GENESIS OF THE CONCEPT SERITI (CATEGORY A) IN OTHER CULTURES

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CHAPTER TWO SERITI IN ITS TRIPARTITE MANIFESTATION

INTRODUCTION

In this chapter, the researcher focuses what on seriti in its tripartite manifestation is among the Sotho speaking people of the Limpopo province and among other African cultures. African cultures, like their religions, are not uniform or monolithic. Since there is no uniformity in terms of cultural manifestations, there are no uniformities in the African perceptions of the concept of seriti. The chapter shall focus on whether the traditional image of seriti in the past has changed in its entirety or whether there are some traces of resilience. The researcher would also like to find out which of the categories of seriti are waning and which category of seriti is gaining prominence as well as the reasons for these phenomena. The researcher also focuses on ancestors and seriti. Ancestors are a personification of seriti and any factors that affect the belief in ancestors will also affect it. On the other hand, the less the people believe in ancestors, the less their tendency to believe in anything that is remotely connected with them. The material that deals with the latter section of the thesis comes from research results.
Category A deals with the strength of character in both the ethical and the mental dimensions among the Northern Sotho. The section that deals with the ritual factors that the researcher has termed category B seriti, considers ways in which the Northern Sotho protect themselves against the powers of evil and this is also the area where ancestors feature prominently. Lastly, category C seriti focuses on increasing one’s seriti with a view of gaining advantage. Most of what is solicited for could be gained at the expense of other people’s diriti /pl (seriti). At the same time, what is solicited for could be gained without using other people’s diriti (pl. seriti). This type of seriti is almost an antithesis of category A, as it is mostly man-made and focuses on the individual rather than the community. What the researcher aims to do with a division of seriti into three parts is to find out if these types of seriti exist in their original form or status or whether there are changes that have taken place. If there is a change what is the status of seriti today?

 CATEGORY A SERITI

A person with seriti is a person who has the ability to speak and to speak very well in a tribal court situation. Oratory elevates the status of people to the highest level. Such a person is believed to have a prodigious memory and the highest form of intelligence. This person intersperses his talk with traditional tools like idiomatic expressions and folklore. He is a very intelligent person who plans before he speaks. In Northern Sotho, such a person has what is called a heart that plans //pelotheri. This person is a traditional philosopher and if he is also a traditional medicine person, his seriti doubles and he is “feared” by everybody. This man is “feared” not because he is a thug but because he is kind, generous and very hospitable. This is indeed the Northern Sotho idea of a gentleman. Ilogu describes a gentleman in the following manner:
A gentleman does not indulge in wickedness but rather through respect to elders and dead ancestors observes the customs for hospitality, generosity and kindness especially to less fortunate members of the community.
Kindness and generosity are some of the features that a person with seriti is supposed to have. A gentleman welcomes strangers into his house without inquiring or finding out what he could do for them. Biko illustrates the situation succinctly when he writes:
No reason was needed as a basis for visits. It was all part of our deep concern for each other. These are things that are never done in the Westerner’s culture. A visitor to someone’s house, with the exception of friends, is always met with the question, “what can I do for you?” This attitude of seeing people not as themselves but as agents for some particular function either to one’s disadvantage is foreign to us.
Things have not changed because people or a group of men could decide to watch a match on television without making prior arrangements with the owner of the house.

 CATEGORY B SERITI

This type of seriti, because of its connections with ancestors, has to do with them as active agents in the process of healing. This type of seriti also has to do with strengthening or making somebody strong against diseases, malevolent forces as well as general fitness and appearance of the body, as Mönnig (1965: 51) states:
It is therefore incumbent on all persons continually to strengthen and protect their seriti against the onslaught of outside forces, or to strengthen it in such a manner as to enable its possessor to attain any desired effects.
Illness makes a person to be weak. It attacks not only the body of a person, but also affects a person’s dignity (seriti). The Northern Sotho like other southern African blacks; are interested in wholesomeness and well-being. Traditional healers from all parts of the continent have converged in the Limpopo Province. They bring with them promises of good health with the introductory fee of R30.00. Local traditional healers do not advertise their expertise. They rely on those who have been healed to pass stories of how they have been healed. In this kind of game there are also charlatans but those who believe in traditional medicine and healing say that it works for them. Here is an example of some of the things that they advertise to claim that they can heal and restore the seriti of their clientele:
1. Do you want to know about your future? 2. Are you addicted to drugs and alcohol? 3. Men’s (sic) penis which cannot erect powerfully? 4. We help single people to find partners/settle marriages (sic) 5. To bring back lost lover and love attraction. 6. Do you have symptoms of HIV/AIDS? 7. Are you being bewitched? 8. We send tokoloshe’s packing.
The list is endless. The common denominator is the claim by the traditional medicine men/women to be able to cure every known condition by making use of their concoctions and other types of medicine. Healing has connections with ancestors who are the major agents in this game.

CATEGORY C SERITI.

