A people’s culture is what distinguishes them from other human societies in the family of humanity. The full investigation of culture in the entirety of its immensity and aspects has a place with the discipline known as humanities, which concentrates on people and finds opportunity to look at their qualities and their relationship to their surroundings.
A people’s culture, as it is typically understood, is a collection of characteristics and traits that distinguish them from other people or societies. These impossible to miss characteristics proceed to incorporate individuals’ language, dressing, music, work, expressions, religion, moving, etc. It likewise proceeds to incorporate a group’s normal practices, restrictions and values. Values here are to be perceived as convictions that are held about what is good and bad and what is significant throughout everyday life. A more full investigation of values properly has a place with the discipline of reasoning. As a philosophical subfield, axiology focuses on aesthetic and ethical values. Because of this, a philosophical analysis of the values and culture of Africa is not only timely and pertinent, but also appropriate.
Besides, the centrality of the spot of values in African culture as a legacy that is passed down starting with one age then onto the next, will be featured. In addition to examining the process of change and the issue of cultural adjustment, we will attempt to demonstrate that African values and culture can be evaluated from a variety of perspectives. Here we desire to show that while positive components of our way of life should be rehearsed and given to succeeding ages, negative elements of our way of life must be dropped to advance a more moderate and dynamic culture.
Before we can have an evaluation of African culture and values, it is vital as far as we’re concerned to have a comprehension of the idea of culture and its significance. This will assist us with wrestling with the issues we will manage in this paper. Allow us now to take a gander at the idea and significance of culture, as this is key to how we might interpret what African culture is.
THE CONCEPT AND MEANING OF CULTURE
The scholar Edward B. Taylor is credited with first coining and defining the concept of culture in his 1871 publication Primitive Culture, which was reprinted in 1958. Taylor saw culture as that mind boggling entire which incorporates information, conviction, workmanship, ethics, regulation, traditions or some other capacities and propensities gained by man as a citizen. The comprehensive nature of culture is captured in this definition. One would have expected that this definition would be a univocal one – yet this isn’t really. In point of fact, there are as many definitions of culture as scholars interested in the phenomenon. A wide range of human phenomena, material accomplishments and norms, beliefs, feelings, manners, and morals are all included in culture. It refers to the standardized way of life followed by a particular group of people who assert to have a common ancestry or descent. Bello’s (1991: ) attempt to capture the encompassing nature of culture 189) defines it as “the whole way of life evolved by a people in their attempts to meet the challenge of living in their environment, which gives order and meaning to their social, political, economic, aesthetic, and religious norms, thus distinguishing a people from their neighbors.” Culture effectively recognizes a group from others, and Aziza (2001: 31) declares that:
Culture…refers to the entirety of the example of conduct of a specific gathering. It incorporates all that makes them particular from some other gathering for example, their hello propensities, dressing, normal practices and restrictions, food, tunes and dance designs, rituals of entries from birth, through union with death, customary occupations, strict as well as philosophical convictions.
Culture is given from one age to another. The obtaining of culture is a consequence of the socialization cycle. Fafunwa (1974:) explains how culture is passed down through generations. 48) composes that:
The child simply adapts to and develops within his people’s cultural heritage. He soaks up it. In traditional society, culture is not taught; it is gotten. The kid notices, soaks up and copies the activity of his older folks and kin. He watches the naming functions, strict administrations, marriage ceremonies, burial service obsequies. He attends the annual yam festival, the coronation of a king or chief, and the dance and acrobatic performances of guilds and age groups or his relatives. The youngster in a conventional society can’t get away from his social and actual conditions.
This shows that each person who experiences childhood in a specific culture is probably going to become imbued with the way of life of that society, whether purposely or unwittingly during the course of social collaboration. To comprehend the concept and significance of culture, we do not need to have all of its defining characteristics and definitions. Despite the fact that there are however many meanings of culture as there are authors, there is a component of comparability that goes through them all. This solitary fundamental trademark is the endeavor to depict and catch culture as the whole or all out lifestyle of a specific gathering. Etuk (2002: 13) is of the assessment that “a whole lifestyle would typify, in addition to other things, individuals’ thought process of themselves and the universe in which they live – their perspective – as such, how they sort out their lives to guarantee their endurance”. It very well may be securely expressed that there can be no culture without a general public. It can likewise be said that culture is exceptionally human and imparted to others in a general public. What is accepted or absorbed from non-members of a particular cultural group is chosen by culture.
