Debunking Cultural Myths:

Something very interesting happened two weeks ago. It all started with Raila Odinga – a true man of the people and a true son of the soil (one who has proven beyond any shadow of doubt that he is ready to take the mantle of leadership come 2012 and unless something very dramatic happens – he is the man to watch). Anyway, this gentleman, decided to take the bull by its horns. He traveled to the Lakeside country and dropped a cultural bomb declaring that "research has now proved circumcised men are safer from the scourge compared to those who are not." Raila continued, "I am taking the challenge of calling upon elders in the Teso, Luo and Turkana communities to ensure people embrace circumcision of boys, although it has not been part of their culture."[1]

For obvious reasons, Raila’s challenge was heavily condemned while others openly commended him for his courage. Some questioned the validity of the claim that male circumcision reduces the risk of infection with AIDS. I am not proposing to debate with any of these sides. We all know, and I am sure Raila is not ignorant of the fact that, circumcision is not the panacea for HIV/AIDS. However, underlying Raila’s bold stand is the fact that culture is not static and there is no such thing as “no-go” area in matters cultural. Ironically, as we argue about whether men of the lake should get the cut or not, men in Kenya are still sending their daughters to bush doctors to make them real “women” and “fit ins”.

What then do we mean by culture? When men declare that Raila is wrong on this since it is “my culture” and nobody should mess with it, what do they exactly mean? Culture ought to be understood in three levels. First, it refers to the systems or frameworks of meaning within which interpretation of the world is carried out as well as guidance on how to live in such a world. Culture embodies beliefs, values, attitudes and rules of behaviour. Secondly, culture can be understood in terms of rituals in which the community embodies and re-enacts their history and values. Finally, culture is understood to include the artefacts and symbolisation that become sources of identity.

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o one of our best interpreters of culture summarises culture as an embodiment of a people’s “values, those aesthetic and moral qualities that people consider basic and important in their contact and interaction with one another and the universe.”[2] This means that culture includes completely the social realities (present and past) of a community such as economic relations, political structures, and language among others. Through culture, a community develops education, law, religion, literature and art, moral and ideological forces in which the social relations operate. In essence, culture conditions people’s understanding of reality at a particular time and place in history.

What this entails is that culture is not static. In Kenya, for example, culture has changed tremendously within the last forty years. Through globalisation and the development of new emphases and sensibilities, cultural changes have evolved so that old ways of looking at and explaining the significance of the world have become extinct and are no longer credible. Bishop Okullu having seen the potential of misrepresentation of culture cautioned that interpretation of culture does not mean engaging in cultural excavation to resuscitate the Africa of years past. African culture is what we are today and tomorrow.[3] Ngũgĩ amplifies this further when he writes that the past is only useful to us “only as a living lesson to the present… not preserved as a museum: rather we must study it critically without illusions, and see what lesson we can draw from it in today’s battlefield of the future and present.” We must not worship it. It is not possible, as Ngũgĩ asserts, to return to the previous state of innocence but we can do something about our present circumstances.

As such we use culture as a tool with which to understand and interpret one’s reality. In doing so we have to take seriously our experiences and connect them with other realities – that is exactly what Raila did in his recent take on male circumcision in Luo land in light of the HIV/AIDS scourge. We can as well appropriate culture as a tool of liberation, in which we identify positive aspects of culture and promote them while discarding those that are not helpful to human progress and experience. By putting these two aspects of culture in practise, we safeguard ourselves against any form of cultural relativism or/and provincialism. The aforementioned cultural parameters remind us of our commitment to wholeness and enhancement of life.

As such we should commend Raila for empowering us to think and talk about cultural things that for long have been considered “no-go” area. Talk about Cultural Revolution! Kudos Amolo!

[1] The East African Standard, August 18 2008.
[2] Ngugi wa Thiongo, Writers in Politics, 6.
[3] Henry Okullu, Quest for Justice (Kisumu: Shalom, 1997), 54.