“An Africa without modern schools and teaching could never make progress; everyone agreed about that. But the provision of this kind of education ran into three big obstacles. One problem was that money for schools and teaching was always in short supply. In every colony, most children had no chance of going to school because there were no schools to go to. By 1945, even in the less backward colonies, the proportion of children who could go to school was smaller than one in every ten. The ability to read and write was still a rare skill. In the backward colonies—those of Portugal after 1945–the proportion of Africans who had been able to learn this skill was smaller than one in every hundred.
“A second obstacle was the poverty of parents. Few could afford school fees, books, clothes, or journey-money if getting to school required a bus journey. Even if they sent their children to school, those sons and daughters might seldom stay for more than one year, or perhaps for two : they were wanted for work at home...Of the few children who went to school, most stayed too short a time to be able to learn much of use.
“A third obstacle was the nature of colonial education. When young people managed to get to school, and stay at school, what could they learn? The elements of literacy and religion were the main subjects taught; in the first year or so, they were usually the only subjects taught. Later years included some history and geography, and perhaps one or two other subjects. But all these subjects were taught from a racist standpoint: tending to show that whatever came from Europe was good or useful, and that whatever came from Africa was either the reverse or not worth studying . In history, for example, British colonial schools taught about British kings and heroes, French colonial schools taught about French kings and heroes , and the smaller empires did the same. The general assumption behind behind such teaching was that Africans lacked the capacity to solve their own problems, and Europeans must show them how.
“By 1945, however, a lot of people began to see that there was something wrong with this lesson. The economic depression of the 1930s and the Second World War has taught a different lesson: that Europeans had not been able to solve even their own problems, let alone the problems of Africa. And from this different lesson there came a new mode of questioning, of criticism. It was the point at which, after 1945, schools which were intended to teach students to accept and even to admire colonial systems began to turn into schools where students became increasingly critical of those systems .
“It was natural that African teachers should often take the lead in this growing trend of independent thought. Much as in the black American community at an earlier period—and black American leadership was now increasingly influential among literate Africans—thoughtful teachers began to question and reject the obedient orthodoxies of official textbooks and attitudes . They sought instead for ways of recalling and then of teaching the values of Africa’s own life and history. “
P.89, “Colonial schools: new sources of anti colonial criticism.” MODERN AFRICA , by Dr. Basil Davidson (1994)
Interestingly when I toured Africa in 1983, with a group of Americans, we visited a grade school in rural Tanzania . Their language was Swahili, but they also spoke other languages, English being one of them. I drew a map on the black board of the United States, of Africa and of my home state, Missouri, to show them the long distance from Tanzania that my home was. When I said the word “Missouri” a sound of rapturous wonder arose from the students. Their teacher recognized my confusion and told me that “Missouri” was the sound of a word in Swahili as well. “Small world!” I said to myself . “Small world !
Monday, December 16, 2019
"MODERN AFRICA"
“An Africa without modern schools and teaching could never make progress; everyone agreed about that. But the provision of this kind of education ran into three big obstacles. One problem was that money for schools and teaching was always in short supply. In every colony, most children had no chance of going to school because there were no schools to go to. By 1945, even in the less backward colonies, the proportion of children who could go to school was smaller than one in every ten. The ability to read and write was still a rare skill. In the backward colonies—those of Portugal after 1945–the proportion of Africans who had been able to learn this skill was smaller than one in every hundred.
“A second obstacle was the poverty of parents. Few could afford school fees, books, clothes, or journey-money if getting to school required a bus journey. Even if they sent their children to school, those sons and daughters might seldom stay for more than one year, or perhaps for two : they were wanted for work at home...Of the few children who went to school, most stayed too short a time to be able to learn much of use.
“A third obstacle was the nature of colonial education. When young people managed to get to school, and stay at school, what could they learn? The elements of literacy and religion were the main subjects taught; in the first year or so, they were usually the only subjects taught. Later years included some history and geography, and perhaps one or two other subjects. But all these subjects were taught from a racist standpoint: tending to show that whatever came from Europe was good or useful, and that whatever came from Africa was either the reverse or not worth studying . In history, for example, British colonial schools taught about British kings and heroes, French colonial schools taught about French kings and heroes , and the smaller empires did the same. The general assumption behind behind such teaching was that Africans lacked the capacity to solve their own problems, and Europeans must show them how.
“By 1945, however, a lot of people began to see that there was something wrong with this lesson. The economic depression of the 1930s and the Second World War has taught a different lesson: that Europeans had not been able to solve even their own problems, let alone the problems of Africa. And from this different lesson there came a new mode of questioning, of criticism. It was the point at which, after 1945, schools which were intended to teach students to accept and even to admire colonial systems began to turn into schools where students became increasingly critical of those systems .
“It was natural that African teachers should often take the lead in this growing trend of independent thought. Much as in the black American community at an earlier period—and black American leadership was now increasingly influential among literate Africans—thoughtful teachers began to question and reject the obedient orthodoxies of official textbooks and attitudes . They sought instead for ways of recalling and then of teaching the values of Africa’s own life and history. “
P.89, “Colonial schools: new sources of anti colonial criticism.” MODERN AFRICA , by Dr. Basil Davidson (1994)
Interestingly when I toured Africa in 1983, with a group of Americans, we visited a grade school in rural Tanzania . Their language was Swahili, but they also spoke other languages, English being one of them. I drew a map on the black board of the United States, of Africa and of my home state, Missouri, to show them the long distance from Tanzania that my home was. When I said the word “Missouri” a sound of rapturous wonder arose from the students. Their teacher recognized my confusion and told me that “Missouri” was the sound of a word in Swahili as well. “Small world!” I said to myself . “Small world !