A people’s way of life is what we mean when we talk about culture. This surmises the way that there can be no individuals without a culture. To guarantee that there is no general public without a culture would, by suggestion, imply that such a general public has kept on making due with no type of social association or foundations, standards, convictions and restrictions, etc; and such an assertion is completely false. Because of this, even Western scholars who might be tempted to use their cultural categories to label people who are very different from themselves as “primitive” frequently deny that these people have history, religion, or even philosophy; however cannot assert that they lack culture.
We will discuss African culture and use Nigerian culture as an example in this paper. Based on the idea that culture is what distinguishes a people from other groups, it is true that there are numerous cultures in Africa. Africa is possessed by different ethnic identities with their various dialects, methods of dressing, eating, moving and in any event, welcoming propensities. However, despite the fact that Africans come from a variety of cultures, they are distinguished from other peoples of the world by the common values and beliefs they hold. On certain cultural dimensions, a Nigerian culture, for instance, would be closer to, say, a Ghanaian culture than it would be to the Oriental culture of the East or the Western culture of Europe. It is actually the case that culture is general and that every neighborhood or local sign of it is special. Cultural variation is a term used to describe this characteristic of each culture’s individuality. The way of life of conventional African social orders, along with their worth frameworks and convictions are close, despite the fact that they fluctuate marginally from each other. These slight varieties possibly exist when we contrast an African culture and others. There is no doubt that African cultures are vastly distinct from those of other regions or continents. Furthermore, we accept there is compelling reason need to over-work this direct since there are adequate likenesses toward legitimize our use of the expression “African culture”. Here we would make certain to for the most part track down a universe of contrasts and variety in convictions, values and culture. Taking the culture of Nigeria as an example, Antia (2005: 17) states, “Nigerians always behave differently than the French, Chinese, Americans, or Hottentots, because Nigerian beliefs, values, and total thinking are different from those of the French, Chinese, Americans, or Hottentots.”
Culture has been grouped into its material and non-material perspectives. While material culture alludes to the apparent material items what man can fabricate for the motivations behind human endurance; non-material culture includes the standards and mores of individuals. Non-material culture is abstract but has a very pervasive impact on the lives of the people of a particular culture, whereas material culture is concrete and manifests itself in the form of artifacts and crafts. Therefore, norms and taboos, as well as beliefs about what is good and bad, are all examples of non-material culture. From the prior, clearly culture is shared since it comprises of treasured values or convictions that are shared by a gathering, genealogy, and strict faction, etc. Aside from this, culture is dynamic as in it is persistently evolving. Culture isn’t static. We are in good company in this perception as Antia (2005: 17) expresses that “culture isn’t fixed and long-lasting. Assimilation, the act of interacting with and absorbing the cultures of other people, is the constant process by which man alters it. Etuk (2002: 25) has likewise seen that “societies are not static, they change. To be sure culture needs to change; which is resistant to change and wants to stay the same would not be a living culture.” We can see that culture is an adaptive system because people are what carry it and people change their social patterns, institutions, beliefs, and even their skills and work tools. Other aspects of the culture are affected, either directly or indirectly, once one aspect of the culture adjusts or shifts in response to environmental changes. It is essential to comprehend how each component of a culture—such as food preparation, material practices, and greeting styles—relates to the entire system. In this way, we can see that even a person’s culture includes their technology.
Idiong (1994: 46) states, “There are some misconceptions that are widely held about the word “culture.” Such misguided judgments can and frequently lead a few people to have a pessimistic impression of ‘culture’ and all that it represents. Such people cause a commotion and out of nowhere grimace at the word ‘culture’ as they to their eyes imagine disguises, symbol venerating, conventional celebrations and different exercises they consider unusual that go with culture”. This “misinterpretation”, we accept, doesn’t have all the earmarks of being far reaching yet the stance might have emerged from a fractional comprehension of the significance of culture on the grounds that as we will see, culture by and large, and African culture specifically, resembles a two-sided coin. It has soullifting, alluring and positive aspects despite the fact that it isn’t totally insusceptible from a few adverse results. African culture, as described by Ezedike 455) composes:
…alludes to the aggregate of shared attitudinal tendencies and abilities, workmanship, convictions, moral codes and practices that describe Africans. It tends to be imagined as a ceaseless, combined repository containing both material and non-material components that are socially communicated starting with one age then onto the next. Therefore, the entire African heritage is referred to as African culture.