This type of seriti could be enhanced with the sole purpose of either harming others or seeking unfair advantage over other people. Mönnig(1965: 51) states that it is possible for a person to change or strengthen his/her seriti. There are people who want to be richer than most people in the society and as a result, they look for means to harm others or to put others at a disadvantage. In the list that was quoted by the researcher earlier there are the following things that the traditional healers claim to be able to do:
1. We specialise in court cases, divorce and bad luck. 2. We specialise in making people to win lotto’s, casino and gambling.
These are examples of the unfairness of the whole situation. What kind of a person would not resign herself/himself to their fate if for example they have either robbed or killed someone and are afraid to face the consequences? A person who is guilty should be made to face the consequences of their actions. They should not strive to win court cases at all costs. Secondly, if these people are indeed specialists in making people to win the lotto, they should show the good example by winning the lotto themselves. These are some of the things that would lead to their lack of credibility as will be shown later.
Another bad side of category C seriti is the belief that human flesh has healing powers. A situation in Venda during the decline of homeland politics proves the case in point. Mihalik and Cassim (1990: 130), of the former University of Bophuthatswana argued that ritual murder was one of the major causes of the decline. Their argument is that chiefs were formerly appointed by the people in the past, but then the government (the South African government in the 1980’s) decided that they were going to appoint the chiefs. The fact that the chiefs were appointed by the government made them shift their loyalties to the government as they were no longer accountable to the people. As a result of that, the status of being a chief waned in the eyes of the people they were supposed to rule.
This decline in the status of the chiefs needed a boost which was provided by the belief that certain organs of the body of a human being, if removed from a victim while he/she was still alive, could help to promote the dignity of the person in possession of such organs. What is important to notice is that ritual murders were never overtly condoned but were secretly practised by chiefs at the instigation of diviners, to gain prosperity and prestige.
Kings and chiefs would sometimes solicit for increasing their seriti or the diriti of their people by killing another person for medicinal purposes. This killing had to be done privately because if it could be done openly, there would be an outcry because such actions are not approved by the society. The researcher shall now focus on seriti as a phenomenon in other African cultures to demonstrate the presence of the tripartite division of seriti.

 GENESIS OF THE CONCEPT SERITI (CATEGORY A) IN OTHER AFRICAN CULTURES

Rites of passage that are intended to guarantee seriti are not the same in the entire African continent and as a result of these differences, the goals or intentions of the rituals of passage are not the same. Since this is the case, the rituals of passage could be abolished or replaced by something else if they prove to be antiquated. Rites of passage are sometimes dictated by the needs of the times. If for example the needs of the times had to do with cattle raiding and consolidation of national power, rites of passage will be designed to meet such needs. The slow process of the rites of passage made certain kings, for example Shaka, to think proactively about finding manpower to deal with cattle raiding and extension of his frontiers.
Shaka is reputed to have replaced the circumcision ritual with army conscription. If Shaka could so dynamically change the age-old custom of circumcision, to suit the changes that he wanted to be effected, there are other areas that could be changed without affecting the quality of the product. The quality of the product would be characteristics such as bravery at war, eloquence in traditional courts and being generally a good and generous person. These things translate into seriti. In a traditional setting, such qualities are still held in high esteem but they do not prepare a person to live comfortably in the twenty first century. The twenty first century is mostly interested in the quality of the product.

CHAPTER 1  INTRODUCTION 
1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE PROBLEM
1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
1.3 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY
1.4 RELEVANCE
1.5 METHOD
1.6 GEOGRAPHY AND ITS PEOPLE
1.7 MODJADJI AREA
1.8 HISTORY OF DISPOSSESSION
1.9 LITERATURE REVIEW
1.10 DIVISION INTO CHAPTERS
CHAPTER TWO SERITI IN ITS TRIPARTITE MANIFESTATION
2.1 INTRODUCTION
2.2 CATEGORY A SERITI
2.3 CATEGORY B SERITI
2.4 CATEGORY C SERITI
2.5 GENESIS OF THE CONCEPT SERITI (CATEGORY A) IN OTHER CULTURES
2.6 INITIATION/CIRCUMCISION
2.7 KINGS, CHIEFS AND SERITI
2.8 SERITI IN THE MODERN TIMES
2.9 SERITI AND ANCESTORS OR ANCESTRAL VENERATION
2.10 SERITI IN CHILDREN
2.11 SERITI AND THE YOUTH
2.12 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
CHAPTER THREE WOMEN AND SERITI
3.1 INTRODUCTION
3.2 WOMEN OF SERITI
3.3 WOMEN IN PROVERBIAL EXPRESSIONS
3.4 MODERN DAY WOMAN AND SERITI
3.5 SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION
CHAPTER FOUR MEN AND SERITI
4.1 INTRODUCTION
4.2 WHAT IS A PROVERB AND A METAPHOR
4.3 MEN IN PROVERBIAL EXPRESSIONS
4.4 PROVERBS THAT ENTRENCH POLYGYNY
4.5 PROVERBS THAT ENCOURAGE CO-OPERATION
4.6 THE DIGNITY//SERITI OF SOLIDARITY
4.7 INITIATION
4.8 CONCLUSION
CHAPTER FIVE CONCLUSION
TOWARDS AN UNDERSTANDING OF SERITI
QUESTIONNAIRE 162-171
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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