S.A.M - Strong Afrocentric Mindsets

I have been watching and listening to the hair debate from the sidelines for a while. I must admit that I find it quite amusing because I cannot believe that we are actually allowing this to be such a divisive subject. For those who might not be aware of it, in the black community there is a lot of back and forth regarding women who choose to either wear weaves or extensions versus those who choose to go natural. A lot of the time, particularly in Africa, it is the men who are very vocal about being against weaves (even though that does not stop them from being with weave wearing ladies or paying for those weaves.... anyway I digress). Apparently wearing a weave is an indication of lack of self love, that you are not proud of being black and therefore are trying to be white. The other is that you are not proud of your God given gifts........ (please!) Some even go as far as to say fake hair, fake nails, fake face (make-up) equals fake person. Well, let me tell you this, as a w

In my African Philosophy lecture today I was made aware of something that I never thought I suffered from. Our lecturer gave us an exercise to do. She asked to take a piece of paper and write down , without thinking, the first 5 things that came to mind about Africa; and the first 5 things that came to mind about Europe.  The results were a big surprise! In a class of about 6 students doing their Masters in African Studies, we were all guilty of seeing Africa in a negative light. Some of the words that came up were ones you would expect from people outside of Africa, who have only been exposed to Africa through media accounts about the continent. This made me realize that even though as Africans we know better, the way in which Africa is constantly portrayed has led to our minds being colonized and in us looking at Africa through western viewpoint. What was even more amazing to me was that I had this white Afrikaans woman, telling me, no correction, showing me that my mind i

I have been travelling been doing a lot of travelling lately and it has given me the opportunity to into contact with an array of people. My recent travels to Lusikisiki have had a great impact on my life. I’m a facilitator which involves some teaching yet this time around I was the one schooled. This particular group consisted mainly of males in their late 40s to late 50s, who would be considered as mature to elder in the African traditional sense. They were not shy to relate their life experiences and impart nuggets of wisdom. One of their gripes about the modern generation was that we never listen; we think we know everything when we don’t. They said that as highly educated as we are, we lack wisdom and that it is something that cannot be found between the pages of a book. There is a Xhosa proverb that says “inyathi ibuzwa kwabaphambili” meaning that one learns through asking, speaking to and listening to who’ve been there already. Taking into account what they told me and wh

Limpopo Boy Initiates Initiation is one of the widely practiced practices in Africa. It is a rite of passage that both boys and girls go through. Rites of passage are an important part of a person's life because they mark the transition from one stage of life to the next. They exist because of the four main stages we go through namely birth, maturation (transition into adulthood), reproduction (marriage and procreation) and death. They help young people navigate the dangerous period between childhood and adulthood and have been proven to have a positive psychological effect on the individual going through it. The absence of rites of passage in some societies have led to the youth creating their own badges of adulthood which vary from obtaining drivers licence, 21st birthday celebrations, experimentation with drugs and alcohol and other dangerous ceremonies. It is apparent that rites of passage are an important and integral part of the human psyche and that in their absence, hu

The "Dark Continent" is a 19th century expression which was used to describe Africa. It is an image of Africa through the colonialists' eyes. It is the perception that Africa is riddled with death and famine, full of mysterious customs and superstitions and a people who are as savage as their land. This view of Africa is still present even today. This will not change not until openly racist books like Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness", which dehumanizes Africa and celebrates this dehumanization stop being listed among the greatest works of art. Those who have studied the book will attest to the racism displayed by Conrad throughout the book. This book is just another symptom of the fact that white racism against Africa is such a normal way of thinking that its manifestations go completely undetected. More recently the term has been used when linking HIV/AIDS, war and famine to the continent; as if it is an explanation for why these things seem to be p

I was present at the Daily Dispatch indaba where Professor Vilakazi presented his model and introduced his book and I must admit that what he said made a lot of sense. Reading the note below he outlines his ideas but goes deeper in terms of the reasons for the economic disparities in South Africa. This is definitely worth the read and would recommend it. At the indaba agriculture was not the only sector he said we need to focus on, the manufacturing sector was another sector he highlighted. In his speech he emphasised the fact that South Africans need to move away from office based ventures that are part of the tertiary economic sector and only provide employment to the middle to upper class. We should focus on primary and secondary economic sector ventures so as to create employment that is needed by labour workers. To get a better understanding of the what Prof Vilakazi refers to I have included some notes on the economic sectors. And a lot of our industries like mining industry