Abstract
The year is 1884. Somewhere in Central Africa is a vast Bantu kingdom known as luBemba. The people are abaBemba. Somewhere else, and unbeknownst to abaBemba, European nations are sharing African land including that of abaBemba. Consequent to this “scramble for Africa,” abaBemba find themselves in an arbitrary amalgamation of 70-plus ethnic groups. The amalgam is Northern Rhodesia. Bemba sociopolitical systems collapse. Young men are forced into mine labor for tax money. Mine townships bring together cultures from Africa, India, and Britain. For abaBemba, this experience is characterized by a multilayered psychological destabilization. Taking advantage of the onset of the written text, Bemba authors delineate for their kinsfolk an Afrocentric space around their new sociopolitical reality. These novelists are neither psychologists nor conventional philosophers; yet their literary treatment of the African psyche is profound. From one such novelist, this article draws insights for Afrocentric psychology.
Keywords
After one and a quarter centuries since the inception of psychology as an independent social science discipline, the global and discipline-defining gathering of psychologists took place for the first time on the African soil: the 30th International Congress of Psychology (ICP2012), held in Cape Town, South Africa, July 22 to 27, 2012. The theme “psychology serving humanity” was particularly epitomic for proponents of African-centered psychology. Coincidentally, Wade Nobles, one of the elders that founded the African-centered psychology movement 40 years ago, was there to pose an experiential challenge: There is a need to document convincingly direct connections between what African-centered psychologists aggregate about African culture and the in situ African cultural life. This article adds to the scholarly work that makes such a link (cf. Mukuka, 2012; Nobles, 2012).
Four implicit arguments frame the message of this article. First, psychology should serve humanity. This argument is inspired by the theme of ICP2012. Second, if psychology has to serve humanity, the contours of “psyche-ology” must be congruent with the psyche-defining cultural and historical realities of a people of interest. Third, the dominant discipline-defining knowledge base of psychology (organizing principles, scientific habits, exemplars, and social outcomes) is biased toward the cultural and historical realities of some people and not others. Scientific psychology is norm referenced, and the statistical samples that shape such norms do matter. Last, for psychology to serve humanity, there is a need to explicate the defining aspects of the “psyche” of any culturally and experientially distinctive group of people. Put differently, what each culturally and experientially distinctive group of people considers important and necessary for human authenticity should be the point of departure. Taking into consideration the foregoing arguments, I seek to do two things in this article: First, using a factual novel, I discuss ubuntu of abaBemba. That is, I explicate the principles that Bemba people of Zambia in Central Africa consider important for their human authenticity. Second, from this analysis, I draw insights for Afrocentric (or African-centered) psychology.
Background
When major events significantly disrupt people’s psychological stability, the affected tend to reflect more on (a) who they are (their identity), (b) where they are (their temporal and psychological location), and (c) how they fit in (whether they are located at the center or the peripheral). Examples of such disruptions abound. The post-Apartheid political dispensation in South Africa is one example. Some South Africans, having reflected on who they were in the new South Africa, their location from the center of the social and economic life of the new South Africa, and how they fit into the newly introduced corrective government policies like Affirmative Action, realized that they no longer belonged; so, they emigrated to Europe and Australia. There were a lot of actual and contemplated emigrations from South Africa particularly in the first 10 years after 1994. The birth of the African-centered psychology movement in the United States is another example. Toward the end of the 1960s, the number of “Black” psychologists increased; correspondingly, their discontent with the relevance of the “White” psychology grew. This, coupled with the “Black” nationalist thought of the time, led the “Black” psychologists to question who they were, their location, and how they fit into “White” psychology. This type of psychological disequilibrium presents an opportunity for studying what particular people consider important for their human authenticity. Ordinary literature (novels, newspaper articles, blog posts, social networking discussions, and the like) can be an effective means of expression. This has been particularly true for the Bemba people of Zambia.
The European scramble for Africa, facilitated by the 1884–1885 Berlin Conference and the consequent sociopolitical maneuvers by colonialists, significantly disrupted the psychological stability of abaBemba (Bemba people). UluBemba (the Bemba Kingdom) occupied the land surrounded by Lake Tanganyika on the north, the Luapula River in the west, Lake Bangweulu in the south, and the Muchinga Escarpment in the east—that is, in the northeast of present-day Zambia in Central Africa. Two major consequences of the scramble destabilized abaBemba.
First is the arbitrary amalgamation of more than 72 autonomous ethnic groups and kingdoms into one colony: Northern Rhodesia. With the introduction of the English polity in the colony, the long-established Bemba civilization and its intrinsic psychological realities were disrupted. For many abaBemba, the amalgamation meant (a) a new identity, incomprehensible and groundless; (b) fears of loss of what they had known (politically, socially, and economically) about managing their lives; and (c) new centers of power (political, social, and cultural) that they had to learn to navigate. Insaka and ifibwanse, the long-established centers for educating Bemba boys and girls, respectively, lost their power to Western schools that promised successful learners the social status next to that of the “White” colonizers. Bemba cultural practices and ideals were harshly judged by both colonizers and Christian missionaries. Consequently, abaBemba asked, who are we in Northern Rhodesia? What is our place in this new amalgam? How do we fit in?
