Sangomas at university
When I first read that my alma mater, the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) has launched a degree for sangomas (in so-called Indigenous Knowledge Systems), I muttered darkly about how a once great academic institution had been reduced to a politically correct joke. Not a very funny joke either. Wits was once the highest rated University for scientific research in Africa, and a top 100 world ranking. Those days are long gone as political pressure and chronic underfunding has resulted in reduced scientific research output and a weakened faculty. Now they want to teach utter mumbo-jumbo.
But then I thought there might actually be some method in their madness. But first the madness:
Sangomas, also known as traditional healers, are African shamans. They worship and are “called” by their ancestral spirits. They deal with a range of issues, from healing illnesses to counteracting witches. They practise strict rituals while doing their interventions, including going into wild trances during which the ancestral spirit is supposed to posses the healer. They throw bones to dish out advice, often pointing a finger at the evil person causing the harm. And they dish out muti, which are medications from animal or plant origin – not for the efficaciousness of the potion, but for its spiritual significance. For instance, very few local soccer players will take to the field without their dose of muti.
This is not science.
So what could the method be? Well the fact is that up to 80% of the indigenous population consult sangomas, either exclusively or before seeing a medical professional. This is a very strong belief system and one can’t just wish it away. So it makes sense that as the primary, trusted health consultants these quacks should be trained to recognise diseases such as AIDS and refer these patients to proper doctors. Why would they do that? After all HIV cures from sangomas are all the rage. Well I suppose that by bringing them into the formal medical community they would feel more collegial and refer patients to their “colleagues”. In other words: we know they’re crazy but so is most of the population that believe in them so let’s make the best of a bad situation and try and co-opt them to do something useful and try and save lives.
Maybe. But then Professor Gundidza Mazuru, of the Wits school of medicine’s pharmacy department says:
“I will be one of the professors who will be teaching them about manufacturing their products, clinical tests, packaging, and the regulations governing manufacturing and distribution before they could think of putting their products on the shelves.”
Products? Clinical tests? WTF?
Sangomas are not benign. They cause many life-threatening problems with their “treatments”, especially through their use of enemas and the psychological trauma they subject on their “patients”. And sometimes it gets truly evil. The rogue ones are involved with harvesting human body parts – usually genitalia, ritual murders, raping of virgins to “cure” AIDS, and baby rape. See F.A.C.T.net for the horrific details.
This sort of thing does not belong in a University.
Comments
3 Comments on Sangomas at university
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Juno on
Fri, 17th Jul 2009 10:55 am
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naly on
Wed, 12th Aug 2009 5:16 pm
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Vusi Moloi on
Fri, 18th Dec 2009 4:00 am
Great post. While I think’s its a brilliant idea to teach sangomas how to recognise diseases for what they are, I agree that there is a danger that this move will give credence to pseudoscience. Next thing we know, we’ll have crystal therapists, aromatherapists and assorted peddlers of snake oil getting Wits degrees. And don’t get me started on that. Thanks for visiting my blog.
i dont think its a bad idea to get sangomas to the universities,thou im very sceptical about the origin of this,or rather the idea behind this thought. sangomas are special beings born with special gifts,like our psychics,bt i neva heared of anyone suggesting psychics must go to univerities,is it because they are educated,what are they going to be thought hygiene or to change their belief systems and become more acceptable to communities than they are now.we must be very careful of losing the little we have,because we want to westernize everything.we are faced with a big challenge coz most pple do not want to recognise nor acknowledge their callings becouse being sangoma means losing yourself and become a new self.i would like to enroll to that university and experience this new adventure
There are scientific reasons why it’s important for the Unversity of Witwatersrand to offer university degrees in the Sangoma profession. The University runs the risk of being irrelevant if it does not adapt. Western societies have been gradually losing patients to alternative medicine or health care. Non-Western medicine like Chinese Acupuncture, among others, have grown explosively and many even command their own universities and colleges (including research institutes) in North America.
Medical science has been losing ground because it has also become some kind of a religious institution based on Darwinist thinking. The Darwinist philosophy has resulted in a number of poor approaches towards curative medicine because of an inherent belief in adapt, mutate and so forth. If you believe in adapt then you are not going to remove a problem because you can always adapt to it. If the problem kills you it means you were not genetically fittest. This Darwinist strategy also has an economic advantage because the shareholders become profitable this way because for as long as the problem exists, we will treat it. In this way it’s not advantageous to remove the problem completely. Look at a simple illness like flu, it has been with us for centuries and yet western medicine has not found cure for it and yet when you go to a pharmacy you find an endless cocktail of how to fight or treat cold.
Contrast that with an Africanist approach which takes a systems approach (some call this holistic) whereby the problem must be eliminated. If you follow that approach then you are going to make a good faith attempt to get rid of the problem. Colon cancer is very high among White South Africans particularly English South Africans. The same disease is almost non-existent (less than 1 per 100 000) among the African population. Part of the reason has to do with the Sangomas who recommend the remedies and the preventative diets which effectively eliminate colon cancer among the African population. The Africans who might suffer from this are those who live in cities like Johannesburg and have adopted western lifestyle.
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