Indigenous knowledge and social work education in Nigeria: Challenges and need for sustainable development

Challenges facing social work education in Africa

There are many daunting challenges confronting social work education in different parts of Africa. These challenges include: a lack of acknowledgement and professionalization of social work by the act of parliament in most African countries (Amadasun, 2019, 2020a, 2020b; Kakowa, 2016; Mwansa, 2010; Okoye, 2014), an over-dominance of Western theories and philosophies in social work curricula in Africa (Mwansa, 2010; Nnama-Okechukwu and McLaughlin, 2022; Osei-Hwedie and Rankopo, 2008; Smith, 2014; Spitzer, 2019; Spitzer and Twikirize, 2019), exclusion of social workers in social policy and development programmes in Africa (Amadasun, 2020b; Kakowa, 2016; Ugiagbe, 2015), a lack of public awareness of the social work role in the African society, a dearth of research on indigenous knowledges (Magni, 2017; Okoye, 2014) and lingering problems of conducting social research in Africa and poor utilization of research findings in problem-solving in Africa (Amadasun, 2019, 2020a, 2020b; Anucha, 2008).

Another key challenge of social work education in Africa is student fieldwork placements as social work educators in Africa, for example, Botswana, Malawi, Nigeria and South Africa, are dependent on Western textbooks due to the lack of indigenous teaching materials. This results in a one-sided narrative where Western ideologies (Western ideology in the context of this study refers to Western methodology, philosophy and beliefs on social work education) are advanced and indigenous knowledges become sidelined in academic curricula. There is also the pressure to train African social work graduates to fit into the global market based on demand for social workers across the globe in the 21st century. Findings based on the experiences of social work educators over the years remain that if social work graduates from Africa are unable to share their indigenous knowledges with colleagues in other continents, then social work education in Africa needs to reconsider its social work curricula.

These identified challenges continue to generate an argument for and against the integration of indigenous knowledges into social work curricula in Africa. Some African scholars, however, assert that social work is a practice-based profession with principles and goals that are universal and therefore should be rightly applied (Amadasun, 2020b; Spitzer and Twikirize, 2019).

The concept of indigenous knowledge

Indigenous knowledge in the context of this article refers to the cultural heritage and histories of peoples that define who they are and what the social world means to them. It is knowledge that is locally generated within a community or communities that takes into cognizance their coping strategies, problem-solving methods, survival strategies and resilience. Indigenous knowledge also takes into account cultural practices, values and skills that people within a geographic location ascribe to events around them, which consequently defines their everyday social interaction within and outside their environment (Magni, 2017; Pearson et al., 2017; Smith, 2014; Spitzer and Twikirize, 2019; Warren, 1991), supported by the Afro-sensed theory and the indigenization theory that is recognized for its uniqueness on indigenous knowledge and cultural approach to problem-solving (Magosa and Shokane, 2019). This study therefore explored indigenous knowledge in the teaching and practice of social work in Nigeria, a major country in Africa. The key research questions were (1) what are the challenges of social work education in Nigeria? (2) How can indigenous and Western knowledges be harmonized in the teaching and practice of social work in Nigeria?

Study area

The study was located in the University of Nigeria, in Nsukka LGA, which is in the Northern part of Enugu State. Enugu State is in the southeast geopolitical zone of Nigeria. The University of Nigeria is recognized as the first fully fledged indigenous university and technically became the first University of Nigeria. The University provides social work courses at undergraduate and postgraduate levels.

Sampling procedure

A phenomenological qualitative research design methodology was used which followed a descriptive and explorative design based on the day-to-day experiences of its participants (Crossman, 2020; Kalof et al., 2008). According to Crossman (2020), the purpose of qualitative sampling is to explain, describe and interpret a phenomenon among a subset of the population. A phenomenological approach provided an opportunity to give a voice and make sense of what participants said based on their lived experiences (Neubauer et al., 2019). The approach was exploratory and allowed participants to tell their stories. The interviewers remained neutral during this process while facilitating the telling of a rich, detailed and reflective account of participants’ experiences and perspectives. As researchers, we acknowledged our own worldview, with its cultural, political and emotional perspectives which could become subjectively intertwined with the study. To address this we, as researchers, made our preconceptions visible and challenged each other to minimize the way in which we impacted upon data collection and interpretation.