Second is the emergence of multicultural mine townships.
For the first time, abaBemba who came to the mines shared communities with many ethnic groups from Northern Rhodesia (later, Zambia) and those from neighboring colonies like Tanganyika (later, Tanzania), Nyasaland (later, Malawi), Southern Rhodesia (later, Zimbabwe), and South Africa. In addition, there were ethnic groups from India and Europe. Again, abaBemba struggled with finding their place and living by their cultural ideals.
Taking advantage of the written text, questions of who we are, where we are, and how we fit in found expression in Bemba literature, particularly, the over twenty documented Bemba factual novels (Mukuka, 2011). Since 2008, I have been studying these books, with a particular interest in the literary treatment of the Bemba psyche therein. In this article, I focus on Simon Mwansa Kapwepwe’s (1967/2005) Shalapo Canicandala, a factual novel in which the implicit treatment of the Bemba psyche is extraordinarily elaborate. The term “psyche” that I use here is variably conceptualized in psychology.
Etymologically, psychology constitutes two Greek words, namely, psyche (soul) and logos (study of), and, when taken together, it originally meant a study of the soul of a people. In traditional (apropos, mainstream) psychology, the conceptualization of “psyche” has been variably skewed toward “mind” or “mental processes.” The “psyche” and the “mind” have almost become synonyms because rationality (a faculty of the mind) has been intrinsic to the Western conceptualization of personhood. As such, the emphasis on “cognition” and “rationality” reflects what the cultural group that has been the normative of traditional psychology considers important for human authenticity (Piper-Mandy & Rowe, 2010). This is evident from the relentless mind-referenced treatment of the “psyche” across popular conceptual orientations in mainstream psychology.
Phenomenology, which is one of the earliest conceptual orientations in traditional psychology, saw the psyche as the subjective consciousness of a person’s mind. For this reason, phenomenological psychology has been interested in the mind’s activities such as perception and judgment. Later on, psychoanalysts saw the psyche as a partly conscious, partly unconscious, and partly semiconscious mind that influenced thought, behavior, and personality. Cognitive psychology, a more recent conceptual development, has pushed the place of the mind to even greater prominence by pushing “psyche” to the peripherals. This preference of “mind” over “psyche,” and coupling this with the emphasis on the scientific method, has seen the definitions of psychology shifting to a scientific study of mental processes. If etymology counts, we are seeing a nous-ology replacing the psyche-ology. Nous is the better Greek word for “mind.” This cultural bias in delineating the study of the soul of a people marginalizes other cultural groups.
Discontent with the marginal position of the soul of “Black” Africans in the social sciences in general has a long history (James, 1954; Woodson, 1933). From the 1970s, two related social science movements have emerged to challenge social sciences to expand their philosophical base. The Afrocentricity paradigmatic movement that spans all social science disciplines (Asante, 2007; Mazama, 2001; Myers, 1985; Schiele, 1990, 1996) and the discipline-specific African-centered psychology movement (Akbar, 1996; Guthrie, 1998; Kambon, 2003; Nobles, 1986; Nobles, Khatib, McGee, & Akbar, 1980) seek to center African cultural values and ideals in all analyses involving “Black” African people. Scholars from the centrist movements ask, from where I am standing (my cultural, historical and psychological location), what is the “psyche” in psychology?
Akbar (1985, in Nobles, 2006) and Nobles (1986, in Nobles, 2006) teach that “psyche” as it functions in the term “psychology” has all the earmarks of the Kemet term “Sakhu” (illumination of the spirit). Thus, the human consciousness that the discipline of psychology seeks is reminiscent of the “Man, Know Thyself” dictum that ancient Egyptians used to inscribe on temple entrances (James, 1954). African-centered psychology, therefore, maintains interest in psyche-ology (seeking the Sakhu or the illumination of the human spirit). “Psyche,” understood in this way, points to what the Bantu call ubuntu. The Bantu are a section of African peoples that use the suffix -ntu (or other lexical variations: -tho, -nthu, -tu, etc.) as the referent to a person. For the Bantu, ubuntu (botho, bunthu, or butu) entails the aggregate of defining aspects of human authenticity. As such, ubuntu and the Afrocentric psyche are analogous terms. The psyche-fragmenting history of slavery, colonialism, and neocolonialism cannot be ignored by any seeker of the illumination of ubuntu or the Afrocentric psyche.
Collective ubuntu and its consequential view of human beings as intrinsically good (Graham, 1999; Mbiti, 1970; Schiele, 1996) were deeply fractured by the slave trade. Elders and leaders started hunting our brothers and sisters down so that they could exchange them for guns, linen, sugar, and bottled alcohol (Kapwepwe, 1970; Magesa, 1992). Using the Chinua Achebe phraseology, the European slave trade put a knife on the things that used to hold Africans together; and, our nonmaterial, communalist, and gerontocratic spirit fell apart—the first fracture on the Afrocentric psyche.
