PERSON AND COMMUNITY.
Introduction
Cultures, traditions, conceptions, world
views and values, etc. varies from place to place, with Africa as no exception.
African thought, way of life, beliefs, understanding is quiet different from
that of the westerners, and all other continents. Africans enjoys some form of
characteristics and way of life among them. In this paper, we shall discuss in
details the concept of communitarianism in Mbiti. To achieve this, we shall
briefly look into the African people, communitarianism in African thought,
Menkiti’s idea of person, John Mbiti’s form of Communitarianism, Criticism of
Mbiti’s communitarianism, after which we shall give a final conclusion.
Africans
Africa is commonly known to be land of the
blacks even though, not all Africans are blacks. It is characterized by its
many traditional cultural practices and religion. The traditional beliefs and
practices of African people are highly diverse and include various ethnic
religions. Followers of traditional African religions pray to various
spirits as well as to their ancestors. These secondary spirits serve as intermediaries
between humans and the primary God. Most African societies believe in a single
Supreme Creator God.[1]
The role of humanity is generally seen as one of harmonizing nature with the
supernatural.[2]
Brotherhood is equally one of the remarkable characteristics of Africans.
Communitarianism In African Thought.
Community is viewed in a common sense as a
population of people who live within a specific legal area to which they can
lay claim. This group of people have contact and socialize with one another;
they communicate and share many things in common. In this categories are towns,
cities and countries.[3]
Thus, a community can be a single family,
a political party, an ethnic group, a Christian assembly, and so on. ”[4]
The term Communitarianism is
a philosophy that emphasizes the connection between
the individual and the community. Its overriding philosophy is
based upon the belief that a person's social identity and personality are
largely molded by community relationships, with a smaller degree of development
being placed on individualism. Although the community might be a family,
communitarianism usually is understood, in the wider, philosophical sense, as a
collection of interactions, among a community of people in a given place
(geographical location), or among a community who share an interest or who
share a history.[5]
In "Person and Community in African
Traditional Thought" (1984), Menkiti gave a crucial distinction between
the African view of man and the view of man found in western thought. In the
African view, it is the community which defines the person as person, not some
isolated static quality of rationality, will or memory.[6]
He further stated that, "as far as Africans are concerned, the reality of
the communal world takes precedence over the reality of individual life
histories" (p. 171). Thus the communal ethos has ontological and
epistemological precedence. Menkiti also defended the communitarian view on
biological and social grounds because the individual comes from a common gene
pool and belongs to a linguistic community: "Just as the navel points men
to umbilical linkage with generations preceding them, so also does language and
its associated social rules point them to a mental commonwealth with others
whose life histories encompass the past, present, and future" (p. 172).
Menkiti stated emphatically that personhood is defined by community and not by
qualities such as rationality, will, or memory.[7]
Menkiti’s Idea Of Person And Community.
Menkiti
rejects the Western minimalist definition of a person, "whoever has a
soul, or rationality, or will, or memory; the African view is 'maximal'."
Menkiti uses the word maximal to indicate that the African view of
personhood includes other criteria and is not limited to soul, rationality, or
will. Since personhood is achieved, not endowed, in Africa, one could fail to
achieve it.
[8]
Menkiti Stated that in Africa personhood
is something which has to be achieved, and is not given simply because one is
born of human seed,[9]
personhood is acquired as one gets along in society. This getting along in
society takes quite a lot of time, usually being attained by people who are of
advanced age. These people, are people who have over time, learnt and grasp the
full knowledge of social values and norms that govern their particular society,
and who as well, adhere to these norms, and are successful in living up to the
standard of personhood. Young people and children as postulated by Matolino
(2008:74) are lesser persons because they have to learn all the moral
requirements of their society and they still have to come to know how to behave
as their elders do. Personhood according to Menkiti is something that is
gradually acquired as one gets older and more accustomed to the ways of his
respective community. If one defies or fails to fully comprehend the
requirements of his community, then he cannot become a person in the maximal
sense of the term. [10]
as far as African societies are
concerned, personhood is something at which individuals could fail, at which
they could be competent or ineffective, better or worse . Hence, the African
emphasized the rituals of incorporation and the overarching necessity of
learning the social rules by which the community lives, so that what was
initially biologically given can come to attain social self-hood, i . e . ,
become a person with all the inbuilt excellencies implied by the term .[11]
In other words, for personhood to be attained, an individual has to go through
a long process of social and ritual transformation until he attains the full
complement of excellences seen as truly definitive of man. [12]
The community plays a special role on the
individual before he achieves personhood. Without the members of the community,
one cannot attain it.
