Research as Vocality: Tracing the African Presence in Naples

Although the presence of Africans in the city of Naples has been well documented since at least the 15th century, personal and collective stories related to such a presence have been neglected or forgotten. As a consequence, African-Italian individuals and communities are still perceived as other. Issues of representation and citizenship within the Italian society have become even more complex as the stream of migration of the l ast decade unfolded. Artists and activists have confronted and challenged such perceptions while using their voices for artistic creations, political statements, and research-based analyses. The international movement that emerged in 2020 following the #BlackLivesMatter protests made their positions prominent, albeit for a limited period of time. The project Research as Vocality will highlight the physical, relational, political and expressive power of their voices, both their singing voices and their spoken voices, while bringing artists and activists at the forefront. In addition, the project will make a fundamental impact as it will center the historical relationships between Naples and Africa in order to build a new and more permanent understanding of contemporary issues of mobility, nationality, divides across race and gender, access to rights and opportunities. The anthropological research of the project is both participative and archival oriented. It draws from the framework of Black Vocality, that Gianpaolo Chiriacò developed at the Center for Black Music Research in Chicago and that is based on dialogical and performative gatherings in which artists and researchers analyze and question historical documentations. Naples is a notable case study within an arts-based research focusing on vocality for i) African slaves appear in Neapolitan musical repertoires as early as the 16th century; ii) Naples hosted in 1940 the main exhibition of Italian colonialism; iii) the city is internationally renowned for its vocal arts. The cooperative research into vocal expressions (songs, rap, spoken word, sermons, etc.) related to the African diaspora in Naples will overturn the difference between artists-as- observed-participants and researchers-as-inquirers. It will rather focus on the work of artists/researchers who contribute on an equal basis to the collective discussion. Primary artists/researchers are Djarah Kan, Napoleon Maddox, and Gianpaolo Chiriacò. Their work will be divided in three phases: 1) a site-specific production, drawing from the performance Twice the First Time, created by Maddox, transformed through the collective work of the project; 2) a second phase in which dialogical and performative spaces will be created. There, cultural meanings and social values of the African presence in Naples will be underlined while emphasizing how voice can help people to navigate barriers between cultural identities and contexts; 3) a final exhibition in Innsbruck.

"Research as Vocality. Tracing the African Presence in Naples" is a project built on a collective, arts-based research approach. A group of artists and researchers, mainly of African origin, conducted an investigation highlighting both the historical presence of Black music in the city and its contemporary scene. What emerged is that Naples is a city where music and activism are closely connected, and artists of African origin have, for at least four decades, been pivotal to that connection. A further finding is the limited public memory and recognition of their presence and significance. The musical activities of artists of African origin are often framed primarily through debates on citizenship and migration. The project actively analysed and challenged that framing. Accordingly, the cooperative ethnomusicological research focused on vocal expressions (songs, rap, spoken word, sermons, etc.) related to the African diaspora in Naples, aiming to blur the divide between artists-as-participants and researchers-as-inquirers. The work was organized into three phases: (1) a series of workshops, meetings, gatherings, and events around Naples (in schools, clubs, and organizations engaged with migration) that enabled initial exploration and the formation of a research team; (2) a site-specific production titled "Twice the First Time in Naples," which created a blueprint for research that operates through-and is communicated by-artistic expression; and (3) a final phase in which members of the research team developed their own micro-projects. The micro-projects culminated in five audiovisual works and four performances, ranging from a historical analysis of the context surrounding the death of Black music icon Miriam Makeba on the outskirts of Naples in 2008 (the documentary "Dove sei, Mama Africa?" by Djarah Kan) to a self-ethnographic account of labor issues in Southern Italy by a Gambian hip-hop artist and entrepreneur (the short documentary "Black Vesuvio" by Samba Ngum and Emilio Tamburini). In addition, the documentary film "Lievete da annanze o' sole," by Halim Mohammed, offers an extensive account of Black musical expressions in Naples in the post-COVID era.