Because of their skin color, African slaves in the Americas were assigned the lowest position in the racial hierarchy. This position attracted only despisement and derision and earned African slaves the role of beasts of burden (Magesa, 1992). No matter what they achieved as individuals and as a collective, the days of slavery saw African slaves accruing the most undesirable of racial stereotypes, stereotypes that stubbornly linger: lazy, unintelligent, dirty, uncultured, immoral, criminal, and the like (Eberhardt, Goff, Purdie, & Davies, 2004; Karlins, Coffman, & Walters, 1969; Katz & Braly, 1933; Madon et al., 2001). The low racial status and the negative racial traits were so impressed on African slaves that, within this reign of error, they slowly came to believe that indeed they were (and are), in Fanonian phraseology, the wretched of the earth. Consequently, some “Black” Africans developed hatred for their skin color, despisement for their cultural ideals, and a desire to escape from anything African (Tempels, 1959). This has been the second fracture of the Afrocentric psyche.
The third epoch of the degradation of the African psyche started with the 1884–1885 Berlin Conference. Europe sliced Africa up, with no regard for African people’s sociogeographical organization. The humiliation, degradation, rejection, and negation that African slaves in the Americas were experiencing at the hands of Portuguese, Spanish, and English slavers-cum-colonialists spread to continental Africans. In colonial Africa, “Black” Africans assumed an inferior status; they became beasts of burden in mines and colonial governmental centers; their personhood was negated and despised (Kapwepwe, 1970; Njoh, 2008). Their social and economic organization had no space for money; yet colonizers started demanding monetary taxes—encouraging a monetary culture and breaking African people’s social organization by forcing young people to emigrate so they could make money for taxes. Within mine townships, African cultural ideals were no longer easy to sustain both economically and socially.
The Afrocentric psyche is about not only “what is” but also “what ought to be” because some fragments of the Afrocentric psyche have been scattered, lost, or subdued (Nobles, 2012). Some may object that there is no need to reclaim Afrocentric ideals because the kind of “Black” African we have today is a product of, and a suitable response to, modernity. But how much has Afrocentricity contributed to the cultural locus of that “modernity”? How can we expect “Black” Africans to flourish within a cultural space that marginalizes them, their values, and their ideals? There is a need to seek the Sakhu.
Bemba Psyche: Ubuntu in Shalapo Canicandala
Within Afrocentricity, location is a key analytic motif (Asante, 2007) and is a precondition for adequate understanding of phenomena. Kasonde (2003), a Bemba author, offers a location-sensitive analytic framework for cultural artifacts: first, get the picture of the contextual foundation of the cultural artifact and, second, learn what an artifact meant for the people. Such a perspectivist analysis allows a cultural tenet to be what it was for the initiating community. This is the analytic framework used to get insights into the Bemba psyche permeating the factual novel, Shalapo Canicandala.
The author of Shalapo Canicandala, Simon Mwansa Kapwepwe (or respectfully Bashi Mpundu, which means “the father of twins”), was born in 1922 and died in 1980. Bashi Mpundu was initially a school teacher, then underwent further training in journalism and shoe technology, and finally became a freedom fighter. In postindependence Zambia, Bashi Mpundu held three ministerial positions and the national vice-presidency. He was ahead of his time in anticipating political, social, and economic problems in postcolonial Africa. When he realized that his forewarnings were not heeded and his vision for alternative postcolonial governance was subdued, he dejectedly retired from active politics. He is author of five other books in iciBemba.
Shalapo Canicandala, written in the 1950s but published in 1967, is about Bemba people. AbaBemba trace their origin from Kola (in Angola) when it was ruled by Muhemba (Kanyanta-manga II, 2011). From Kola, they moved east and had a number of settlements before they finally settled in what today constitutes northeastern Zambia. AbaBemba pride themselves in their social astuteness. In the 19th century, they stopped the northward movement of the Nguni’s Mfecane. At the same time, they crafted an egalitarian coexistence with early European visitors to their kingdom, notably, a Portuguese they named Lucele Ng’anga. AbaBemba use umuntu for a person and ubuntu for personhood.
Shalapo Canicandala is about a young boy, Canda Bemba, who is born and groomed in a Bemba village. The boy’s grandfather, Canicandala, teaches him the wisdom of being a Bemba person and the values of ubuntu (Bemba personhood). When Canda Bemba is about to put the life lessons into practice, he is forced to emigrate to the mines in search of tax money. He spends his adult life in mine townships where he struggles to put to use the cultural values he had learned as a boy. Generosity sends him into poverty, traditional ways of respecting elders conflict with his “White” employer’s view of respect, care for his kin sends him out of employment. When he finally breaks away from the values of ubuntu, his marriage collapses, he steals, and he becomes homeless. Old age finds him miserable and dejected, but his nephews come from the village to take him back home where gerontocratic deference restores his dignity and social security.