We could see that African culture embraces the entirety of the African lifestyle in the entirety of its structures and consequences.
THE PLACE OF VALUES IN AFRICAN CULTURE
The worth of a thing, be it an article or a conviction, is regularly characterized as its worth. Our beliefs about what is right and wrong are equally treasured, just as an object is regarded as having a high value and is cherished. A worth should be visible as some perspective or conviction which we can live with, live by and might pass on for. To this end it appears to be that values really saturate each part of human existence. We can, for instance, appropriately discuss personal, political, social, aesthetic, moral, and cultural values. We have noticed somewhere else that there are many sorts and groupings of values. As individuals vary in their origination of the real world, then, at that point, the upsides of one individual might be not quite the same as those of another. Life appears to drive individuals to simply decide, or to rate things as better or more regrettable as well as plan some scale or standard of values. Contingent upon the manner in which we see things we can acclaim and fault, proclaim activities right or off-base or even announce the scene or items before us as either lovely or monstrous. Every individual, as should have been obvious, has a few feeling of values and there is no general public without some worth framework (Idang 2007: 4).
Whether we are aware of it or not, our society constantly imposes its values on us regarding what is acceptable, right, and good. We happen in our regular routines attempting to adjust to OK methods of conduct and direct. People who don’t live up to the standards set by their immediate society are reprimanded in some way. On the off chance that a man, for example, didn’t really believe it to be a good idea to make genuineness an individual worth, and it is broadly held by his nearby society that reality telling is a non-debatable temperance, it wouldn’t be some time before such an individual crosses paths with different individuals from his general public. This demonstrates the centrality of values to a culture. It is the most important support for a people’s culture, making it more real and grounded. “All the material and spiritual values of the African people in the course of history and characterizing the historical stage attained by Africa in her developments” (Idang 2009: 142). This basically intends that there is an impossible to miss lifestyle, way to deal with issues, values and world perspectives that are ordinarily African.
In view of social contemplations, a few types of conduct, activities and lead are supported while others are generally disliked. To show the degree of dissatisfaction that followed the infringement of values that ought to in any case be held hallowed, the punishment was at times exceptionally disgraceful, some of the time outrageous. The Ibibio people in Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria, are an example of an African culture that has zero tolerance for theft. Once the thief was caught or convicted, he or she would be stripped naked, have their entire body rubbed with charcoal from head to toe, and given the item they had stolen to carry around the village in broad daylight. The feeling of individual disgrace and the shame the cheat has welcomed on oneself, family, relations and companions would be sufficient to put even the most trying hoodlum down. Antia (2005: 17) says, “What a people hold to be true, right, or proper with regard to those things explains much of the cultural traits by which they become identified.” What Antia refers to as “traits” here could also be referred to as values; likewise Etuk (2002: 22) states, “No group of people can survive without a set of values that hold them together and guarantee their continued existence.”
The study of values—be they moral or aesthetic—covers a wide range of topics in philosophy. To show the major significance of values, it is viewed as a center region in way of thinking, along with information and reality. At the point when we are managing activities that a group consider positive or negative, correct, commendable or reprehensible, we are managing the part of significant worth hypothesis that properly falls under morals or moral way of thinking. Yet, when we are managing an examination of excellence in human expression and specialties of a group, we are managing the part of significant worth hypothesis called feel. It does appear that the aesthetic aspect of value theory can be used to study and evaluate material culture, while the ethical aspect of value theory can be used to study and evaluate non-material culture equally. The non-material and material dimensions of a culture together constitute two related aspects that give a people their unique identity, hence the relationship that exists between ethics and aesthetics. Just as ethics and aesthetics are twin sisters that form or constitute value theory, the non-material and material dimensions of a culture together constitute two related aspects. Having seen the centrality of values to African culture and any culture so far as that is concerned, it tends to be expressed that the upsides of culture give it uniqueness and character. Let us now examine the beliefs and practices of Africa.