The study participants included 10 social work students, four social work educators and four social work practitioners. The study adopted a purposive sampling strategy in the selection of female and male students who were in their third and final years at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, for in-depth interviews. The reason for this was to select participants with sufficient experience for the study acknowledging that the strength and usefulness of qualitative research are not in the number but in the quality of respondents that are recruited (Robinson, 2014; Saunders et al., 2018; Vasileiou et al., 2018). Undergraduate social work students in their third and final years were considered eligible for the study if they had studied social work throughout their university course. Undergraduate students who joined the social work course in their second year of studies were not eligible to participate in the study. Length of time on the course was considered important to be able to reflect on the teaching and practice opportunities provided on the course. Critical incident sampling was used to select four social work practitioners from four different states in Nigeria for key in-depth interviews (KII). Critical incident sampling is useful in generating hypotheses and assumptions about social work practice effectiveness (Rubbin and Babbie, 2008). Practitioners were eligible to participate in the study if their job description identified their posts as core social work and were graduates of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. The purposive sampling technique was also used to select four social work educators from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, who had spent at least 3 years teaching social work courses and had undergone a postgraduate programme in social work from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka.

Data collection

A semi-structured interview guide was used to collect data. While sharing their experience on indigenous knowledge and social work education in Nigeria, we used probes to explore the place of indigenous knowledge and Western pedagogy in the social work curriculum. We also probed on challenges impeding the development of social work education and practice in Nigeria. Questions such as: How is the present social work curriculum, based on your personal experience, effective in projecting indigenous knowledge in social work education in Nigeria? What are the challenges of social work education and practice in Nigeria based on your personal experience? Why should Western pedagogy and indigenous knowledge be visible in the curriculum of social work education in Nigeria? Discussion with social work students and educators were held in different locations based on participants’ recommendation and what was available. For social work practitioners, initial contact was made to establish their willingness to participate in the study after which the interview was conducted via mobile phone.

Data analysis

The data analysis included reflection on the participant’s experiences and interpretation of indigenous knowledge, including the challenges to social work education in Nigeria. These were grounded in the participants’ experiences and views. To begin the process of data analysis, the research assistants recorded the responses using audiotape. Data were then analysed after transcribing the interviews into English. The transcribed discussions were then compared with the recorded discussions by one of the researchers that took notes during the discussion. This was to ensure that the original meaning of what the participants said was retained and not lost in translation while also helping to validate views making the data more reliable (Kalof et al., 2008). After transcription, the researchers compared the contents of the transcripts with the field notes to ensure coherence. Data immersion commenced by repeatedly hearing the audio and reading the transcribed discussion and field notes for familiarization. The data analysis procedure for this study was based on the interpretative phenomenological approach (IPA) having followed the qualitative analysis procedure of data reduction, data display and conclusion (Marvasti, 2004).

The translated data were open-coded, and this was begun immediately after the translation of the data to avoid memory loss. The coded data were further checked by other researchers, grouped and categorized. This was done to ensure that codes with similar characteristics were grouped together thematically. Thematic analysis is a method of data analysis that is often used with IPA to clarify thematic clusters and arrive at key themes (Braun and Clarke, 2014; Creswell and Creswell, 2018). We then went further to identify patterns of meaning in the data by the details given by the participants. According to Larkin and Thompson (2012), when patterns are identified, the researcher can draw themes together into some kind of structure. To add greater rigour to our data analysis, the analysis with relevant discussions was handed to two academic peers who were not part of the research team for further examination. Their insights contributed to the final checks on the analysis. These exercises are in line with peer debriefing in qualitative research (Padgett, 2008). Finally, contextual or special connotations that addressed the research questions were noted and pulled out as illustrative quotes from the thematic cluster to exemplify the key issues below.

Ethical approval

All interviews were carried out with the voluntary consent of participants and anonymity was assured to all study participants, who received a personal information sheet sent through their emails to indicate their willingness to participate in the study. Ethical approval for the study was given by the Ethical Review Board of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka.

Demographic characteristic of study participants

All the study participants had an academic background in social work. A total of 10 undergraduate students (five males and five females) participated in the study. The ages of undergraduate students ranged from 22 to 27 years. Six of the undergraduate students were in their final year while four were in their penultimate year. A total of four social work practitioners (two males and two females) aged between 30 and 49 years participated in the study. The practitioners were employed as a Children Protection Officer, Youth Care Coordinator and Social Welfare Officer and Social Development Officer (also known as social workers). Four social work educators (two males and two females) from the Department of Social Work, University of Nigeria, Nsukka, participated in the study. The ages of the social work educators ranged from 25 to 42 years, and all have spent at least 3 years teaching social work courses in the department.

Social work education in Nigeria: A one-sided narrative

Findings from the study revealed that most (14/18, 78%) study participants agreed that social work education in Nigeria was based more on Western knowledge than on indigenous knowledge. For these study participants (mainly social work students and practitioners), social work education in Nigeria was a Western product that was imported into Nigeria. They argued that there is currently no social justice between indigenous knowledge and Western knowledge in the social work curriculum at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. Some participants, especially social work educators, however, felt that Western knowledge laid a solid foundation for the development of social work education in Nigeria and therefore should not be completely ignored in the teaching of social work in Nigeria and Africa. Student social workers and social work practitioners, however, argued that social work education in Nigeria presents a one-sided narrative which promotes Western ideologies at the expense of indigenous knowledge.