According to the grandfather character, Canicandala, the curriculum of abaBemba comprised two aspects: teaching of cultural values and teaching of physical skills pertaining to work, war, and recreation. Canicandala teaches Canda Bemba 14 values that collectively sought to produce abantu. The project of producing abantu was a key aspect of the Afrocentric curricula, as succinctly noted elsewhere by an African elder in Uganda:
Our education did not produce paper certificates because we did not have the paper and did not need the certificates. It did not lead to earning salaries because we did not have money to pay and we did not need it. Our education was meant to produce “people” in thoughts, people in what was said and people in what was done. (Tiberondwa, 1978, pp. 13-14)
For abaBemba, the defining aspects of ubuntu are not automatic endowments consequent on fetal conception or nativity; instead, one needed to acquire ubuntu by learning, internalizing, and putting into practice the key values. To ascertain if someone had attained ubuntu, abaBemba would ask, “Bushe uyu muntu, muntu?” (Kapwepwe, 1967/2005, p. 20), translated as “Is this person a person?” Obviously, the double use of “person” spoke to different layers of appraising ubuntu. The defining aspects of ubuntu are the ones captured in the 14 Bemba values taught by Canicandala. These values were as forceful to abaBemba as the Ten Commandments were to the scriptural Israelites.
Values 1-5: Respect for All Elders (Kapwepwe, 1967/2005, pp. 13-15)
Canicandala presents five values that sought to enshrine the saying, Umuswema ukukose fupa kulamba inshila (for a snake to grow without broken bones, it must avoid footpaths). This saying spoke to the need to respect all elders who were the custodians of all that a young person needed to become umuntu:
Ukucindika abakalamba bonse; bonse abakalamba abaume niba wiso, bonse abakalamba abanakashi niba noko (respect for all elders; regard every older man as your father, every older woman as your mother).
Ukwimina abakalamba pa cipuna ngabafika apo wikele (whenever an elder comes where you are, surrender your seat to him or her).
Tekwesha ukufwisa amate apali abakalamba (never spit in the company of elders).
Tekwesha ukwiminina apali abakalamba (never stand tall where there are elders).
Tekwesha ukubikana ifikansa na bakalamba (never argue with elders).
Contextual foundations of the “respect” values
First, in a traditional Bemba community, an elder meant (a) a guardian of the young, (b) a protector of the young from enemies, wild animals, and forces of nature, (c) a mentor in social and practical skills, (d) a custodian of the knowledge of ubuntu and the kingdom, (e) a custodian of community history and the lessons learned from it, and (f) a maker of ubuntu, one wielding the institutional power to produce people. Second, each of the values spoke to community realities. “Respect for all elders” spoke to the fact that traditional Bemba communities expected every elder to “parent” every child of the community; “surrendering of seats” spoke to the need for the young to ensure the physical comfort of elders (to appease them!); the value about “not spitting in the presence of elders” spoke to the disrespect that went with spitting when one came across something that was stinking (the bad). For abaBemba, the old (even if they would be smelly, mad, or foolish) always had something good for the young; “prohibition of standing where elders are sitting” spoke to the fact that only a senior or important person would look on the head of an inferior person; “arguments” spoke to the need for the young ones to avoid burning their fingers and to develop a disposition of listening. Third, the values of “respect” stemmed from an intricate interplay among gerontocracy, interdependence, collective preservation, individual survival, and moral alignment.
What “respect” values meant for abaBemba
First, for the young, the values helped in aligning their behaviors so that these would be above reproach. Second, aligning oneself with the “respect” values opened up, for the young, access to knowledge, blessings, person-making institutions, and protection. Third, the “respect” values provided checks and balances for morality. In order to gain easy access to the community’s resources, the young were “forced” to be morally upright.
For older members of the community, these values were a call to duty. First, an elder had a duty to live as umuntu par excellence, meaning, he or she needed to manifest exemplary ubuntu. Second, an elder had a duty to perpetuate the cycle of producing abantu. Last, every elder had a duty to parent, protect, mentor, and transmit tradition to every young person of the community.
Values 6-8: Food Generosity (Kapwepwe, 1967/2005, pp. 13-15)
Canicandala further presents three values that sought to enshrine the saying Icakulya tacicepa, akacepa ka kufwala (a piece of clothing can be small but food can never be too small to share). This saying spoke to the need to develop a food sharing disposition, without any excuse not to share. The following values encouraged this attitude:
6. Tekwesha ukutana umunobe icakulya, nangu engaba wamu musolo nangu fye uo mwaba nankwe mu mushi (never refuse to share food with both people you know and strangers).
7. Tekwesha ukutana umulendo icakulya nga afika pa nsaka yenu. Icilyo tacicepa, icicepa cakufwala (never refuse to share food with a traveler who comes to your door; a piece of clothing can be small but food is never too small to share).
