Learning from TICH Students
While the master's students prepare presentations for class, Mitch and I suggest they use topics that arise naturally during class discussions. When the topic of wife inheritance comes up we decide to use it. Wife inheritance is practiced by the Luo and other West African tribes (Luos are the second largest tribe in Kenya). The students divide themselves into three groups according to ethnicity, with the Luos developing a persuasive speech on the merits of wife inheritance and the other two groups (non-Luos), creating persuasive speeches on the dangers of wife inheritance.
Wife inheritance is considered one of the many Luo cultural practices contributing to the high rate of HIV/AIDS in West Africa. If looking at a map of West Kenya, wide bands surrounding Lake Victoria have the highest rates of HIV infection (these bands are consistent with Luoland). While the national average of HIV infection is 6.7%, it rises to 15% in our part of Kenya, with Kisumu being the hub of the high percentage area. Many pockets around the lake, such as slum areas, have rates as hight as 38%. Why? I’ve been asking this question when appropriate and do not have a complete answer. Yet. But here’s what came from the class discussions and speeches.
If a Luo woman is widowed, her husband’s family wants her attached to another man within the family right away. Usually it is the deceased’s brother who takes the widow as his wife, even if he already has a wife, and the Luo’s see the practice as providing care for the widow and her dependent children. According to tradition, the woman is to have sex with her new husband before her deceased husband is buried. If it doesn’t happen before the funeral, it must happen within four days after the burial. They also want her to become pregnant within three months of her husband’s death. When the child is born, it will be given the name of the deceased and treated as his physical embodiment. The Luo believe deceased relatives oversee their welfare and act as intermediaries with the spirit world.
If the man is thought to have died from a curse (which is often what AIDS is called), then the woman must be cleansed before having sex with her new husband (the same holds true for men who lose their wives to curses/AIDS). This means a man, acting as a "cleanser" from outside the family, will have sex with the widow. If she is HIV positive, she may infect the male outsider, who then goes on to have sex with other widows who may or may not be infected. Most likely, the "cleanser" is already HIV positive and therefore has a high likelihood of infecting widows who were not infected by their husbands.
Opponents of wife inheritance say Luos want the wife attached to a new husband right away so their family will retain rights to the man’s property. If the woman is left to her own devices, argues one Luo student, then there will be a line of men at her gate and she may let them all in, one at a time. Other’s argue that women do not have to have a man, that when a woman is widowed, she should get to choose if she remarries and whom she remarries. If she’s okay living on her own and taking care of her children, she should be able to live thusly.
When one anti-wife inheritance group speaks too harshly against women who are inherited, a female Luo student speaks up. Her name is Elizabeth and she participates fully and strongly in all discussions. She comes across as confident and sharp. Elizabeth’s comment to the anti-wife inheritance team is that their attitude during delivery of their speech put her off, because as a Luo woman, she wants to be inherited (should her husband die). But their viewpoints caused her to shut down to their message. This is my opportunity to jump in and reiterate what we had already discussed about knowing the audience. Only when a speaker knows the attitudes and beliefs held by his or her audience can they construct an argument to meet that belief and then work to change it. Attitudes must be changed before behavior will be changed.
The topic of wife inheritance is so important and so deeply felt by everyone in the room, I struggle to view it purely as a topic for communication instruction. This continual stepping back to examine delivery was a good way to get the students to take a meta approach to this and other topics. Because it's a fascinating topic, and heartbreaking in many ways, everyone is fully engaged for the two hours of presentations and evaluations.
Orphans are another topic that comes up during discussion. One student says he read a news article about street boys in Nairobi being taken to the Congo and trained in military tactics by rebels. Mitch Odera says, "I wrote that article," and he proceeds to tell us that soon peace will arrive in The Congo and perhaps even the Sudan, where many boys are taken and trained as soldiers. They’re taught to torture and kill without remorse. When fighting stops in these other countries, the militant boys will return to Kenya and Nairobi. Mitch pleads with the government to prepare for their return, because Kenya has never dealt with street boys trained to kill.
An orphan in Africa is defined as a child who has lost one or both parents. Vera, a research intern at TICH who's originally from The Congo, says her father was killed in their civil war in the early 60’s. Because of the stigma of being an orphan, her father’s family and her mother’s family ostracized them. She says her mother had a bitter time taking care of her family without a husband and without the assistance of extended family. The stigma holds true for the nearly one million orphans in Kenya. If their parent(s) die from AIDS, people are more likely to shun them for fear the child might be infected. There are so many orphans in Kenya, the government cannot afford to build orphanages. Grandparents are burdened with orphaned grandchildren. One student tells us some grandparents do well enough and can provide good meals for their orphaned grandchildren. Such good meals, in fact, that the children living next door with both parents begin to wish they were orphans, too, just so they can eat good meals. The class chuckles at the irony.