AFRICAN CULTURE AND VALUES After examining the concept of culture and its significance, as well as the significance of values to a culture, we want to apply this to the African context. A culture is an encapsulation of various qualities with every one of them firmly connected with one another. For that reason one can seriously discuss social, moral, strict, political, stylish and, surprisingly, monetary upsides of a culture. Allow us now to take a gander at these qualities piece-dinner, as this would give us a comprehension how they manifest in an African culture and the significance being joined to them.
SOCIAL VALUES The beliefs and practices that each society adheres to are referred to as social values. The general public has an approach to directing the convictions and practices that are performed either regularly by its individuals or performed at whatever point the event requests. As a result, we have celebrations, games, sports, and dances that are unique to various societies. The society engages in these activities because it considers them necessary. A few social qualities, particularly in African culture, can’t precisely be isolated from strict, moral, political qualities, etc. For this reason we can see that in a conventional African culture like in Ibibio land (Nigeria), celebrations which were praised frequently had strict suggestions – they finished with penances that were proposed to specific divinities on unique days to draw in their generosity on the individuals from the general public. Social qualities are upheld by standard regulations. They contain those conventional fairs that a group consider essential for their significant endurance. Allow us to outline with a model: the new sweet potato celebration as polished in Ibibio land has an approach to empowering difficult work and really looking at starvation. Any man who bought yams for his family within the first two to three weeks of the festival was ashamed. A man would appear to be too lazy if this were done. Because no one is allowed to do anything at these festivals when it is not time, the society is really disciplined. For example, new sweet potato couldn’t be eaten until the new sweet potato celebration has been commended.
MORAL PRINCIPLES African culture is deeply rooted in moral principles. It has an arrangement of different convictions and customs which each individual should maintain in control to live lengthy and to try not to welcome condemnations on them and others. Infidelity, taking and different types of corrupt way of behaving are firmly deterred and at whatever point a thought guilty party denies a charge brought against him, he would be taken to a diviner or made to make a vow for confirmation of guiltlessness. In Ibibio land for example, ukang (trial) is extremely well known as a strategy for wrongdoing location. The expert soothsayer drops a stone into a pot of boiling oil and asks the suspects to try to retrieve the stone. The guiltless can reach to the lower part of the pot and recover the stone without the hair on his arms getting scorched. However, when the guilty party moves toward the pot, it furies and bubbles over in a way that even the most trying crook would wonder whether or not to try to recover the stone. The apprehension about being made to go through such difficulty or to be stripped exposed and accepted round the local area as on account of taking, sufficiently looks at wrongdoings or the like. African precepts and savvy idioms have a rich store of intelligence. According to Mbiti (1977: ), the African is advised not to engage in evil behavior by the proverbs. 8), are “hence a significant wellspring of African insight and an important piece of African legacy”. African culture has an ethical code that disallows causing damage to a family member, a brother, an in-regulation, an outsider and an outsider, with the exception of when such an individual is associated with an improper demonstration; If that is the case, it is best to stay away from such a person. Even when they die, their bodies would not be buried in a dignified manner in a coffin and grave. Moms of twins were not wanted and were viewed as the harbinger of wickedness, consequently unsatisfactory.
Strict Qualities
Religion in African social orders is by all accounts the support around which each action spins. Consequently strict qualities are not played with. Wherever it is practiced, traditional African religion shares a few defining characteristics. For example, it has the idea of a Preeminent Being which is undetectable and native. It holds that the human soul exists and that the soul does not die with the body. African customary religion additionally has the conviction that great and terrible spirits really do exist and that these spirits make correspondence with the Incomparable Being conceivable. Most importantly, it holds an ethical feeling of equity and truth and the information on the presence of good and fiendishness (Umoh 2005: 68). Africans believe that anything can be given spiritual significance, and their religious beliefs appear to permeate every aspect of their lives. Further evidence that Africans place a high value on their religious beliefs can be found in the worship of various deities on various days. Alchemists and soothsayers are believed to intervene among God and man and deciphering God’s desires to the human. The seers, alchemists and diviners help to smooth out human conduct in the general public and individuals are hesitant to commit offenses in light of the apprehension about being uncovered by the soothsayers and magicians.
