‘Verstehen’,Everyday Sociology and Development: Incorporating African Indigenous Knowledge

Introduction

Development has remained a major quest for African nations. The so called under-development of Africa supposedly informed the partitioning and sharing of the ‘dark continent’ by the European powers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The process of ‘forced’ development of Africa commenced thenceforth and lasted till the 1960s for most African countries and the late 1970s for certain Southern African countries such as Mozambique, Angola, and Zimbabwe. Although Africa was under the colonial tutelage of the developed world for close to a century (Senegal was under French rule for close to 500 years), Africa is largely under-developed still. The search for development in Africa may be unachievable unless the context of African social relations, social structure and development is taken to consideration.

The focus of the article therefore is a discourse on verstehen, everyday sociology, and development in Africa taking the African indigenous philosophy (proverbs) as an important standpoint in the understanding of African context and development. It is pertinent to put development in context because how individuals exploit their environments, satisfy their basic needs, and improve their lives has direct implications for their development. The incorporation of Africa into the world capitalist system has however widened the horizon of the development concept such that ‘basic needs’ are no longer as contextually defined by Africans since the basis of understanding and exploiting the environment, at least for Africans, are externally informed. Externalizing the development concept has not only broadened the horizon but it also now implies that Africans have to contend with ideas outside their indigenous ways of life. This explains the structural re-orientation that Africa has experienced in her institutional arrangements. Of most significance is the displacement of African philosophy by ‘imported science’.

Though this was the European experience from the 16th century, the creation and acceptance of this ‘scientific orientation’ was, more or less, internal to the European system. Central to this new science was its critical nature and ‘the sharp blade of a fundamental, merciless scrutiny brought to bear on even the most exclusive truths’ (Shayegan, 1992: 26), including the displacement of European philosophy/theology. By the end of the 19th century, the foundations of science were firmly established in Europe and, indeed, in their colonized parts of the world. Embedded in this new science was the inevitability of progress expected wherever ‘science’ or ‘scientific attitude’ was applied. It was also assumed that ‘greater prosperity and freedom would accrue to everyone’s children and children’s children’ (Hopkins and Wallerstein, 1996:1–2). The scientific enterprise has, however, been regarded with ambivalence both because some large parts of the world have failed to progress (Olutayo and Bankole, 2002) and because the negative applications of science became manifest with the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the USA, as well as other catastrophes that scientific products have failed to avert. With these doubts and criticisms about the universality of intellectual progress emerged relativism. ‘Relativism’ became, in a far more sophisticated way, the order of the day and the limits of ‘rationality’ were exposed (Solomon and Higgins, 1996). As succinctly stated by Lauer:

By the end of the twentieth century it became fashionable among philosophers and social critics to argue that there can be no measurement of scientific progress – that the very notion of ‘progress’ is an imperialistic construction functioning as a key component in the ideology of industrial capitalist societies. It was supposed that there could be no warrant for applying such concepts beyond the domain of experience peculiar to individuals within those specific societies. (Lauer, 2003: 1)

Yet, it is clear that the founding fathers of knowledge, at least of sociology, never explicitly claimed any ideological orientation. Indeed, the science they advocated, though generalizing, had the germ of individual societal peculiarities in them (Olutayo, 2004, 2001–2), though many authors and policies tend to deliberately underemphasize them.

Of central importance to this endeavor is a reassessment of the knowledge development that occurred since the late 20th century in terms of ‘everyday sociology’ (Olutayo, 2001–2) to which impetus was given with the increasing relationship between philosophy and sociology. This relationship seems to have analytically informed post-modern discourses that deconstruct rational and structural arguments for contextual analysis. In this wise, Antonio (1998) posits the need for a fresh critique of science, inundated with authoritarian, cultural, relativist, irrationalist, and even proto-fascist ideas. For example, Lyotard (1984) had earlier attempted to develop what he calls a ‘post-modern science’ with emphasis shifting to ‘language games’ to provide insight into plural types of ‘local’ knowledge that foster genuine social bonds, new free spaces, and difference. Indeed, various perspectives have emerged recognizing ‘individualities’ rather than ‘generalities’ in postmodernism. Perhaps this was a response to what Archer (1991) referred to as ‘doing sociology in the vernacular’ with attempts at developing indigenous sociology. This resonates in symbolic interactionism and very explicitly, in phenomenological discourses with accentuation in language and expression (which may hide lived experiences). This article hence examines language in the interpretive understanding of social action. This we now turn to.

