ABSTRACT
Doing African philosophy could never end with narrating or describing African traditions and belief systems. Rather, it primarily and essentially involves making comments, critical and analytical ones at that as, for instance, has been done with African communitarianism, and pointing out connexions and relevance of the different parts as, for instance, an African environmental ethicist may do when she tells us about the relevance of African ontological beliefs for the moral status of the environment. This chapter emerges from the same desire: to record and critically comment on a particular aspect of African traditions showing its connexion to a larger body of beliefs and ideologies. It develops and defends the theses concerning the feminine experience of coping with a spouse's death in African traditions. The chapter concludes that a philosopher in Africa researching African thoughts and traditions is saddled with the crucial responsibility of critiquing cultures and traditions.
