Culture and religion in Africa

In the years 2010–2011, while on a research fellowship in one of the Eastern European countries, in one of our weekly seminars at the research institute, I made a presentation on the role of ethnicity in conflicts and conflict resolution in Kenya. What followed was a lively discussion that signified the extent to which the participants and the seminar conveners were interested in the topic. During the social break, one of the participants wanted to know more about Africa – not Kenya, because through our conversation I realized that Africa is still perceived by some outsiders as a country, not a continent of 54 diverse countries, with varied languages, religions and cultures. Among the many questions that she asked was whether Africans still live on trees! Though she seemed to be genuinely concerned, the question, to me, was gross. It implied a great level of ignorance and misrepresentation of a people’s culture. In my response to the question I had the patience to ask my colleague at the Institute to read more about people’s cultures and what they mean to them, and that Africans did not live on trees, as she perceived. I also pointed out that there are some universal (not African) terminologies called globalization, secularization, urbanization and development, which might shed light on what has been happening to cultures of people around the world. When I received an invitation to contribute a chapter to this book, I was glad that I was mandated with a task of revisiting issues around culture, religion and development. It presented an opportunity for me to engage more with issues about how Africa’s development agenda is perceived and the place of culture and religion in this agenda. Obviously, when talking about development, Western ideologies take the center stage, while African cultures (ideas) are branded retrogressive. ¹ As a way of ensuring neutrality, in this chapter I will cite examples of what are deemed positive and negative aspects of culture in Africa, and how these affect development. Of importance to this chapter is the role of religion on Africa’s culture and how this has contributed to Africa’s development.