Language, ‘Verstehen’, and ‘Everyday Sociology’

In spite of the above realization, social scientists and development ‘experts’ still seem to under-emphasize this centrality of language in understanding human existence. Even with the emergence and seeming acceptance of ‘everyday sociology’, the social science researchers and ‘experts’ only peripherally make use of the existing interpretation individuals give for their behavior. It is often with the ‘expertise’ located in social scientific theories that they analyze human behavior rather than a reconstruction of such theories.

Even in the use of language, the use of proverbs is of utmost relevance when one considers the fact that ordinary language use, without a deeper root in day to day interactions, limits the efficacy of understanding people. Indeed, as noted above, language has been ‘politicized’, making it somewhat ineffective. The language planning studies that developed in the 1960s, as a result of the emergence of new nations in Africa and elsewhere, dictated the relationship between language planning studies and the so-called Third World (Mazama, 1994).

Recently, language planning, in the application of language of techniques and practices of social control, is intricately linked to the rise of Western modernity. Western modernity, as noted above, implies progress by which, through increased knowledge (acquired through reason, i.e. ‘scientific’ knowledge) when appropriately applied, it is assumed, human beings would reach unprecedented level of happiness. This required a ‘standardization’ and ‘homogenization’ of attitudes and behavior ‘which in turn entails injustice and the erasure of difference and diversity’ (Escobar, 1992: 134). In ensuring this ‘homogenization’ and ‘standardization’, language ‘development’, as noted by Mazama (1994), is assumed to involve a threefold process including ‘graphization’ (meaning the elaboration or modification of a script), ‘modernization’ (meaning lexical expansion to meet Western standards of industrialization and other aspects of what is termed ‘modern life’), and finally, ‘standardization’ (meaning the selection or elaboration of a modern norm among many competing dialects).

All of these have incorporated a pro-Western propaganda of linear pattern of language development within which a continuum is created and societies are placed within the continuum as the linguist pleases. This placement has involved the idea of the creation of what is termed ‘functional literacy’ wherein people are ‘ideally’ expected to be able to read and write to be literate, and any society that can attain this standard is assumed to be developing! Yet, without taking cognizance of this ‘politicized’ language, sociologists subjectively interpret interviews and discussions without realizing that even the respondents have become ingrained into the ‘politics’. From personal field observations, what the respondents do is to ‘speak the language’ of the researcher by giving what they ‘reason’ the researcher expects.

This is, perhaps, why Tucker (1999) has argued that the concept of development, in its entirety, should be ‘rehabilitated’ by including multiple perspectives which would recognize different contexts of experience, description, and theorizing rather than a single or ‘uniform’ idea. This, it is argued, would facilitate a process of mutual criticism and mutual correction and the incorporation of the experience of others’ perspectives and cultures into the development discourse. It is not, however, only the Western social scientists that need to engage in this dialogue, but also other intellectuals that have had to subordinate their indigenous values to acquire foreign values necessary for the improvement of their status (Sigmund, 1972).

Indeed, as adumbrated above, linguistic anthropologists (not always differentiated from socio-cultural anthropologists or ethnologists – as known in the US), by the mid-20th century, had started emphasizing local conditions in the definition and understanding of cultures. With this, anthropology ought to transcend the divisions between the humanities and the natural and social sciences in exploring the complex whole of cultures and the symbolic dimensions of humankind in all its forms.