Wiredu, has similar idea of personhood
with Menkiti, Wiredu is of the view that the concept of a person is a social
concept before it is anything else. Personhood is not an automatic quality of
the human individual; it is something to be achieved. By this position Wiredu
accords primacy and value to the community over the individual. On the same
note, Taylor believe that living in a society is a necessary condition of the
development of rationality in some sense of this property, or of becoming moral
agents in the full sense of the term, or of becoming a fully responsible, autonomous
being. This entails that full development of a person cannot be realised
outside the context of a community. [13]
Menkiti defended the communitarian ethos
by arguing that people use the neuter pronoun itto refer to a child rather
than the personal pronouns him or her because the child has
not yet attained personhood. He also stated that when a child dies, the funeral
ceremonies are brief. However, when an older person dies, elaborate funeral
celebrations take place because the older individual has achieved personhood
and has now become an ancestor who lives among the people. In general, when one
dies, he or she ceases to be a person.[14]
Menkiti argues that for one to be
considered a full person, that particular individual should exhibit unquestionable
moral worth. The transition from an ‘it’ as a baby to a ‘him or her’ as an
adult depends largely on the moral conduct of the individual. various societies
found in traditional Africa accept the fact that personhood is the sort of
thing which has to be attained, and is attained in direct proportion as one
participates in communal life through the discharge of the various obligations
defined by one’s stations. the traditional African society has no place and
space for an immoral and evil person. A virtuous or generous person is
considered a full person with great importance in the society. This simply
entails that if an individual does not behave according to the moral
expectations of the community he or she can fail to graduate from the ‘it’
status to full personhood. [15]
Mbiti’s Communitarianism
Mbiti started by discussing the tribal
nature among Africans and how this concept is connected to African
communitarianism. According to Matolino (2008:65) Mbiti claims that each and
every different tribal group or people in Africa have a common ancestor and
share a common language as well as common rituals. Where a tribal group shares
the same history it at least mythologically will trace its ancestry to the
first man created by God or they will trace their ancestry to the first leaders
of their tribe who established their group. This entails that Mbiti’s brand of
communitarianism is one that mirrors African traditional religion. Religion is
very central in African traditional cultures.[16]
Writing on tribes in Africa, Mbiti asserts
that each tribe has its own distinct religious system with which that tribe is
identified with. Members of a particular tribe are permanently fixed to their
tribe because they are born in that tribe. Thus he argues; these are the main features
of an African tribe, people, society or nation. A person has to be born a
member of it and he cannot change tribal membership. On rare occasions he can
be adopted ritually into another tribal group, but this is seldom done and
applies to both African and non- Africans. Tribal identity is still a powerful
force even in modern African statehood, although that feeling of tribal
identity varies like temperature, from time to time depending on prevailing
circumstances.[17]
This aspect of tribes is very fundamental in the discourse of communitarianism
because before we consider the whole community, we should recognize tribal
groups through which different people belong and identify themselves with.[18]
Mbiti also postulates that in the
traditional African society, kinship system regulate the life of all members of
the tribe. The entire tribe is tied to this kinship system. For Mbiti the
kinship system is like a vast network stretching laterally (horizontally in
every direction) to embrace everybody in any given local group. This means that
each individual is a brother or sister, father or mother, grandmother, or
cousin or brother-in-law, uncle or aunt or something else to everybody else.[19]
This entails that each and every member of the tribal group is related and no
individual is treated as a foreigner. Such societal setting contributes to the
establishment of a communitarian society with a shared identity. [20]
Furthermore, Matolino (2008:68) argues
that for Mbiti the kinship system is not merely restricted to the relations of
people who are living but it also extends to include those who have passed on
in life and those who are yet to be born. The living has a duty as seen above
towards the dead, to keep their little soul alive and offer libations for it.
Appiah also observes that, for as we shall see, many ritual acts of a religious
nature have components that appear to be modelled on other social relations
among people informs the notions of relations with other sorts of beings
(Appiah 2004:26).[21]
Concerning the place of the individual in
the traditional African society, Mbiti argues that a human person owes his
existence to other people including those of past generations and his
contemporaries. He is simply part of the whole. The community must therefore
make, create or produce the individual, for the individual depends on the
corporate group. Physical birth is not enough; the child must go through rites
of incorporation so that it becomes fully integrated into the entire society.
These rites continue throughout the physical life of the person, during which
the individual passes from one stage of corporate existence to another. The
final stage is reached when he dies and even then he is ritually incorporated
into the wider family of both the dead and the living.[22]
From this assertion one can deduce two sacrosanct ideas which are: that the
community has a special role in nurturing and upbringing of an individual for
him to be socially acceptable and that in traditional African thought, death
does not mark the end of life and relationship among the people of the same
tribe or clan. There is strong bond between the dead, the living and the yet to
be born. [23]
Stressing on the symbiotic and mutual
relationship between individual and the community, Mbiti argues that whatever
happens to the individual happens to the whole group and whatever happens to
the whole group happens to the individual. The individual can only say “I am
because we are; and since we are, therefore I am”. This is a cardinal point in
the understanding of the African view of man. This ideology depicts that in the
traditional African society, individual achievements and challenges are taken
to be of the community and the reverse is true. This collective approach as
part and parcel of African communitarianism is very fundamental in identifying
a people. Eze concurs with Mbiti when he argues that a community is formed by a
‘people’ a group of individuals that live together by fortune or misfortune of
shared histories and heritage, of common fate and destiny. No community exist
in a vacuum. At the same time however, an individual’s subjectivity is
necessarily located and actualized within a community.[24]
Kwame Gyekye on African communitarianism
Before discussing the nature of his version of moderate communitarianism, Gyekye
began by attacking Menkiti and Mbiti for exaggerating the value and importance
of community in the understanding of personhood in Africa. Gyekye disapproves
Mbiti and Menkiti’s version of communitarianism as radical and philosophically
inexcusable. [25]
Criticism Of
Mbiti’s Communitarianism
Gyekye criticized Mbiti version of
communitarianism on the ground that it does not recognize individual freedom.
