Fortress Mentality: Breaking Through the Barriers of Culture to Deliver Transformative Education in Africa; The Nigerian Example

Culture in Africa is one great barrier to transformative education. This is not to say that there was no education in Africa before Western education. Rather, the pioneers of western education perhaps did not gather enough on African culture before introducing it. It has therefore become next to impossible to totally penetrate the existing “culture fortress” and make education purely transformative. One “culture fortress” identified by the present author is the “Almajiri culture” amongst the Hausa-Fulani people of Northern Nigeria. The argument of the present writer is that this “culture fortress mentality” must first be broken through by in-depth study of the people’s culture if transformative education is to be provided. Data are gathered from ethnographic sources from the Northern Nigeria, oral information elicited from Hausa-Fulani group found in Southwestern Nigeria and secondary information in books and journals. The data were analysed through the use of historical method where elicited information are juxtaposed with existing study to verify the veracity of claims earlier made. The study found that Nigeria has recorded some ground breaking successes, yet much still required to be done to attain educational transformation perhaps because background studies on the people are not enough yet.

Fortress mentality, Almajiri, Transformative Education

No references available.

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