This contextual analysis has been enriched through an in-depth explanation by Berger and Luckmann (1967) in chapter 3 of their book titled The Social Construction of Reality, which clearly elucidates the importance of ‘Language and Knowledge in Everyday Life’. In lucid terms, the authors, in the next two chapters, show how language is institutionalized so that knowledge of social reality can be understood as it is constructed in human interaction. No doubt, this work of Berger and Luckmann fundamentally revolutionized not only sociological theory but also sociological research with its anthropological tone. Along with the development of Mead’s ‘symbolic interactionism’ and Durkheimian sociology, phenomenology influenced the relevance of interviews and group discussions, though this is, it seems, only in its infancy in sociological studies as the anthropological method of observation is being watered down from participant to direct observation. While this can be improved, it is the contention of this article that since language is institutionalized to enhance communication, the process of which is dynamic within social contexts, language can be further understood through the use of proverbs which encode it.

Proverbs in Everyday Life

Linguistic/socio-cultural anthropologists, as noted above, have long recognized the importance of proverbs in understanding human socio-structural arrangements. Proverbs, they have observed, facilitate the learning process of children (Penfield and Duru, 1988). They are, according to Finnegan (1976), necessities in African societies; without at least a passive knowledge, adults may comprehend very little in African interactional settings. Proverbs introduce children, in their metaphorical contents, to abstract thought and moral stances in a highly naturalistic and integrative fashion. They socialize children into the ‘ways of the culture’ of the people and emphasize the appropriate role, behavior, values, ethics, social relations, rules of etiquette, and pragmatics of language with regards to social and religious rituals and language usage. Furthermore, proverbs, through these, link the living to the dead/ancestors who can punish as well as protect. As such, rules of social order are taught to children through the acquisition of language skills requiring deep thinking. Proverbs, according to Penfield and Duru (1988), attempt to introduce an unchallengeable description of the world through concrete imagery to the conversational situation or speech context in which they are used and the rules of behavior specified by cultural tradition. They are conceptual tools for presenting salient cognitive and perceptual features, abstract ideas that cannot easily be explained literally, and experiences perceived through vivid and memorable imagery. Intellectually, they teach such skills subsuming the particular under the general, thus developing reasoning capacity within interactional contexts in which they are used.

In his ‘Culture, Communication, and Education’, Casmir (1991) succinctly argues that since culture plays a powerful role in human societies, educationists (and ‘development experts’) should realize their inadequacies in the information, the experience, and the frequently applicable symbol systems in understanding others as well as making their concepts and ideas understandable. Thus, human actions and events are to be seen as: active, dynamic, and developmental movements of a continuously changing reality; having to do with communicative contexts; containing boundaries of knowledge rather than being universal; and embedded in cultures rather than being treated as scientific inquiry, as the pure and unbiased process through which disinterested observers report objective facts of life. To study the ‘facts of life’ therefore requires that the researcher, even as a fully immersed member of a culture, should ‘take up the roles of “observer” and “respondent” and to positively and concretely partake in the constructionism, evaluation, and transformation of the social milieu’ (Georgoudi and Rosnow, 1985: 86). In doing this, it becomes inevitable for researchers to understand the indigenous systems. These systems, in relation to communication, especially in African social structures, are located in drama, storytelling, proverbs, poetry, and other such indigenous forms of communication, especially among the predominantly rural populations. They are, as contributors to the book Indigenous Communication in Africa showed, through empirical studies, ‘structures that are fully integrated into the interactive holistic social systems of the societies concerned [and] … can serve to meet the communication, social interaction, information, and development and entertainment needs of the people’ (Ansu-Kyeremah, 2005: 3). In drama, storytelling, poetry, humor, and so on, proverbs feature prominently.

Even though proverbs are referred to as ‘shorter’ or ‘minor’ forms (Okpewho, 1992; Yankah, 1989), Okpewho has argued that because proverbs ‘are frequently used in normal, everyday speech situations, native speakers of African Languages are far more likely to encounter and to use them than stories and songs’ (Okpewho, 1992: 226). They are structurally neat and sharp in poetic appeals. Defined as ‘a piece of folk wisdom expressed with terseness and charm’, proverbs, Okpewho states, are ‘indeed … metaphorical statements since they reflect a general truth by reference to a specific phenomenon or experience’ (Okpewho, 1992: 226) which are contextually applied by different people.

