Development of Education in Kenya

In Basil Davidson’s video “Different but Equal,” he outlines the European perception of Africa upon their discovery of the continent. Claims that the Europeans were making about African culture, however, were far fetched and did not depict Africa in a positive manner. History according to pre-European Africa was rich and diverse, but once Europeans saw for themselves how different their continent was from Africa, they began to make up their own version of African history.

The cultural diversity and advancements portray the progression developed in African history. The growth of these two subcontinents prove that American and European historians were incorrect on how advanced and civilized Africa was.

European Imperialism and Colonization of Africa created many social and economic changes including superiority over different people, technological advances, and new territories for European countries.

The Scramble for Africa from 1876-1914 has influenced many Africans by violent resistance, diplomacy, and adopting traditions. During this time period, Africa was being colonized and taken over by European powers. This was caused by the The Berlin Conference and it consisted of European powers deciding what they should do about Africa. Africa didn't actually have a say in this. Therefore, Europe ended up dividing up Africa into colonies that they took over.

The end to segregation started on May 17, 1954 with the Supreme Court’s ruling in “Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, that separated public schools for whites and blacks were illegal” (Beals, 1995, p. 12). By May 24, 1955 plans had been made to limit integration to Central High School.

According to the author, education was not bestowed upon African-American by enlightened citizens. Literacy is viewed as a valuable commodity that African-Americans have had limited opportunities to acquire. And for them becoming literate is perceived as continuous struggle. So Literacy serves emancipatory function when appropriate to reconstruct a society, so it limits access to those who are not literate to participate in all cultural institutions. According to Harris, European American do not fully support the education of African-American and would prefer not to fund it at the levels comparable to funding for their children and would prefer curricula that do not enable African –American to compete with their children for access to high education and possibly opportunities .

European Imperialism heavily impacted the African continent through culturally, economic, and political ideas. This era of history is heavily drenched in the aspect of ethnocentrism, which is the belief that one’s own culture is superior that of another. The Europeans colonized Africa believing that they could bring civilization, but they were often ignorant of Africa’s very complex societies. The European powers divided up the continent of Africa among themselves, without any consent from the people who actually lived there. The tribal stratification was changed to a caste system where racial, ethnic, and religious differences were of utmost importance, as delegated by European rule. The structure and business of the African economy was

The Republic of Niger, a poor, landlocked country, located in the heart of Sub-Saharan West Africa. Niger has seen its fair share of change throughout the decades; moving away from the control of the French Parliament in 1960, Niger formally declared its independence. Despite this bold act of independence, Niger would not see its first steps towards democracy until the early 1990’s, when they held their first open election as a free state. However, even with the empowerment of the people in a democratic government, Niger has seen itself nearly torn apart as a result constant coups, that have occurred as recently as 2010. Such instability has led to incredulous amounts of corruption and poverty, within the Niger government. This lack of stability and constant turnover in government, has been a driving factor behind the lack of resources available for education in Niger.

The proportion of children who are enrolled in primary schools has increased from 49% to 77% in the past decade in sub-Saharan Africa. This increase in enrollment is due mostly to the initiative of the governments from these regions to improve universal primary education. However, much remains to be done because even though enrollment has been made a possibility in a lot of these countries, there are a lot of other variables at play that still prevent children from receiving a quality education. Things such as poverty, cultural traditions, gender violence, and the incidence of early marriage are a major reason for disadvantaged groups, particularly poor girls, not making as much progress in enrolling

This chapter in Africans and Their History by Joseph Harris presents some of the roots of the stereotypes and myths about Africa in the past and for the most part are still held today. Harris discusses how the “greats” of history, geography, and literature starting a path of devaluation of Africans that writers after their time followed. Harris also denounced the language that these “greats” used to describe and talk about Africans. He asserts that this language inherently painted Africans as inferior and subhuman.

The British colonization of Kenya destroyed the culture and economy of the native people, but it established a democratic government and left Kenya a more modernized country.[1] During the 1880’s through 1914, the start of WWI, was an age of imperialism. One place that felt victim to this imperialism was Africa. At this time Africa was a wholly unmodernized continent. The reason the Europeans went after Africa was the introduction of the idea of social Darwinism and the “white man’s burden”. Social Darwinism is the belief that only the strongest and the most cunning can make it to the top of the social ladder, and it was the White Man’s Burden to step in for these undeveloped countries

In the past when I would think of Kenya I would think of wild animals, African tribes, and AIDS. When I met Wanjiku an international student from Kenya she told me many things about the culture of her country. I know from talking and working with her that they value friendship and believe in hard work.

One example of ethnic cleavage which can be traced directly to colonial foundations is that of the African/Asian(Indian) divide in Kenya and Uganda. Paul Vandenberg explains the racial privileges which the Asians enjoyed under British rule, leading to their concentration as a relatively successful ethnic group. As migrants flowed within the British empire, Asians who arrived in Kenya were given greater access to social, educational and capitalist opportunities by the colonials, as a result of higher 'racial' status(also Bennell 1982, p131). This expanding community naturally reinforced itself, in part due to the issues of trust and networking, in the absence of openly available commercial institutions(Vandenberg 2003, p450).

Many African people, as well as peoples of other races felt strongly against the Bantu Education. African people felt that this would make their children feel ashamed of their own culture and make them feel inferior to children of other race. The only other choice the Government left these people, was the choice of leaving their children without any education. Therefore the African parents decided to leave their children without any

Kenya is the regional leader in East Africa and this position is expected to be a constant over time. The economy is fairly diversified with a strong and well developed services sector. The financial services industry in particular is well developed and established, moreso the country is considered East and Central Africa’s hub for financial services.