8. Tekwesha ukufunda umwanakashi ubulya-fibi; pa kunaya afwile ukulakusha no ushiliko aisa kwata apakusuna (never teach a woman stinginess vis-à-vis food; when she is preparing food, she should prepare more than needed so that an unexpected arrival can have a decent share of your food).
Contextual foundations of food generosity values
Before abaBemba settled in uluBemba, they were a mobile, crop growing, and food gathering community and there was vulnerability associated with this: natural disasters and famine. From their vulnerability, abaBemba realized that human beings could survive without clothing or shelter but not without food. As such, food came to be appreciated as the fundamental human need. Furthermore, abaBemba came to realize that “ubuntu kulya” (Kapwepwe, 1967/2005, p. 5), meaning if one has eaten, one can easily live out ubuntu and be moral. Lack of food came to be seen as the source of immoral behaviors. For this reason, a Bemba community desired that all had access to food—community members as well as travelers. A woman, strategically placed as the food preparer, needed to especially learn food generosity. The divisibility analogy between food and cloth spoke to the coming of linen: Linen has limits for sharing but not food.
What food generosity values meant for abaBemba
The food sharing values meant collective preservation, which in return meant interdependence. As long as some people recorded success in their farming and food gathering efforts, the vulnerable (those without access, the traveler, the old and physically challenged) would be assured of the dignity-restoring commodity. The food sharing values also had a moral dimension. Food access for all was in itself a positive step toward establishing a moral society.
Values 9-14: Assorted Values (Kapwepwe, 1967/2005, pp. 13-15)
In addition to “respect” and “food sharing” values, there are six other values that the grandfather figure, Canicandala, taught Canda Bemba. These include,
9. Ufwile ukulanda ifyacine lyonse (always speak the truth).
10. Tekwesha ukufwaya muka mwine (never covet another person’s spouse).
11. Tekwesha ukwiba (never steal).
12. Tekwesha ukwipaya umuntu munobe (never kill a human being).
13. Mufwile ukwafwa abakote ne filema mu milimo yabo (you should help the old and physically challenged with their chores).
14. Mufwile ukuba no luse ku fibumbwa fyakwa Lesa Mukulu (have compassion for all God’s creatures).
Foundational context of the assorted values
First, the requirement to speak the truth had two dimensions (orality and safety) and one goal (credibility of one’s spoken word). Historically, abaBemba depended on oral transmission of information. During times of outside invasions, it was necessary that anyone who saw an approaching enemy alerted the community. The spoken word of a known liar, however, was not credible. Only the truthful would be credible and, therefore, protect the kingdom. As such, truthfulness would guarantee the safety of the kingdom. Second, the value that forbade coveting another person’s spouse spoke to the nature of the institution of marriage among abaBemba. Marriage was not only a tie of two families but also the natural unit for “producing” abantu. Tampering with family unity had community-wide repercussions. As such, the value was instituted for the preservation of unity. Third, abaBemba believed in the value of hard work. Most of what abaBemba could have depended on hard work: food, shelter, and security. Stealing was the easy way out and was discouraged. Fourth, abaBemba believed in ubukulu bwa nkoko masako (literary, the size of a chicken is determined by its feathers). This spoke to the belief that the more children and relatives one had, the safer, greater, and more powerful that person became in the community. More children meant a bigger and more formidable army of custodians, food producers, and protectors. Killing anyone meant weakening the family, community, and the kingdom, thus the harsh punishment for the crime: the culprit, the culprit’s father, and the culprit’s maternal uncle would be burned on a stake (Kapwepwe, 1967/2005). It was a bitter lesson for all and was meant to produce norm-aligned abantu. Furthermore, old age and disability meant reduced ability; consequently, the two states resulted in vulnerability. For this reason, the community needed to “protect” these vulnerable beings, just as parents were obliged to protect the vulnerable young. Last, the life of umuBemba was an intricate web of interdependence with other people and nature. God’s creatures, therefore, had a close relationship with human life—and this provided reason for the requirement to safeguard the well-being of all God’s creatures.
What the assorted values meant for abaBemba
Truthfulness meant trust in one’s word of mouth, which translated into collective security should one spot the approaching enemy. The need to keep away from another person’s spouse meant the protection of the people-producing social unit. Forbidding theft encouraged hard work, which translated into having no one in need and ensured morality. Preservation of life meant more resources for the community and ensured the preservation of the community. Looking after vulnerable, though not young, members of the community meant unity and a cultivation of values of interdependence. Safeguarding the well-being of all God’s creatures meant people’s interdependence with nature was preserved.
Bemba Psyche and Its Links to Existing Literature on the African-Centered Psyche
To be umuntu (according to ubuBemba as portrayed in Shalapo Canicandala) was an intricate interplay of the 14 values that culminated in the following attributes of ubuntu: (a) collective identity, (b) mutuality or interdependence, (c) morality, (d) unity, (e) humility, and (f) generosity. These were the nonnegotiable attributes of ubuntu.