Sourced through folktales, comments on actual historical experiences, and well-considered observation of various aspects of the natural environment as well as human affairs and conduct, proverbs reflect people’s lives and fate in the world. They may be applied: as social control awareness of certain groups and, hence, the maintenance of the status quo; as tools of the ruling class for the propagation of its ideas and interpretations; and for social and intellectual change. Proverbs do not, therefore, always belong to a ‘folk’ or ‘group’ but only in an extended sense or ‘a spontaneous and necessarily un-self-interested product of the people as a whole’ (Finnegan, 1992: 46).

According to Yankah (1989), except in Australia, Papua New Guinea, and among the American Indians, proverbs are used all over the world though the strategies and intensity of use differ from culture to culture. Rather than being fixed, rigid, and formal, as some scholars posit, and thus limiting reasoning, proverbs are re-creative and, often, context-specific. As such, they are better understood when the dynamics of the proverb, the discourse devices that trigger it, speaker–audience interaction, and the efficacy or otherwise of the proverb in influencing or changing attitude are clearly monitored, since both researcher and discussant cannot predict if, when, and which proverbs will be used in any discourse (Yankah, 1989). Furthermore, in composing proverbs, it is not only the dead past that is the concern but also a part of a primary on-going process of culture formation within which speakers devise new strategies to deal with old problems, and resort to old strategies to contain new ones. It is not therefore surprising that proverbs are often triggered under conditions of uncertainty, stress, and adversity. They are, however, also used to critique current events, such as politics, and to create drama and humor to explain human behavior. Nonetheless, even proverbs are also used to criticize through the presentation of the obverse side.

Proverbs, Everyday Sociology, and Development

Just as biblical hermeneutics was at the root of the incorporation of social constructionism, theologians have led the way in the use of African oral literature to contextually understand and interpret Africans’ ways of life – a type of ‘inculturation’ theology (Van Engen et al., 1999). ‘Inculturation’ theology has continued, through the efforts of the African Proverbs Project (APP) and Global Mapping International (GMI), both under Pauline’s Publication Africa based in Nairobi, Kenya, to promote the importance of inculturation and contextualization (Healy and Sybertz, 1996). Healy and Sybertz (1996) have shown that to preach acceptable Christianity to Africans, and I will add, in all aspects of human life, ‘one must begin from African perspective’. Theologians, therefore, now use ‘oral tradition’ to construct a new model of African theology in a dialogue of mutual respect. Indigenous practices are no longer perceived as ‘fetish’, ‘tribal’, ‘heathen’, and ‘pagan’ along which development used to be conceived ‘civilizing’ the Black man – to make Africans forget their way of life. Anthropologists and African literary critics like Ferdinand Oyono, Wole Soyinka, Okot p’Biket, and Chinua Achebe, among others, have shown this ‘civilizing’ thesis as Eurocentric and have radically carved a niche for African literature.

Ironically, even though social scientific methodology is the medium for these endeavors, very little has been done by social scientists to apply, critically, ‘oral tradition’ in understanding and interpreting African behavior and, indeed, other world cultures. In spite of what Georgoudi and Rosnow (1985: 76) referred to as the reflection of ‘revolutionary changes subversive to established ideals in the naturalistic vision of the social sciences’, the social scientists still seem, from my personal observation, to ‘define the situation’ with respect to what ‘development’ is and should mean. This, interestingly, was what, more than four decades ago, in his ‘The Neglected Situation’, Goffman (1964) warned against. For him, situations should be defined in terms of an environment of mutual monitoring possibilities. In other words, any environment within which an individual will find her/himself determines how s/he will act depending on the presence of others who are assessing her/his behavior. As such a researcher:

