“Given the centrality of various forms of graphic inscription in Dogon cosmology, the cosmogonic potency and role of sign, figure, drawing, trace, diagram, outline, image, mark, design and so on (for all of which the Dogon use a careful, hairsplitting terminology), along with the strikingly tactile, abraided vocality, the grating ‘graphic’ tone and timbre of the song of the Andoumboulou itself, I couldn’t help thinking of the Andoumboulou [an earlier, incomplete form of human in Dogon mythology] as not simply a failed or flawed, earlier form of human being but a rough draft of human being, the work-in-progress we continue to be…The song of the Andoumboulou is one of striving, strain, abrasion, an all but asthmatic song of aspiration.” -- Nathaniel Mackey, Splay Anthem