Collective identity
In instituting values that demanded respect and generosity, values that prohibited coveting another person’s spouse, killing of another human being, and stealing, and values that encouraged eagerness to help the old and disabled, abaBemba signaled an interest in producing a person whose self-concept was relational. The implicit collective identity theme is at the heart of all the other attributes of ubuntu.
For abaBemba, the collective identity dimension of ubuntu was so pronounced that the community assumed credit for individuals’ meritorious innovations, ideas, or military astuteness. For example, if umuBemba at one point in history came up with a saying that epitomized what abaBemba believed in as a collective, any other person would later appropriate that saying without any reference to the originator but using the formula Fwe baBemba tulanda ati . . . (We, abaBemba, say . . .) or IciBemba citila . . . (Bemba wisdom teaches that . . .). Bemba history and recurrent knowledge celebrate the community, not individuals. In this dimension of ubuntu, abaBemba are unlike ethnic groups that celebrate Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle and “their” (or are they “theirs”?) ideas (cf. Asante, 2012; James, 1954). AbaBemba believed that individual genius was an appropriation of community genius.
Collective identity has been amply identified in existing Afrocentric scholarship. Collective identity underpins Mbiti’s (1970) most-quoted epitome: “I am because we are, and because we are, therefore I am” (p. 141; cf. Graham, 1999; Mkhize, 2004; Schiele, 1990). Baldwin (1986) identified the collective identity theme as a part of the African survival thrust, a set of principles that constitute African cosmology. Schiele (1990) taught that collective identity is a key Afrocentric assumption about human beings and that it is a key value of the Afrocentric paradigm (Schiele, 1996). Graham (1999) reiterated collective identity as one of key principles and values that underpin the African-centered worldview. Nguni peoples of Southern and Central Africa teach that we are human to the extent that we recognize and affirm the humanity of others, a theme captured in the saying umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu (Mkhize, 2004; Mkhize, Mukuka, & Wambugu, 2008).
The collective identity dimension of ubuntu—and, by extension, African-centered personhood—revolves around the relational psyche. In view of this, the key attributes of the Bemba psyche are herein rephrased as relational mutuality, relational unity, relational morality, relational humility, and relational generosity. This emphasis on relating validates the following:
Afrocentricity’s emphasis on affect. Due to the importance of relating within Afrocentricity, affect (comprising feelings/emotions) becomes an important constituent of knowledge production and practice systems. Schiele (1990, 1996) and Asante (2007) have consistently taught the importance of affect in the Afrocentric paradigm. Mazama (2001) rightly expands the original Kuhnian concept by infusing into it the affect aspect, arguing that the concept of paradigm must address itself to this African-centered value.
The alienation-based Afrocentric analyses of human problems. Schiele (1996) and Graham (1999) have argued that alienation (the absence of relating and collective identity) is the source of human problems. Similarly, Mkhize et al. (2008) aptly exposed the xenophobic negrophobia that characterized South Africa in 2008 as a case of alienated and mind-shackled “Black” South Africans denying the humanity of “Black” non–South Africans.
Reduced emphasis on individuals in the history of ideas. Cultures that see an individual as a self-contained entity usually have a propensity to give credit to individuals for “bringing to life” particular ideas. A mention of “cogito, ergo sum,” “know thyself,” “unmoved mover,” “Oedipus complex,” “hypotenuse,” “paradigm,” or “psychoanalysis” brings to mind names of particular individuals because this association is celebrated in applicable cultures. However, when one’s intellectual undertakings are intrinsically implicated in the philosophy of one’s community, it is neither necessary nor desirable to celebrate individual genius. Instead, emphasis is placed on the ideas and their contribution to the aspirations of the community.
Relational mutuality/interdependence
AbaBemba believed in the importance of relational mutuality in all areas of social interaction. Relational mutuality operated on many levels. Peer-to-peer mutuality translated into collaborative work, exchange of gifts, and sharing of food. Age-based mutuality had two aspects: the young to the old and the old to the young. The young offered the old physical comfort and support; the old offered the young blessings, protection, guidance, and access to person-creating institutions. Family-based mutuality translated into labor partnerships (e.g., icima, where the families would take turns in working on one family’s farm), collaborative ceremonies (marriage, initiation of girls), and collective sorrow (e.g., when one had a funeral, all community members would abandon their activities until the funeral was over). Community-based mutuality was expected during wars or whenever calamities befell a community. People-nature mutuality was a multidirectional relationship: with birds, animals, and plants. For example, a honey bird (ing’uni) that had seen a bee hive would look for people, guide them for as much as three kilometers, and show them the hive. Once it knew that people had seen the hive, it would wait for people to harvest the honey. People had to leave some honeycombs for the honey bird, as a mutuality obligation. Other birds had sounds that would warn people about the presence of a dangerous snake or animal. On one hand, people would benefit from the bird’s sharp sight, while the bird would benefit when people saw the snake and killed it or chased it away, leaving the birds safe on their nests. The values about respect, food sharing, truthfulness, helping the old and disabled, and safeguarding the well-being of nature advanced this aspect of ubuntu.