… interested in the properties of speech may find himself having to look at the physical setting in which the speaker performs his gestures, simply because you cannot describe a gesture fully without reference to the extra-bodily environment in which it occurs. And someone interested in the linguistic correlates of social structure may find that he must attend to the social occasion when someone of given social attribute makes his appearance before others … (thus) cultural rules establish how individuals are to conduct themselves by virtue of being in a gathering, and these rules for complying, when adhered to, socially organize the behaviour of those in the situation. (Goffman, 1964: 63–4)

Or what Berger and Luckmann (1967) referred to as ‘The Social Construction of Reality’. When social scientists conduct qualitative research, this is not often taken note of, that is, as respondents construct /reconstruct the social situation. Thus, while the symbolic gestures and speeches are relevant, researchers need to further consider the contextual situation. In interviews and focus group discussions (FGDs), the use of proverbs is one of the ‘situations’ the researcher should look out for. Better still, s/he should look out for how the proverbs used in the interviews, FGDs or everyday discourse illuminate the information being sought or even important African values and how these values reflect or contradict universal values – as Wanjohi (2001) did in Under One Roof: Gikuyu Proverbs Consolidated. What is of utmost significance, however, is not just the contextual understanding of the proverbs but also how the people define what makes for ‘progress’ within the environmental circumstances. While the external ideas are admissible, it is only within the definition of the admissibility by the people. This is an important point not taken into consideration by Akiwowo (1983, 1986, 1999) or Adesina (2000), among others, in their contributions to the feasibility of indigenous sociology. Indeed, what they attempted to do is not precisely within ‘everyday life’ but more ‘abstractions’ from everyday life located within their professional ambit.

African Proverbs and Conceptions of Development: Between the Community and the Individual

The proverb, when used appropriately, clearly brings the picture home to the people for whom development efforts are targeted. Proverbs present deep meanings that contextualize and structure embedded social relations, social structure, culture, and accompanying development within the contextualized meaning of the immediate local/culture group. It is not surprising, therefore, that the World Bank (2000) found that proverbs, in evaluation, have typically served two purposes. First, they shed light on the social dynamics that influence program operations, in so far as they distill local culture and illustrate factors that impinge on individual and collective behavior. Though African proverbs, and, indeed all African cultural values, acknowledge the communal or what Pratt and Manheim (1988) refer to as ‘groupthink(ing)’, Africans also conceive of the individual as an independent being with her/his individualistic values. In other words, while development, i.e. new ways of doing things, may be communally defined, individualistic values are also acknowledged as possible ways.

Communalism, according to Gyekye (1996: 36), is ‘the doctrine or theory that the community (group) is the focus of the activities of the individual members of the society … though not to the detriment of the individual but rather to the well-being of every individual member of the society’. Thus, it is said among the Yoruba of Southwestern Nigeria that:

A tree does not make a forest.

Or, in an Akan proverb of Ghana:

A person is not a palm-tree that he should be self-complete [or self-sufficient].

These imply that an individual cannot exist independent of others, thus the necessity for cooperation. It is the necessity for this cooperation that informs the interpersonal bonds of people sharing common interests, values, and goals within certain boundaries. Sharing common values, interests, and goals implies that all have responsibilities to the community, and all must work together to achieve a common purpose so that the ‘burden’ becomes light for everybody. It is therefore common among Africans to say:

One hand cannot lift a load up to the head.

The left hand washes the right hand and the right hand washes the left for the hands to be clean.

It is when all hands come together that confidence (independence) exudes.

All these, among others, imply the need for cooperation, mutual aid, and collective action for the accomplishment of any task – both for the individual and the community. And this is why Africans also say:

S/he who borrows from others’ wisdom is not easily put to shame.

Meaning that whatever wisdom an individual possesses can be enhanced through learning from others and is thus more useful.

Yet, as Gyekye (1996), further shows from the Akan proverb:

The clan is like a cluster of trees which, when seen from afar, appears huddled together, but which would be seen individually when closely approached. (Original emphasis)

This expains that, contextually, the individual is real/separately rooted and is not totally diminished/absorbed in the human community. Thus, the Yoruba will say that even though the community has taught you,

It is with your own hands that you present good behavior.

