Africa must get rid of self-hatred she inherited from colonialism
SHAKESPEARE once asked through one of his fictional characters: “What’s in a name?†The Bard also provided the answer by observing that a rose by any other name will still smell as sweet. It may be true for flowers but for Africans in general names mean a lot. They define our identity; our pl
Dr. Tajudeen
SHAKESPEARE once asked through one of his fictional characters: “What’s in a name?†The Bard also provided the answer by observing that a rose by any other name will still smell as sweet. It may be true for flowers but for Africans in general names mean a lot. They define our identity; our place in the social order within the clan, the community and even the circumstances of our birth. In many cases, our ethnic and cultural identities are either obvious from the names or can be guessed. For instance, if you hear someone called Tanko among the Hausa of Nigeria it means a male child amongst several female children while Delu is for a female child that follows several male ones.
Why am I talking clans this week? One of the hazards of being a self-opinionated columnist is that you get all kinds ofunsolicited responses, requests, invitations and suggestions. Not all of them will be complimentary or flattering.
In this day and age of instant gratification by SMS texts and emails, the responses are bigger in volume. They mostly go unanswered even from the most conscientious columnist. However, in some cases, there are those responses or queries that you simply cannot ignore.
Such were two emails I received recently one asked: “why are you, a strong Pan- Africanist, that we look up to, bearing a foreign, non- African name, donâ€t you have an African name?â€. The other was more direct. The subject of the email ordered: “change your nameâ€.
The text itself pulled no punches: “Please Sir, after a heated discussion on acculturisation and loss of one’s identity, I find it imperative please to bring to your attention that your name does not fit some one of your academic status.
You should know better to be proud of your roots. At first we thought you were an Arab. Why do you have to despise your cultural identity today and take 100% Arabic names? Be proud of your roots and have African names even if not 100%.
Concerned
African students are tired of being asked by Americans: “don’t you have African names?†It is not the first time that I have been asked this question. The answer is a simple truth. I do have ‘African’ names—Abayomi, Amao.
However, they have not stuck like the Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem everyone is familiar with. I did not shed them consciously. They are middle names that no one but my late grandmother and very few older people of my mother’s generation will ever call me by.
The Arabisation or Westernisation of Africans are part of the legacy of both our cultural and material conquest and domination by extra-African forces. That is why during the anti-colonial struggles there was a lot of resistance against foreign names and reassertion of African cultural identities which inspired nationalists to drop their Christian/ western names in favour of African ones.
It also encouraged Africans to avoid anything colonial or Western they can do without such as clothes, food, The earlier generation of non-Christian pupils and students who went to Mission schools were forced to change their Muslim or cultural names.
It is sadly true that several decades after the formal end of colonialism, the colonial mentality is still rampant in the attitude of many Africans about themselves, our societies and our relationship with the rest of the
world.
Many of us are still steeped in inferiority complexes that make us despise anything African and ape the west in the most bizarre ways. The worst expression of this are those mobile human laboratories we call ‘Fanta face coca cola legs’ in Kampala (men and women bleaching themselves in order to become bazungu or at least ‘brown’).
Thus it is still very important to proclaim ‘I am African and proud to be’. In the famous lines of James Brown : ‘ say it loud I am black and proud’. We need to get rid of the self-hatred induced by slavery and perfected under colonialism that makes us seek validation for our humanity.
However, as we struggle for regaining our collective self-esteem and exercise our equality with other peoples it is important that we do so in no chauvinistic ways or become Black fascists seeking a ‘pure African race’. Our dignity should not be built
on notions of superiority to other races or peoples.
We should also avoid turning being African into a kind of identity prison or cultural desert or an island that is not in contact or conversation with other cultures and peoples. We touch other peoples just as they touch us and do so in very fundamental
ways, many of them painful. However, we inhabit and have
to live in the same world, victims and villains.
My second young reader who demanded I change my name did not even consider his own first name which is Michael! Somehow we have been brainwashed into thinking that biblical names are acceptable but somehow Muslim/Arabic ones are suspect.