Wife inheritance is considered one of the many Luo cultural practices contributing to the high rate of HIV/AIDS in West Africa. If looking at a map of West Kenya, wide bands surrounding Lake Victoria have the highest rates of HIV infection (these bands are consistent with Luoland). While the national average of HIV infection is 6.7%, it rises to 15% in our part of Kenya, with Kisumu being the hub of the high percentage area. Many pockets around the lake, such as slum areas, have rates as hight as 38%. Why? I’ve been asking this question when appropriate and do not have a complete answer. Yet. But here’s what came from the class discussions and speeches.
If a Luo woman is widowed, her husband’s family wants her attached to another man within the family right away. Usually it is the deceased’s brother who takes the widow as his wife, even if he already has a wife, and the Luo’s see the practice as providing care for the widow and her dependent children. According to tradition, the woman is to have sex with her new husband before her deceased husband is buried. If it doesn’t happen before the funeral, it must happen within four days after the burial. They also want her to become pregnant within three months of her husband’s death. When the child is born, it will be given the name of the deceased and treated as his physical embodiment. The Luo believe deceased relatives oversee their welfare and act as intermediaries with the spirit world.
If the man is thought to have died from a curse (which is often what AIDS is called), then the woman must be cleansed before having sex with her new husband (the same holds true for men who lose their wives to curses/AIDS). This means a man, acting as a "cleanser" from outside the family, will have sex with the widow. If she is HIV positive, she may infect the male outsider, who then goes on to have sex with other widows who may or may not be infected. Most likely, the "cleanser" is already HIV positive and therefore has a high likelihood of infecting widows who were not infected by their husbands.
Opponents of wife inheritance say Luos want the wife attached to a new husband right away so their family will retain rights to the man’s property. If the woman is left to her own devices, argues one Luo student, then there will be a line of men at her gate and she may let them all in, one at a time. Other’s argue that women do not have to have a man, that when a woman is widowed, she should get to choose if she remarries and whom she remarries. If she’s okay living on her own and taking care of her children, she should be able to live thusly.
When one anti-wife inheritance group speaks too harshly against women who are inherited, a female Luo student speaks up. Her name is Elizabeth and she participates fully and strongly in all discussions. She comes across as confident and sharp. Elizabeth’s comment to the anti-wife inheritance team is that their attitude during delivery of their speech put her off, because as a Luo woman, she wants to be inherited (should her husband die). But their viewpoints caused her to shut down to their message. This is my opportunity to jump in and reiterate what we had already discussed about knowing the audience. Only when a speaker knows the attitudes and beliefs held by his or her audience can they construct an argument to meet that belief and then work to change it. Attitudes must be changed before behavior will be changed.
The topic of wife inheritance is so important and so deeply felt by everyone in the room, I struggle to view it purely as a topic for communication instruction. This continual stepping back to examine delivery was a good way to get the students to take a meta approach to this and other topics. Because it's a fascinating topic, and heartbreaking in many ways, everyone is fully engaged for the two hours of presentations and evaluations.
Orphans are another topic that comes up during discussion. One student says he read a news article about street boys in Nairobi being taken to the Congo and trained in military tactics by rebels. Mitch Odera says, "I wrote that article," and he proceeds to tell us that soon peace will arrive in The Congo and perhaps even the Sudan, where many boys are taken and trained as soldiers. They’re taught to torture and kill without remorse. When fighting stops in these other countries, the militant boys will return to Kenya and Nairobi. Mitch pleads with the government to prepare for their return, because Kenya has never dealt with street boys trained to kill.
An orphan in Africa is defined as a child who has lost one or both parents. Vera, a research intern at TICH who's originally from The Congo, says her father was killed in their civil war in the early 60’s. Because of the stigma of being an orphan, her father’s family and her mother’s family ostracized them. She says her mother had a bitter time taking care of her family without a husband and without the assistance of extended family. The stigma holds true for the nearly one million orphans in Kenya. If their parent(s) die from AIDS, people are more likely to shun them for fear the child might be infected. There are so many orphans in Kenya, the government cannot afford to build orphanages. Grandparents are burdened with orphaned grandchildren. One student tells us some grandparents do well enough and can provide good meals for their orphaned grandchildren. Such good meals, in fact, that the children living next door with both parents begin to wish they were orphans, too, just so they can eat good meals. The class chuckles at the irony.
posted by Cindi at 3:50 AM
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