Consequently, individuals require wisdom, knowledge, and understanding for their survival within the community/society. These three requirements are independent of each other.

Knowledge, according to Gyekye (1996: 137), is, for Africans, the source of freedom while wisdom ‘includes the ability to think out ways of making success in one’s personal life – to analyze and solve the practical problems of life – and the ability to pay reflexive attention to fundamental principles underlying human life and experience’. Possession of wisdom and knowledge may imply understanding but, in itself, it connotes the clever presentation of what knowledge and wisdom has taught the individual in everyday interaction. Suffice it to say that it is understanding that exhibits/manifests the knowledge and wisdom acquired – the practice – bringing out the theory/philosophy into the open. This is why ‘men and women of wisdom’ need understanding to present proverbs in different contexts. A proverb requires the deployment of strategies, as Yankah, as cited earlier, observed, ‘to deal with old problems, and to resort to old strategies to contain new problems’ (Yankah, 1989: 184). It is also this ‘understanding’ of proverbs (in content and in context) that social science researchers, especially sociologists, need for analyzing development process. This is apposite when, as the World Bank (2000) noted, proverbs help to make development recipients realize that there is nothing new in ‘new’ development initiatives, since the expectations of development such as evaluation and performance, accountability and efficiency, collective decision making, empiricism and causal analysis, and self-governance and self-assessment are present within their indigenous expectations. Thus, beneficiaries are able to develop culturally appropriate technology of democratic self-governance or –more appropriately – author it themselves.

Research needs to weigh the implications of proverbs as it explains the importance of the community and the individual, yet recognize that, at the end of the day, though both are important, the community defines the reality/situation for the individual. Even the extent of deviation or deviancy is determined by the community. This is, however, with the full realization that proverbs within communal contexts are not rigid or fixed but allow for social control for all groups in the society. For example, there is a proverb that says:

Even if the hand of the child cannot reach up to where things are kept, that of the elder cannot enter into the gourd.

Both the young and the old are relevant in societal arrangements with each playing her/his role because:

Old age does not imply wisdom.

Consequently, development may not be conceptualized on individualistic character as it applies in the ‘developed’ world. That the latter is a ‘complex’, ‘organic’, and ‘formal’, characteristically, does not imply that ‘developing’ societies should follow suit. Indeed, it seems as if it is the so-called ‘primitive’ character of these latter societies that colors their social capital better than the economic advancement of the ‘developed’ societies. In fact, the rural areas in the former subsist and survive with or without the formal, bureaucratic, military/democratic regimes that have been (and are being) instituted. It is of utmost significance that the social capital presence is a sine qua non to battling the ravaging wars and environmental destructions the world over. With social capital in its ‘primitive’ character, these problems can be eradicated when ‘all work in the interest of all’. Human rights, in this regard, derive from community rights.

In short, the onus is on the ‘development experts’ to appreciate what unites, rather than what disintegrates, in understanding the people and forming recommendations for moving forward. Proverbs help one to appreciate both the heterogeneity and homogeneity in societies by interpreting and transcending human reality. This in-depth understanding exhibits the truth of things in different contexts, laying bare the description and interpretation. While recognizing community, proverbs also expose social inequality and thus can contribute to the understanding of order and social change.

Conclusion

Proverbs are commonly used in almost all known human societies. Their relevance in Africa is the pervasiveness with which they occur in everyday living, especially in rural areas. Since rural dwellers constitute at least 60 percent of African society, the understanding of the rural social structure becomes most feasible when oral poetry, especially proverbs, is critically analyzed in its contextual situation. This is more so with the acceptance of qualitative methodologies of FGDs, interviews (in-depth, key-informant), and observations in the social sciences. These can, however, be enriched when the content and context of these interviews, discussions, and observations are located in the proverbial understanding. Proverbs are not only common in everyday living but also provide deep insight into the ways of life of the people. And it is this deep insight that can assist in development purposes as it enhances the understandings of the meanings people attach to their existence.