Final answer:
Music in African society fulfills various roles including fostering community, expressing culture through spirituals and hymns, allowing for nonverbal communication, and serving as a medium to convey emotions, as evidenced by the universal impact of music across cultures.
Step-by-step explanation:
African society employs music for a multiplicity of purposes, serving as a conduit for social cohesion, emotional expression, cultural preservation, and spirituality. One notable function of music in African culture is to create a sense of community, as exemplified by African Americans traveling to rural areas in places like Charleston, South Carolina for countryside dances that persisted even in the face of prohibitive laws post-Stono Rebellion.
Moreover, African American spirituals and hymns are a rich cultural expression that amalgamated West African rhythms with European American melodies, influencing the development of numerous American music genres such as blues, soul, and jazz. Similarly, through nonverbal communication, music transcends linguistic barriers, fostering a sense of unity and shared identity. This concept is supported by research indicating the universal recognition of basic emotions in music, even by communities with no prior exposure to the musical style, such as the Mafa tribe's reaction to Western music in Thomas Fritz's study.
Additionally, music in African-American communities has served as a means of communication, with slave calls and 'patting juba' being prominent examples of this practice. These musical elements not only communicated practical messages but also carried on African drumming traditions and influenced modern American music and dance forms, including the Charleston.