Gyekye claims that although an individual is a social being, he is also other
things. The other things that he has in mind concern attributes such as virtue,
the ability to make individual choices and rationality. He argues that if these
attributes play any meaningful role in individual’s life like setting goals and
making important decisions then it cannot be said that an individual is
completely defined by the social structures that she finds herself in. He concedes
that although many of our goals are set by the community we live in, it is
still possible for individuals to make their own choices and decide on what
goals to purse and what to give up. To this Gyekye argues that “in the light of
the autonomous or near autonomous character of its activities, the
communitarian self cannot be held ads shackled self, responding robotically to
the ways and demands of the communal structure. That structure is never to be
conceived as reducing a person to intellectual or rational inactivity,
servility and docility.[26]
Conclusion
In the African thought, an individual is
identified with respect to where he belongs, which is his community. The
community shapes the individual, and the individual lives to live out what he
received from the community. In summary, just like Mbiti rightly said, the
nature of the African communitarianism can be summarized as thus: I am because
we are; and since we are, therefore I am”.
REFERENCE
Abiona
Adekeye, principles and practice of
community development[2],Ibadan University press
C. N.
Anyanwu, Introduction to Community
Development (Ibadan: Gabesther Educational Publishers, 1999).
Eze,
M.O. 2008. What is African
Communitarianism? Against consensus as a
regulative ideal. (South African Journal of Philosophy. 27.) (4).
Accessed on 21 June 2015.
Ifeanyi
A . Menkiti, Person And Community In African
Traditional Thought
Mbiti,
J.S.. African Religions and Philosophies.
(New York: Anchor Books. 1970)
Mhazo
Watadza, A Critical Assessment Of African
Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being. University Of South Africa.
February 2016.
Communitarianism
in African Thought- Menkiti on Communitarianism. http://science.jrank.org/pages/8771/Communitarianism-in-African-Thought-Menkiti-on-Communitarianism.html
The New Dictionary Of The History Of Ideas, Conmmunitarianism In African Thought. http://www.encyclopedia.com/history/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/communitarianism-african-thought.
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Wikipedia,
Communitarianism. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communitarianism
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Traditional African Religions. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_African_religions
[1] Wikipedia.https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_African_religions
[2]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Traditional_African_religions
[3] Abiona Adekeye, principles and practice of community
development[2],Ibadan University press
[4] C. N. Anyanwu, Introduction to Community Development
(Ibadan: Gabesther Educational Publishers, 1999), p.1.
[5]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communitarianism
[7]
http://science.jrank.org/pages/8771/Communitarianism-in-African-Thought-Menkiti-on-Communitarianism.html
[8]
http://science.jrank.org/pages/8771/Communitarianism-in-African-Thought-Menkiti-on-Communitarianism.html
[10] Mhazo Watadza, A
Critical Assessment Of African Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being.
University Of South Africa. February 2016.
[12] Mhazo Watadza, A
Critical Assessment Of African Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being.
University Of South Africa. February 2016.
[13] Mhazo Watadza, A
Critical Assessment Of African Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being.
University Of South Africa. February 2016.
[14]
http://www.encyclopedia.com/history/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/communitarianism-african-thought
[15] Mhazo Watadza, A
Critical Assessment Of African Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being.
University Of South Africa. February 2016.
[16] Mhazo Watadza, A
Critical Assessment Of African Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being.
University Of South Africa. February 2016.
[18] Mhazo Watadza, A
Critical Assessment Of African Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being.
University Of South Africa. February 2016.
[20] Mhazo Watadza, A
Critical Assessment Of African Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being.
University Of South Africa. February 2016.
[21] Mhazo Watadza, A Critical
Assessment Of African Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being. University
Of South Africa. February 2016.
[23] Mhazo Watadza, A
Critical Assessment Of African Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being.
University Of South Africa. February 2016.
[24] Mhazo Watadza, A
Critical Assessment Of African Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being.
University Of South Africa. February 2016.
[25] Mhazo Watadza, A
Critical Assessment Of African Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being.
University Of South Africa. February 2016.
[26] Mhazo Watadza, A
Critical Assessment Of African Communitarianism For Environmental Well-Being.
University Of South Africa. February 2016.
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