POLITICAL VALUES There are political institutions in African society, and the heads of these institutions are respected individuals. The main thing about the customary society is that the political order starts with the family. Every family has a family head; every town has a town head. From these, we have group head or more the faction head, is the foremost ruler. This sort of political course of action is perceptible in the Southern piece of Nigeria. Preceding the approaching of Western colonization and its resulting disruption of the African customary political game plans, African social orders had their gathering of bosses, consultants, religion gatherings, etc. Disloyalty to a leader was considered to be disloyalty to God, and leadership positions were thought to be either conquest or inherited. In Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria, for example, despite the fact that the customary political organization was predominantly extremist, there were still a few balanced governance. The Ekpo cult executed any ruler who attempted to take power. Antia (2005: 145) composes that “such balanced governance were upheld by the presence of mystery social orders, cliques, cultural standards, customary images and articles, different classes of bosses who carried out various roles on the various parts of life”. As a result, we can see that political values are inextricably linked to religious, social, and moral values, among other things. A people’s respect for their political institutions and leaders is based on the political values they hold.
Stylish Qualities
The African idea of feel is predicated on the principal conventional conviction framework which gave vent to the development of the workmanship. Nowadays, art is usually thought of as a human endeavor that focuses on making beautiful things. As a result, an individual’s sense of aesthetic value is brought to bear when they attempt to produce or create things that they find admirable in their spare time. In the event that we view craftsmanship as being worried about the development of stylish articles, then, at that point, we can really say of African tasteful worth that it is colossally rich. Let’s look at an example: the feeling of magnificence of the Ibibio public is embodied in their swelled ladies whom they call mbopo. These swelled ladies are bound to a room where they are taken care of with customary cooking styles. The thought behind it is to set up the lady and make her look as great, sound and lovely as feasible for her significant other. This is typically finished before marriage and after labor. The Western model of excellence isn’t like this. It is many times envisioned as thin looking young women who move in staggered advances. This shows that the African stylish worth and feeling of what is delightful is particularly unique. Stylish worth illuminates a group’s specialties and artworks as it influences their feeling of what is wonderful instead of that which is monstrous. The artist is influenced in his efforts to produce aesthetic objects that are deemed acceptable by the society in which he lives by the aesthetic value of that society.
Monetary Qualities
Monetary upsides of the customary African culture are set apart by participation. The customary economy, which is for the most part founded on cultivating and fishing, was co-usable in nature. For instance, in Ibibio land, friends and family would come and help with farm work not so that they would be paid, but so that if they needed it in the near future, they would be sure to find it. Youngsters apparently provided the fundamental workforce. To that end a man invested heavily in having large numbers of them, particularly guys. The synergetic idea of the African culture made at least two people to pool their assets together and inspire each other financially through the arrangement of commitments called osusu. In addition, they worked together to construct homes and assist fellow members in other ways. At the point when any of them was in trouble, all individuals lifted up and helped that person. Subsequently, we can state unafraid of logical inconsistency that the monetary upsides of the customary African culture, for example, the Ibibio were established on difficult work and participation.
CULTURAL CHANGE IN AFRICA AND THE PROBLEMS OF ADJUSTMENT It is pertinent to examine some of the changes in culture and the difficulties of adjustment. Now that we have looked at some of the values that are characteristic of African culture, it is important to state that these values are inseparably linked to one another and are to be understood in their entirety as African cultural values. Inside this unique situation, “change” signifies a huge modification or stamped takeoff from that which existed previously. Innovation, revelation and dispersion are a portion of the ways by which a culture can change or develop. Innovation, for example, includes the recombination of existing social components to mold new things. Ogbum (1922: 200), on this view, keeps up with that “the pace of innovation inside a general public is a component of the size of the current culture base”. The way of life base or the social components, articles, characteristics and information accessible in all areas of the pre-1600 African culture were restricted in types and variety. In this way, not many developments which could significantly change the way of life could occur. Most machines and utensils utilized then were made of wood, as metal was not a normally known social component of individuals. A canoe, for instance, was the only mode of transportation available at the time. It was entirely made of wood until it was recently upgraded with a motorized propeller and tarp.