A practitioner commented that

. . . at the onset of social work education in Nigeria, we shouldn’t have embraced everything in Western social work education to the detriment of our indigenous knowledges. We should have improved, propagated and not have abandoned our own local knowledge. (Social work practitioner)

Most practitioners recounted their ordeals of trying to resolve an ethical dilemma in their practice areas in compliance with organizational principles that often projected Western ideologies and intervention strategies:

. . . the clients we work with are Nigerians but the intervention strategies and education we received during training as social workers are Western based . . . you have to respect cultural values of the clients that you are working with . . . this is problematic.

A social work practitioner decried the one-sided narrative that Western knowledge had on social work education in Nigeria. This participant explained that:

I am particularly delighted to share my view on this topic because all through my undergraduate and postgraduate days as a social work student in the University of Nigeria, I have been bombarded from every angle with Western method[s] of social work practice . . . all the theories we use here are Western based and the examples in classroom are more on social work from UK and USA. (Social work practitioner)

The experience of propagating Western theories and knowledge in social work education according to many social work practitioners and student social workers suggests that social work education in Nigeria is made in the West and not in Nigeria. A study participant who expressed his annoyance said: ‘this had left me wondering if nothing good can actually be said about Nigeria or African indigenous knowledge and cultural practice in social work education’. This view was, however, countered when a social work educator narrated that social work education in Nigeria teaches student social workers to be aware of their culture, other cultures and the implication of cultural diversities, ideologies and knowledges beyond the shores of Africa: ‘Without such awareness, students might graduate with certificates; but lack the basic requisite skills and broad-based knowledge required to practise in both Global North and Global South’.

Indigenous knowledges were seen by all participants as vital for culturally competent practice. A student social worker emphatically said ‘. . . every student social worker should be made to be aware of the diverse cultural practices, values and perspectives within his or her environment and that of other cultures within the Nigeria Nation’. In affirmation, views from practitioners and educators revealed that knowledge sharing on different indigenous practices would help students to think creatively about the challenges within and foster solutions that reflect indigenous values.

All other social work students and two of the social work educators upheld the need to promote, ‘made in Nigeria’ teaching and practical examples to help students appreciate indigenous knowledge. It was obvious from the discussions that the majority of the study participants affirmed that the process of social work education in Nigeria is like a finished product imported from the Western world.

Most of what we are taught in the classroom reflects the culture, problems and beliefs of the Western world. Our indigenous knowledge is often ignored in the classroom teaching . . . even examples are given to us based on Western cases studies . . .we should come up with our own local contents in the teaching and practice of social work. (Social work student)

However, some study participants, particularly social work educators, did not believe that social work education was a finished product from the Western world. While one educator felt that this was the case, the other three social work educators believed that indigenous knowledges through evidence-informed research are crucial to the teaching and practice of social work in Nigeria. The need for research was constantly brought to the fore as the vehicle through which knowledge of local practice can be studied and disseminated. Social work educators affirmed that Western knowledge cannot be entirely jettisoned in the teaching and practice of social work in Nigeria.

We are today living in a global community and so we need knowledge from the Global North just as they will also need indigenous knowledge to understand our own aspect of social work education. The research you are undertaking now is to share knowledge . . . we should do more on our indigenous knowledge to make it more public . . . much is not known about our indigenous knowledge for now. (Social work educator)

Challenges of social work education in Nigeria

Findings from the study revealed that social work practitioners admitted that some aspect of indigenous knowledge is incorporated into the teaching of social work in Nigeria, but this is often ignored in practice. Most practitioners argued that social work educators seem to favour Western knowledge in the teaching of social work because that aspect of knowledge is readily available in books and other online materials. In defence of this assertion, a social work educator said: ‘We are training these students to be professional social workers in the future and so we must do everything possible to let them know that the world is now a global village . . . we cannot throw away Western knowledge’. To understand how indigenous knowledge is incorporated into the field of practice, a practitioner explained:

Yes, my training in social work took cognizance of indigenous knowledge. . . just few of them . . . can’t remember now . . . I am a practising social worker but I don’t respect this indigenous knowledge in my practice with my client . . . because we embrace Western knowledge due to the background of the organization I am working with . . . there are Western materials for you to read and find your way around safe practice . . . (Social work practitioner)

This practitioner, who was infuriated with the level of social work education in Nigeria, continued by saying:

. . . where is the material on our indigenous knowledge . . . no textbooks, no conference, no workshops and no training opportunities within the country to share knowledge about what we do in our different fields of practice in our organization. There is so much training for me outside Nigeria . . . I use what I know on Western knowledge to practise as a social worker here in Nigeria. (Social work practitioner)

