Circumcision and Celebratory Orality among Some Black South African Cultural Groups

Abstract

My premise in this study affirms views like those of Abraham (2015) that the African personality pervading all African cultures has selectively preserved its traditional identity even as it dealt with hybrity that has been a natural outcome of encounters with different cultural clusters. Krige and Krige (1943) and Nkadimeng (1973) describe broad cultural benefits of circumcision as practised among the BaloBedu of Rain Queen Modjadji and the BaPedi respectively, both of the Limpopo Province of South Africa, while Nyembezi et. al. (2014) dwell on the same among the AmaXhosa of the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. The writers mentioned above variously hint at and describe the content and benefits of African lore encoded in oral formulae taught in circumcision schools. Morton (2011) stretches the research by going further to emphasize self-praise compositions as prominent among the lessons learnt during traditional circumcision, analyzing examples from southern African countries. However, he does this without adequately analyzing the content of self-praises and their use beyond celebrations that mark completion of circumcision. I intend to fill this gap by probing how self-praises learnt during the arcane initiation period survive beyond returnee festivities, as well as scrutinize the content of such self-praises. I focused in my research on the Northern Ndebele cultural group concentrated in the Vaaltyn-Moshate area of the town of Mokopane, in the Limpopo Province of South Africa.