Sand, leaves knit into roofing mats, and wooden frameworks were other building materials. Disregarding the presentation of new developments from different societies, most houses are as yet inherent the conventional techniques utilizing customary materials, presumably for financial reasons and sheer traditionalism. Once more, the pre-European-contact African example of trade was fundamentally by deal. The requirement for money didn’t emerge thus none was designed. Exchange by trade, deal without normalized loads and measures and the overall non-legally binding example of trade, all went quite far to cultivate, upgrade and support social fortitude. The presentation of money alongside imported material ancient rarities produced or if nothing else complemented greedy affinities and benefit direction among individuals, in this way step by step articulating social imbalance in view of simply financial standards. Material or social inventions may exist.
Culture can change and grow through discovery and diffusion, in addition to invention. Disclosure, in contrast to development, doesn’t include recombination of attributes however the sharing of information on a current yet obscure thing. The significance of disclosure in culture lies in its utilization as well as when it creates specific difficulties to individuals, which thus transform into innovation for the turn of events and endurance of the general public. Cultural diffusion, or the transfer of cultural characteristics from one society to another through cultural contact, is another process that has the potential to profoundly alter African culture. Dispersion involves deliberate getting of social characteristics from different social orders with which the recipient society comes in touch, or a burden of social qualities on one society by a more grounded society expecting to acclimatize the more fragile society.
The desire to yield to change in the non-marital culture, compatibility of the anticipated change with the existing culture or its flexibility, and the nature and extent of force available to exact or induce compliance all play a significant role in determining the likelihood of reducing the period of culture lag. However, whether people think the new way of doing things is better than what they were used to determines whether it is desirable to accept change in the non-material culture.
In many examples the appeal of respecting change is much of the time intervened and adapted by the similarity of the normal change with existing society. Preservative changes, on the other hand, are more likely to be accepted because they either provide additional options or simply expand the culture by adding new things. These kinds of changes are less likely to be accepted than radical ones.
Presently, it ought to be realized that power has its own cutoff points in achieving change as it is difficult to illuminate all of a group’s lifestyles and form regulations to cover them. Actually, this is where the issue of adapting to change that comes from outside has arisen. The majority of modern Africans struggle to make the transition between the supposedly modern way of life and their primitive beliefs about certain aspects of their culture. For instance, how does the African explain tragedies, accidents, deaths, and other family tragedies? A new Christian convert would go straight to the church for explanation and comfort, but if the church doesn’t respond right away, the person might secretly go to the local herbalist for immediate help. In the event that the alleviation comes, he winds up holding double loyalty – one to his freshly discovered confidence, and the other to his crude convictions. This type of polarity goes past adversities and penetrates most parts of the individual’s life.
EVALUATION AND CONCLUSION
Because values are a part of culture and culture is what makes a person who they are, a person’s values are what make them different from other people. It does appear that cultures always make an effort to uphold the values that are essential to the people’s ability to survive. We can see, for instance, that close kinship relationships are highly valued among Africans. The synergetic idea of the general public that permits individuals to construct houses and work on ranches together is straightforwardly inverse toward the Western individualistic model. In those “bygone times” as some would agree that it was normal to see a neighbor, companion or relative remedying a blundering youngster whose guardians he knows. This depended on the genuine conviction that the producing of a polite youngster would be to the advantage of the prompt guardians, yet additionally the general public. Along these lines, it was trusted that on the off chance that the youngster ended up being a disappointment, not just the close family would endure the worst part: His annoyance could also affect friends, neighbors, and acquaintances. However, today, we see individuals embracing increasingly more family unit designs and the individualistic way of life of the West. To the embarrassment of a friend or neighbor who attempts to correct a child, the following question will be posed: What is your business?” Family relationship ties and love described the customary African culture. Just love would make a local area, for example, to burden themselves through the offer of the results of money crops like oil palm and utilize the returns to instructively uphold a kid who is splendid. In this regard, the synergetic idea of African culture made the general public truly genial.
It is important for the African perspective to treat the climate in which he winds up with deference: The African works with nature rather than attempting to rule it. On certain days, farming was forbidden in order to prevent thieves from reaping where they had never planted. It was against the custom to develop on specific region of the local area or even fish on specific streams for quite a while. This framework, regardless of whether it was established on legend, had an approach to saving and rationing nature. Accordingly, whether deliberately or unknowingly, the general public was ensured an expansion in farming efficiency, which was the pillar of the conventional economy. Today, with the infringement of those traditions and legends, we experience low rural efficiency and bared farmlands on the grounds that the customary qualities that safe-watched the land, have been watered-down and we don’t have the innovative skill to supplant these convictions that have been deserted.