Some practitioners believed that social workers in various practice agencies in Nigeria were struggling to balance indigenous knowledge and Western knowledge, and many felt they were exposed to so much Western knowledge in their course that they knew little about their own local knowledge. ‘That is why we sometimes don’t even know what to do or the techniques to apply. We know too much from the Western culture but cannot apply everything given our local realities’. In clarifying this, a social work practitioner explained thus:

We know too much about Western ideology and too little about our indigenous knowledge and we are in constant struggle with these two knowledges and how to fit them in perfectly during intervention . . . we end up using Western knowledge which is everywhere for us . . . you see it online, in books and training programmes which [are] sometime free for download. (Social work practitioner)

Views from student social workers revealed that indigenous knowledges are sidelined in the academic curriculum because the foundation of social work education in Nigeria was an imported Western idea that sought to provide answers to our increasing social problems.

. . . yes social work was created with Western culture and ideologies without consideration of indigenous knowledge . . . well we have learnt some knowledge on ethnicity and cultural diversity but we don’t know what those diversit[ies] are and how to manage them . . . so we need more research to talk more about our cultural knowledge. (Social work student)

A social work practitioner was emphatic when he said: ‘I read something from a book that revealed that social work curriculum presently in-use in teaching student social workers both at the graduate and undergraduate level in Nigeria places less emphasize on our cultural practices’. He went further to explain that:

. . . all our cultural practices may not be good or perfect but I must tell you that so many of them are very good and need to be discovered and made more visible in social work curriculum. Much to be blamed is the less attention given to research on indigenous knowledge, which has continued to subordinate indigenous knowledge. (Social work practitioner)

Findings from the study reveal that student social workers held on to the view that some practices are peculiar to some indigenous groups in Nigeria and thus need to be studied to assess whether to promote, abolish or enhance their practice. For example, a social work student explained that indigenous knowledges concerning the practice of female genital mutilation, child marriage, harmful rites of passage, and widowhood practices should be fully explored in the curriculum of social work practice to seek ways to abolish such practices through engagement with relevant stakeholders. According to a student: ‘there are problems unique to the Nigeria society that are not found abroad . . . problems like the practice of Osu-caste system, communal land conflict, ethnic intolerance, child witchcraft accusation’. This student went on to explain that:

. . . these practices need to be studied further and appropriate indigenous theories developed for effective intervention . . . most of the Western theories and intervention strategies might not be effective if applied in such cases. Although, Western knowledge and theories has helped in tackling problems such as: terrorism, public health challenges, human right violations . . . some challenges requires the development of local theories that will be helpful in tackling our problem. (Social work student)

For another social work student: ‘most of what is contained in the social work curriculum reflects Western knowledge and culture . . . Well we have courses like ethno cultural relations . . . the course teaches us so many things . . . only few ethnic groups are highlighted in the course’. Student social workers felt that there is a need for greater awareness of the various cultural practices and indigenous knowledges of different ethnic groups in Nigeria. This would provide a means by which social workers become more exposed to the cultural diversities of the Nigerian people and thus develop strategies that will address the age-long challenge of peaceful co-existence. For yet another social work student:

. . . we should be able to acquire information and understand our indigenous activities through research not sitting down in the classroom. . . . We are not exposed to knowledge on ethnicity and cultural diversity. The truth is that we don’t have deep knowledge of indigenous knowledge . . . we don’t even have text books written by Nigeria authors . . . only a few local text books in social work and they are not even exhaustive like Western textbooks. The Western knowledge is more evident in our curriculum . . . (Social work student)

Other practitioners decried situations where indigenous knowledge about the African cultural practice is written by foreign authors. One of the practitioners’ referred to this as the case of ‘an outsider sharing my personal evidence’. Such a position could also be viewed as a re-colonization of Nigerian cultural experiences.

Harmonization of Western and indigenous knowledges

All participants in this study criticized the present social work curriculum. However, they were of the view that Western and indigenous knowledges needed to be harmonized in the social work curriculum in Nigeria to provide the best training for social work students and practitioners. Practitioners were of the view that there was a need to identify similarities, differences and connections between indigenous and Western knowledges thereby establishing a way they can be blended into the curriculum. A practitioner said:

Western ideologies will not be completely deleted from our curriculum, but it will be better if indigenous knowledge is advanced too . . . Does the white man use our knowledge in Nigeria to solve their problem? The answer is no. We must understand our cultural practices, diversities and challenges . . . Learning from our indigenous knowledge system can help us solve our own problem rather than depend on others for support every time. (Social work practitioner)

A social work educator explained that the social work curriculum in Nigeria prepares students to meet and address the needs of the individual and society at large: ‘this notion should be a meeting point for both indigenous and Western knowledge . . . both are important in social work education and practice’.