INDIGENOUS PRACTICE.....CHILD AND YOUTH CARE IN SOUTH AFRICA.

There's a sudden recent spurt of comment, question ,articles and discussion on the issue of indigenous child and youth care in South Africa. Or should I say,....lack of it? The form of response varies from academic treatise to opinion. Some of the child and youth care worker's voices for indigenous practice sound somewhat like calls in the wilderness.

It's not at all new...but an interesting renewal of the call to move away from the dominant Euro-centric, North American  theories and practice. And it is so. Our South African practice is Euro- technocratic rather than culturally African.

Blame gets bandied about. Blame the early missionaries. Blame colonialism.  Blame the churches. Blame academics. Blame the continuous importing  of  overseas key-note speakers to our conferences. Blame our Westminster form of parliament. There can be no doubt that the scarcity....No!.. lack of South African literature and research exacerbates our European, Canadian and North American practice. And it doesn't always work. This IS Africa. We ARE African..and so are the children and young persons in our system.

It all sounds as if we are afraid to apply, in practice, what we know.  Are we trapped in organisational cultures that want to look good in a child and youth care world for fear of ridicule or being labelled as unscientific and merely superstitious? No-one is sying that proven theory is  worthless in Africa. There is just a call to apply it in the unique ways of Africa. 

Our experience may provide a candle-flame glimpse of our distance or proximity to real, indigenous African child and youth care work here.

I say this often.  I always thought that residential care in child and youth care facilities ( Centres, or Treatment Centres ) , the methods approach, and practice was the sort of Grand Prix of child and youth care work.  BUT, when experiencing community based care first hand, my opinion changed. I now think that residential facilities can learn from community based child and youth care.  In the Isibindi project in Bethanie village in the North West Province, when the community or a family experienced a problem, especially with its young people, they called the police. The police were really good. They sat with the family or neighbours and tried to get everyone reconciled.They used a restorative justice approach. If that didn't work, they assisted to arrange a restorative justice meeting with and at, the tribal authority, I'm told in Setwana it is called rerabolola kgetse. If the chief or the queen was not available, elders in the Tribal Committee would facilitate restorative discussion. The basis of this is "It takes a village to raise a child" within the African cultural roots of u'buntu. Some say u'buntu is dead. But I experienced it in Bethanie.

Strange that we don't see it happening in the residential facilities that much.

In 1995, when the transformation of the South African Child and Youth Care system policy was published 17 principles of practice were listed. I was told that the then President of South Africa, Thabo Mbeki, added that last 17th.....African Renaissance. It was his thrust - we had to ride above the dominant culture and practice who we were.......African in heart mind and soul. So, in the Cabinet Enquiry of 1995/6  child and youth care Centres practice was measured also against African Renaissance. In general, there were somewhat weak, superficial responses. Food, celebration of heritage day, consent to circumcision if requested....and that was problematic for some.....Nothing central. Nothing spiritual.

Again, I go back to this frequently,  ..."Thom Garfat's " an intervention is only as effective as it is experienced to be effective." When Prof Norman Powell, a black American, said, " Young people learn to play the system", this resonated with me. In the gap between what we actually do in the Euro-centric system and the African reality, young people "play the game". It pays.

We constantly engage within ourselves and with young people in the search for meaning. What do we, and young people believe are the "roots" ....the CAUSE of their NOW situation? Probing around,  through engagement and trust building, we can sometimes pierce the game playing. Allowed in, for a moment, "I am being used by the ancestors as a message to my parents. Through what has  happened to me, they were meant to realise, that the ancestors are not happy." Rites and rituals either not done, or not properly performed. Some slaughter not done. Names not properly chosen. Catching these little moments of African meaning were much easier in the community based setting. 

Divination it was believed would confirm much of this
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At the tribal place, the rerabolola kgetse, tribal elders and community could well also perhaps set out reconciliatory acts or rites to make good. 

I did say that this would be no more than an experiential candle flame glimpse to help us see if we are distanced from or approaching indigenous child and youth care in the African context.

Are we ready in our facilities to engage with white chickens, circles of elders, grave sites, beads, cords, herbs and goats sheep and divination. Maybe we are and do, but the cries for indigenisation suggest that we have a journey still to go.

It looks as if we will not get it right until we think Africa, problem solve Africa, Find African meaning. Break the African silence, Act Africa. Be proudly African.