A gander at the African uncovers that conjugal rituals and practices are generally done in accordance with the custom of the general public concerned. The polygamous marriage was more ideal; not on the grounds that the African is normally polygamous as some would agree, but since it was related with abundance, power, impact, societal position and the solid African craving to be encircled by numerous youngsters and relations.
Youngsters were viewed as federal retirement aide and monetary resources and guardians invested heavily in having a large number of them. A man who marries a woman has the expectation that she will have many children for him. If the woman was unable to fulfill this obligation, it was sufficient cause to take a second or even a third wife instead of getting divorced.
As a man gets richer in farmland and crowds of dairy cattle, his kids would give the labor force. As a result, it was desirable for women to continue having children as long as they were successful. From this, it isn’t difficult to see the reason why the primary spouse would compress the husband into taking one more wife to ease her of certain jobs and childbearing. In the past, African women simply continued having children until perhaps nature intervened to prevent additional births. This was because of the demand for children.
Aside from this, inability to compress the spouse to take one more wife would be confused as childishness – that she doesn’t believe anybody should partake in her significant other’s abundance. As a result, she advises her husband to find a new wife so that he won’t be called names. Talbot’s 1969: 136) has seen that polygamy was viewed as right on account of the common circumstances concerning youngster bearing in the conventional society. That’s what he composes “the custom by which a lady is kept from being ‘spoilt’ by a too soon pregnancy or through intercourse being forbidden until the kid is being weaned by exorbitant kid bearing is, generally speaking, stringently kept among most clans”. Childlessness was viewed as a revile and the inability to bring forth male youngsters was accused on the lady since it was accepted that she decides the sex of the kid. Following this, Etuk (2002: 91) composes along these lines:
In my piece of Africa, the lady endures the worst part of assault for childlessness in marriage. The male with the exception of where he is plainly barren, is scarcely at any point thought as the reason for fruitlessness. Since there are no children, the husband will not seek medical attention, even though experts claim that the male factor is much simpler to prove or disprove. For a man to go for examination, is now to point denouncing fingers at his masculinity and that is something no pleased African male needs to expose himself to.
Next to this, a few social orders are as yet rehearsing the framework that on the off chance that a man kicks the bucket abandoning a youthful spouse and young kids, the widow is expected by custom to name somebody in the group of the departed husband for whom she will remain on and satisfy the life-time commitment that she owes her dead husband. Seldom do they stop to ponder the government assistance of the widow and that of the youngsters abandoned by their sibling’s end. These instances demonstrate that some African societies need to change marriage practices and the cultural values associated with them immediately. It creates the impression that while African culture and values have positive, soul-lifting and humanistic-aspects, it likewise has some negative and dehumanizing viewpoints. Preceding the appearance of Mary Mitchell Slessor (1848-1905) in Africa, obliviousness, strange notion and negative qualities made numerous births to be viewed as a harbinger of fiendishness. Udoh (2007:) explains how twins were viewed in those dark times. 103) composes that “one of the twins was supposed to be certified, the other, a fraud. They were both cursed and infected by sharing the same cradle bed; their folks were similarly at real fault for pollution, especially, the mother”. It was thought that having twins was a very bad sign. To save the local area from
the displeasure and rage of the divinities, the twins were killed along with their moms. Mary Slessor ended this custom, so multiple births are now considered multiple blessings. Donations from the general public are accepted without charge to support their upkeep. We experience no anger of those divinities that requested the head of twins today. Twins have grown up to become ordinary, solid, regarded and decent individuals from our general public contributing monetarily, socially, ethically, strategically and mentally to the advancement of the African culture.
The end here is basically that those positive components of our way of life – our synergetic culture, our preservation of nature and, surprisingly, our local expressions, moves and games that offer us fascinating wellsprings of diversion and joy, ought to be empowered given the way that culture should be proficiently imaginative and instrumentally valuable to individuals so that the general public can move starting with one degree of advancement then onto the next. Tragically, a few customary practices can’t be shown observationally and such conflict with the soul of globalization, science and innovation. Because culture is an adaptive system and values play a central role in giving a society its uniqueness, harmful traditional practices that dehumanize people and portray them as unimproved, backward, and without a future should be discarded immediately.