Being Muslim or Christian or of any other faith and bearing any name should be a question of your circumstance and choice. It should not really matter as long as we are proudly African. I am very happy to remain Tajudeen, son of Africa, doing my best for the mother continent!
SHAKESPEARE once asked through one of his fictional characters: “What’s in a name?†The Bard also provided the answer by observing that a rose by any other name will still smell as sweet. It may be true for flowers but for Africans in general names mean a lot. They define our identity; our place in the social order within the clan, the community and even the circumstances of our birth. In many cases, our ethnic and cultural identities are either obvious from the names or can be guessed. For instance, if you hear someone called Tanko among the Hausa of Nigeria it means a male child amongst several female children while Delu is for a female child that follows several male ones.
Why am I talking clans this week? One of the hazards of being a self-opinionated columnist is that you get all kinds ofunsolicited responses, requests, invitations and suggestions. Not all of them will be complimentary or flattering.
In this day and age of instant gratification by SMS texts and emails, the responses are bigger in volume. They mostly go unanswered even from the most conscientious columnist. However, in some cases, there are those responses or queries that you simply cannot ignore.
Such were two emails I received recently one asked: “why are you, a strong Pan- Africanist, that we look up to, bearing a foreign, non- African name, donâ€t you have an African name?â€. The other was more direct. The subject of the email ordered: “change your nameâ€.
The text itself pulled no punches: “Please Sir, after a heated discussion on acculturisation and loss of one’s identity, I find it imperative please to bring to your attention that your name does not fit some one of your academic status.
You should know better to be proud of your roots. At first we thought you were an Arab. Why do you have to despise your cultural identity today and take 100% Arabic names? Be proud of your roots and have African names even if not 100%.
Concerned
African students are tired of being asked by Americans: “don’t you have African names?†It is not the first time that I have been asked this question. The answer is a simple truth. I do have ‘African’ names—Abayomi, Amao.
However, they have not stuck like the Tajudeen Abdul-Raheem everyone is familiar with. I did not shed them consciously. They are middle names that no one but my late grandmother and very few older people of my mother’s generation will ever call me by.
The Arabisation or Westernisation of Africans are part of the legacy of both our cultural and material conquest and domination by extra-African forces. That is why during the anti-colonial struggles there was a lot of resistance against foreign names and reassertion of African cultural identities which inspired nationalists to drop their Christian/ western names in favour of African ones.
It also encouraged Africans to avoid anything colonial or Western they can do without such as clothes, food, The earlier generation of non-Christian pupils and students who went to Mission schools were forced to change their Muslim or cultural names.
It is sadly true that several decades after the formal end of colonialism, the colonial mentality is still rampant in the attitude of many Africans about themselves, our societies and our relationship with the rest of the
world.
Many of us are still steeped in inferiority complexes that make us despise anything African and ape the west in the most bizarre ways. The worst expression of this are those mobile human laboratories we call ‘Fanta face coca cola legs’ in Kampala (men and women bleaching themselves in order to become bazungu or at least ‘brown’).
Thus it is still very important to proclaim ‘I am African and proud to be’. In the famous lines of James Brown : ‘ say it loud I am black and proud’. We need to get rid of the self-hatred induced by slavery and perfected under colonialism that makes us seek validation for our humanity.
However, as we struggle for regaining our collective self-esteem and exercise our equality with other peoples it is important that we do so in no chauvinistic ways or become Black fascists seeking a ‘pure African race’. Our dignity should not be built
on notions of superiority to other races or peoples.
We should also avoid turning being African into a kind of identity prison or cultural desert or an island that is not in contact or conversation with other cultures and peoples. We touch other peoples just as they touch us and do so in very fundamental
ways, many of them painful. However, we inhabit and have
to live in the same world, victims and villains.
My second young reader who demanded I change my name did not even consider his own first name which is Michael! Somehow we have been brainwashed into thinking that biblical names are acceptable but somehow Muslim/Arabic ones are suspect.
Being Muslim or Christian or of any other faith and bearing any name should be a question of your circumstance and choice. It should not really matter as long as we are proudly African. I am very happy to remain Tajudeen, son of Africa, doing my best for the mother continent!