In the literature on African-centered values and ideals, the relational mutuality/interdependence theme has been identified by Baldwin (1986) as a part of the African survival thrust. Phillips (1990) taught that mutuality/interdependence alludes to ujima (collective work responsibility in kiSwahili) in the Nguzo Saba, the seven principles of Kwanzaa. Dei (1994) identified mutuality/interdependence as it operated through traditions of mutuality like labor partnerships and self-help institutions among African people. For Dei, these traditions of mutuality were based on kin and nonkin social groups that provided social comfort, identity, and information to its membership.
Relational unity
To be umuntu meant the ability to create and nurture relationships that fostered unity on personal, family, community, clan, and kingdom levels. The values about food sharing, not stealing, not coveting other people’s spouses, and not killing advanced this aspect of ubuntu. Baldwin (1986) discussed relational unity as a part of the African survival thrust. Phillips (1990) presented it as umoja (unity in kiSwahili), a value on the Nguzo Saba. Dei (1994) highlighted the African-centered unity of being (the individual and the community) that produced a cooperative individual.
Relational morality
In order to find favor with the community in traditional Bemba society, one needed to align one’s behavior to the community’s norms. As such, one needed to relate according to specified normative behavior or risk losing the community’s support and help. The values about respect, food sharing, not coveting other people’s spouses, helping the old and disabled, not stealing, and not killing advanced the relational morality attribute. In African-centered literature, relational morality has been posited as the product of relational unity and collective identity. An alienated or disconnected identity (the absence of relational unity and collective identity) breeds immorality (Graham, 1999; Mkhize et al., 2008; Schiele, 1990, 1996). If one has a disconnected identity, it becomes easier and possible to create the us-them (or I-you) distinction and, consequently, to objectify the “other.” Once another person is “objectified,” it becomes easy to use him or her as means to one’s end:
You can kill the object that stands between you and your need (money, food, luxury, etc.). The other, in this case, is an object like an automated teller machine (ATM) from which you can draw money.
You can rape, should you disconnect yourself from the “other,” seeing the “other” as an object of sexual gratification.
A disconnected identity makes the language of sports—we beat them!—possible, since the “other” is an object out of which you can “mine” your joy. While you can find a lot of joy in “beating them,” that joy is at the expense of another.
We always witness immorality when national (military) strength, disconnected national identities, and precious resources (oil, diamond, gold) in weaker countries are cooked in one pot: NATO interventions in oil-rich Libya; extensive funding to rebels in diamond-rich Angola, Sierra Leone, and Democratic Republic of Congo; and war mongering in the oil-rich Middle East.
These acts of immorality, emanating from a starved psyche, are not possible when one individual sees one’s identity as intrinsically connected to the other or when one nation sees itself as connected to other nations. The absence of “relatedness” and “connectedness” breeds the absence of ubuntu—and there is ample evidence of this in interactions among political parties, nations, sports teams, ethnic groups, “race” groups, religious groups, and individuals.
Relational humility
UmuBemba needed a lot from the community: knowledge, protection, and lessons in ubuntu. Humility was the key that guaranteed access to all these. AbaBemba believed that Ukupoka icinsenda ku nkoko kunakilila (tact is needed if one has to grab back an insect from a chicken’s beak). This attribute of ubuntu is what the “respect” values particularly advanced. Gerontocracy, a respect for elders, is a common theme in African cultures (Dei, 1994) and sought to create a relationship among people that perpetuated knowledge transmission, the “production” of abantu, and the strengthening of a kingdom.
Relational generosity
Food sharing values sought to cultivate relationships that fostered generosity among abaBemba. To be umuntu, for abaBemba, meant to possess relational generosity. This theme is a common African value as reflected in many traditions of mutuality (Dei, 1994) that sought collective preservation and care.
Insights for Afrocentric Psychology
The Bemba psyche, implicit in Bashi Mpundu’s Shalapo Canicandala, consists of nuanced themes of collective identity and relational mutuality, relational unity, relational morality, relational humility, and relational generosity. Umuntu, for abaBemba, is essentially collectivist and relational and cannot be defined without reference to the two dimensions. This conceptualization of the psyche, congruent with existing Afrocentric literature, has implications for the understanding of “psyche” in Afrocentric and/or African-centered psychology. Before discussing the implications, let me reiterate the conceptual boundaries of Afrocentric psychology and African-centered psychology.
