referring to the wicked act of people to their beneficiaries. See the humble but sheer grievance uttered by the poor animal! (lines 5-8)

In the poem to follow one can share the strong nationalist / patriotic zeal the narrator poses in the reader.

midhaan miti
bishaan miti
kan Biyya
Biyya godhuu
Lafa ‘saafi
Nama ‘saati.

what makes a Nation
Nation (-State),
is not just
what it has,
but what its citizen does
what s/he is.

Poem 9, f48

Fraternity, solidarity and equal opportunity for citizens can arouse strong sense of belongingness and patriotic ardor only where there is love and concern among the citizens. Where there is no love, care, recognition and sense of commonality taken as a duty in the Nation, abundance, excess and overindulgence cannot guarantee peace and solidarity in the State.

In Anaan’yaa, the Oromo time concept is also presented. To present the cyclical, not circular nor linear, the Oromo time concept is a subject of Edas-edanas, the first anthology of my poems, 1997. Here it reads:

kaleessarra bor wayya
hadharra ‘mmoo kaleessa,
bor kunoo hadha ta’ee
hadhi kaleessa ta’ee
meerreree irbuun Gameessaa?

Tomorrow will be alright
yes, Yesterday we said.
here we are Today
(sat on the same cross-road)
Today—a cinder of Yesterday.
Veteran, where are your Promises gone?

Poem 16, p55

This poem is modeled on one geerarsa folk song1 (see below) about the two-way-traffic connecting ‘youth’ and ‘power’ and ‘age’ and ‘experience’.

If youth knew, if age could!2 Yesterday when you were young, you had the power to do almost everything. But you didn’t know what to do. Today that you have got old, you have almost every experience. You are a veteran, astute. But you don’t have the power to make it or break it. Only observations tell you answer to the puzzle you pose. You sit tired, frustrated and blankly immersed in an enigmatic contemplation of the Past. Almost you have forgotten that you made dozens of promises when you had power—promises that were not kept. Now you don’t care for anything as long as you are safe.

In the poem, time was, time is, time would never be again! And life is such a fleeting bad dream.

The poem to follow is also about time and human infirmity to act in time.

yeroo coqorsi yaa’u
yeroo kaloon lalisaa,
bonni indhufaa hinbeekani
yeroo galaanni ciisaa.

when the grass is still green
and the pasture is sprout,
and the river is overflow,
who cares about the dry season
approaching empty wells,
hollow river beds? who cares?

Poem 20, p59

Notes:
1.
boqqolloon Birraa dhufa
aananni Arfaasaa dhufa
humni ganama dhufa
qalbiin galgala dhufa
eessa abbaa kootiin fida
lameen wal bira lufa!

corn does come in the autumn
when milk comes in the spring.
(will-)power comes when one is youth
experience is when one is old
the route betwixt youth and age
is two-way. The two don’t comply!

(also in Edas-edanas, 1997)

2. Draws on William Faulkner’s speech to one graduating class on May 28, 1951.

All the poems in this article are taken from Asafa Tafara Dibaba’s book, Anaan’yaa (1998, 208 pages).