Tuji, Wendmagegnehu (2014) The Relevance of Primary Education to the Developmental Needs of Pastoral Communities in Ethiopia: The Case of Hammer Pastoralists Area. PhD thesis, Addis Ababa University.
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Abstract
The purpose of this study was to explore the relevance of the primary education program to the developmental needs of pastoral communities in Ethiopia by taking the case of the Hamer pastoralist community. Based on social reconstructionism as my theoretical orientation, I argued that education (the school curriculum and pedagogy) can help to enhance pastoralists’ endogenous development if it gives recognition to and makes use of their’ indigenous knowledge and culture. That is, the study was founded on my understanding that education can serve as an instrument for pastoralists’ development and transformation if it is designed and provided in a manner that is responsive to the actual socio-economic, cultural and political needs and concerns of pastoral communities. Accordingly, the study sought to identify the actual needs and problems that affect the life and development of the Hamer pastoral communities and explored the kind of education that can contribute to address these needs and problems. Based on these arguments, the 10 study examined the responsiveness of the existing education program to the developmental needs of the Hamer pastoral communities. To address my research questions I used multiple ethnographic methods. I interviewed pastoralist elders and children, education officials, teachers, local experts and extension workers. I did content analysis of policy and program documents and environmental science textbooks. I observed environmental science classes in first cycle grades (grade one to four) and the everyday life activities of children and the pastoral people. Qualitative interpretation and narration were employed to analyze the data obtained from the field and to draw conclusion and implications. The data and analysis in this study have revealed that the relevance of the existing primary education program of the SNNPR to the socio-economic and cultural needs of the Hamer pastoral communities is poor. For most Hamer people, sending children to formal schools would have a negative impact on the household economy. They perceived the existing formal primary education program to be irrelevant to their livelihood needs. The current education system, as it is designed and delivered in the SNNPR, tends to exclude the Hamer pastoralist people’s indigenous knowledge and lifestyle and seeks to promote their children’s assimilation into mainstream society. In contrast to the intention of the education policy, the formal education program tends to undermine Hamer children’s sense of identity and belongingness to their own ethic group and their understanding of the pastoral way of life as a life of dignity. By doing so, it undermines the potential of the Hamer pastoralists for endogenous change. Since the inception of the existing education policy, the SNNPR education bureau has been preoccupied with ‘southernizing’ (regionalizing) the school curriculum by adapting it to the socio-cultural realities of the southern Ethiopia. Deconstructing both the western and the so called the ‘ Amhara’ cultures that are said to have been embedded in the previous centralized curricula of Ethiopia has been the key strategy towards this goal. However, the decision to use a uniform regional curriculum for many pastoral and non-pastoral communities of the SNNPR seems to have undermined the intention to provide responsive education to these communities. The standardized regional curriculum can hardly meet the needs of the diverse ethnic groups in the region. Therefore, what is missing in the curricular project of the region is the understanding that the SNNPR itself is a heterogeneous society in terms of its ethnic, cultural, social, livelihood, and linguistic characteristics. That is, policy makers and implementers in the SNNPR seem to have adopted a mono-cultural approach to contextualize the curriculum for multicultural and multiethnic communities of the region. They seem to have situated their conceptualization of the multicultural principle of ‘unity in diversity’ on a mono-cultural mindset. Unity-in-diversity is the motto that binds more than 56 ethno-linguistic groups as one political and economic community that we call the SNNPR. However, the fundamental notion of this motto seems to have been misunderstood mainly because of the tendency to conceive the two notions ‘unity’ and ‘diversity’ as being incompatible or contradictory. I argue that genuine 11 unity can flourish in a setting that recognizes and values diversity. Any attempt to maintain unity through homogenization of cultures may lead to assimilation that would breed disintegration rather than unity. On the other hand, diversity should not be understood and promoted from the perspective that essentializes otherness. The implication is that education program in the SNNPR has to be designed in such a way that helps to promote identity construction among students and to inculcate in them a humble attitude toward learning about diverse ethnicities and cultures by explaining differences as due to different world views or value systems rather than due to historical rivalry or enmity. Education has to instill in the students a mindset that is founded on the notion that the diverse groups in the SNNPR have many things in common and they can be stronger and powerful from uniting without sacrificing their identity. The study underscores that using education as a tool for transforming pastoralists’ mode of production and lifestyle is a rational strategy to mitigate the prevailing problems of underdevelopment and their marginalization. However, the study insists that education can play instrumental role in promoting pastoralist development if it is designed and implemented in such a way that addresses the seemingly contesting needs (such as identity construction versus nation building, local needs versus national needs, cultural change versus continuity) without subscribing exclusively to one or the other polar stance. The study suggests that contextualizing learning through decentralization of the curriculum development process to the grassroots level and adopting a policy approach that is responsive to the contesting needs within pastoral communities and the internal and external dynamics that affect the life of pastoral society are the major steps in order to maintain the link between education and development of pastoral communities.
| Item Type: | Thesis (PhD) |
|---|---|
| Subjects: | B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > B Philosophy (General) L Education > LB Theory and practice of education > LB2361 Curriculum |
| Divisions: | Africana |
| Depositing User: | Vincent Mpoza |
| Date Deposited: | 27 Nov 2018 10:49 |
| Last Modified: | 27 Nov 2018 10:49 |
| URI: | http://thesisbank.jhia.ac.ke/id/eprint/7798 |
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