Psychology is a science. Scientific rigor requires that a scientific discipline spells out the organizing principles of its assertions, the acceptable scientific habits therein, exemplars, and the desired social outcomes of the intellectual activities therein. Roughly, this is what Kuhn (1970) sought to accomplish with the concept of scientific paradigm. Mazama (2001) has explicated the paradigmatic contours of Afrocentricity; and earlier, Myers (1985) and Schiele (1990, 1996) had accorded Afrocentricity the paradigm status. However, the Kuhnian concept of paradigm has limitations: It is an ethnocentric term that reflects the human authenticity aspirations of the implicit culture(s). The two central aspects of the Kuhnian paradigm (the cognitive aspect and the structural aspect) are fundamentally thorough from the standpoint of the nous-referenced human authenticity, not from cultures that have other centers of referencing human authenticity. To overcome this limitation, Mazama (2001) reworked the cognitive aspect into the cognitive-affective-conative aspect and added the new functional aspect. Limitations aside, the paradigm concept makes a useful contribution to intellectual scrutiny: It makes appreciable the existence of ethnocentric viewpoints on which particular intellectual enquiries are based.
When I talk about “Afrocentric psychology,” I am particularly referring to the psychology that is rooted in the Afrocentric paradigm as delineated by Mazama (2001). Within Afrocentric psychology, the ultimate reference for conceptualizing the “psyche,” psychological normality and abnormality, and authentic being are the African cultural ideals and values. Both Afrocentricity (the broad social science orientation) and Afrocentric psychology (the discipline-specific orientation) seek to create an intellectual enterprise that advances the collective interests of African people.
Unlike Afrocentric psychology, African-centered psychology does not align itself with the paradigmatic contours of the Afrocentric paradigm. Like Afrocentric psychology, African-centered psychology seeks the centrality of African cultural values and ideals in all analyses involving “Black” African people. As such, Afrocentric psychology and African-centered psychology are used interchangeably even though they have nuanced differences. Having outlined the similarities and dissimilarities between Afrocentric psychology and African-centered psychology, I now discuss the implications.
The analysis of the Bemba psyche in this article shows that the Afrocentric psyche is both collectivist and relational. The two are the fundamentals of human authenticity and are at the heart of human functioning and behavioral normality. As such, the primary implication of the current understanding of the Afrocentric psyche vis-à-vis Afrocentric psychology has to do with the definition of the discipline. The located and adequate definition of Afrocentric psychology is the study of the collectivist and relational human spirit. This located definition of Afrocentric psychology reflects (a) the African-centered human authenticity, (b) African-centered normative community standards for being and functioning, and (c) Afrocentric psychology’s goal of enhancing the human authenticity of “Black” Africans. This definition adds concrete value positions (relational and collectivist) to Akbar and Nobles’s Sakhu (abstract human spirit; Nobles, 2006). In addition, the implicit desire to illuminate the relational and collectivist human spirit resonates with the Kemet dictum “Man, know thyself” (James, 1954). What the definition does, therefore, is to include concrete parameters of the Afrocentric psyche (a collectivist and relational Sakhu) as opposed to the prevailing definitions that leave the Afrocentric psyche indeterminate (cf. Piper-Mandy & Rowe, 2010).
For a relational and collectivist psyche, normal behavior comes from and/or moves toward the creation and maintenance of collectivist and relational existence. This focus on collective and relational dimensions of normality, Schiele (1990) observes, culminates in the African-centered highest value of interpersonal relationships. The collectivist and relational dimensions of human identity are the standards for behavioral normality. In addition, psychological health is assessed in terms of alignment with the collectivist and relational standards; psychological abnormality is assessed in terms of the absence of collectivist and relational attributes. For this reason, psychological problems emerge when there is absence of collectivist and relational living. From this perspective, one begins to see the problematic of the taken-for-granted human endeavors such as competitive sports wherein one team and its supporters disengage their identity from that of the opposing team and its supporters. “We beat them!” a highly gratifying emotional experience, comes at the expense of the disconnected “them.” Similarly problematic are national boundaries. The arbitrary boundaries facilitate us-them disconnections; and “them” become foreigners, illegal immigrants, refugees, or other demeaning and phobia-prone delineations. If Afrocentric psychology is to offer the best of Africa toward interpersonal psychological health, it should expose institutional practices, human endeavors, and international political practices that work against the relational and collectivist psyche.
There is also an implication for the intellectual enterprise. When human authenticity is collectivist and relational, the products of the intellectual endeavors of a people so defined should reflect the valued attributes of the creators. Particularly, the ownership of knowledge should reflect the collectivist attribute. Currently, the knowledge ownership practices (particularly those supported by the journal publishing industry) do not speak to the Afrocentric human authenticity: (a) knowledge is an intellectual property of its “authors,” (b) there is a resource barrier to access to journal articles, (c) author referencing practices ensure individuals get credit for “their knowledge,” and (d) knowledge cannot be circulated freely without the shackles of copyrights.
From the perspective of collectivist and relational human authenticity, what we now frown at as plagiarism (synonymous with stealing, illegal use, and breach of copyright) would be encouraged. Knowledge that is good for the authenticity of a community must be used word for word or paraphrased by any community member with pride and a clear conscience. The pride of a community member is to see his or her take on community ideals and values being appropriated for the well-being of the community. From a collectivist and relational location, it is neither required nor desirable for an individual to claim ownership of knowledge, phraseology, or a take on knowledge.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.