Seselelãme: Aŋlɔ-Eʋe Refractions of an African Somaesthetics

This article draws on both personal experience and long-term ethnographic research into Aŋlɔ bodily ways of knowing, as given in the Eʋe phrase seselelãme (perceive-perceive-at-flesh-inside). We use the term refractions in the title to signal how this local “foundational schema” is related to what has been dubbed an African Somaesthetics. We address such topics as body sculpting, kinaesthetic styles, forms of greeting, adornment and the idea of the porosity of selves, and enucleate – that is, explicitly relate all this – to the biotic, organic, and ecosystem qualities of seselelãme. We argue that understanding somaesthetics in Aŋlɔland (southeastern Ghana) requires grasping the significance of interactivity and exploring how body, nature, and spirit dynamically interweave in Aŋlɔ ways of knowing – and becoming, or self-fashioning.