New social economic challenges have continued to affect and change roles and responsibilities traditional society prescribed to family and the community at large. Factors that have contributed to the social economic challenges include: Population increase, changing weather patterns, disease especially HIV/Aids, civil unrest, moral decay, poverty, modernization / westernization and policy among others. Many of the factors are interrelated with one factor aggravating the other.
Social –economic changes have stressed the traditional social system in which parents, grandparents, relatives and the community played different but mutual roles in children upbringing. Child upbringing was a collective community responsibility and it was intended to groom children into functional members of society. The system also provided for a social security system in which the young, vulnerable, disadvantaged were supported by other strong and productive members of the family and community.
Every parent strived to groom his/her children into productive and responsible members of society such that when he/she became older and weaker, his children would be able to take care of him or her. The parents had to provide for, love and take care of their families. “Family” in traditional society meant parents, children, grand parents and any other relatives. At family level, the man was in charge of family leadership, owned all family property and was responsible for all critical family decisions. The role of the woman was bearing children and taking care of the family. Women had limited access to education and productive resources say land, they lacked independence in decision making.
Parents taught their children skills relevant to their social gender roles. Boys learnt by working with fathers, while girls learnt by working alongside mothers. Boys learnt skills like metal works, carpentry, diviners, while girls learnt skills like basketry, pottery. Blame for a socially mal- adjusted child was put on the father or mother. Vocational skills like animal husbandry, farming, hunting, healing, rain making were passed on to children through apprenticeship hence were hereditary. Grandparents with diminished physical energy were supposed to be taken care of with their role inclined to passing on the cores of socialization to their grand children .They taught children stories that glorified and promoted socially acceptable behavior and disparaged undesirable behavior. They were integral and effective socializing agents because they combined personal life experiences and heroics with freedom to broach sensitive subjects like sex. This multi-generation social setup ensured a nearly flawless socialization of children in traditional society. In today society, most of the roles played by the traditional society to groom children like socialization,skills development, and teaching morals have been left to formal schools, however, school socialization often teaches skills and behaviour that are some times irrelevant to local needs.It also relies on a limited number of role models.
The HIV/Aids Scourge devastated communities in Uganda, especially during its peak period in the 1980’s and 90’s. The HIV prevalence rate peaked 35% of the Uganda population. HIV robbed children of their parents. Everybody in Uganda has lost a close relative to HIV/Aids. Its effects are typically evident in the number of total Orphans whose care is left to their grandparents.
In traditional society, the care of Orphans is the responsibility of a close relative especially an Uncle, or the grandparent. Many orphans end up in the care of grandparent since they tend to offer more social stability to the orphans. The devastation of HIV/aids has destroyed the “social security “system in Ugandan communities. Typically, Parents bear children whom they strive to shape into successful adults, who in turn take have to take care of the parents in their senile ages. Typically, it has created a generation gap which makes the traditional social system malfunctioned.
Nabirye Topista, a 68 year old single grandmother living in Buwanzu village takes care of 8 total orphans in the age bracket of 3 to 12. She clearly looks overstretched with her responsibilities. “They all lost their fathers. I am getting less strong every day but I do have to feed and provide for my grand children. We all have to work in the gardens every single day to provide food for us. With God’s grace we have been able to live on” explains Topista . Topista’s only wish is to have her grand children attain an education to help them attain a better future. The story is the same for several other grandparents and single mothers who have to struggle day to day to provide a life to the orphans they are taking care of. Clearly, Topista like many other grandparents in similar situation is going through a tough struggle. The role she is trying to play is neither prescribed in the traditional social system nor is it supported by the prevailing social system. Topista’s social security and "pension" was “robbed” by AIDS through which she lost most of her productive sons. She has to play the role of father, mother, and grandparent all at the same time yet society still looks at her as a “woman”- with no right to ownership of land or property and has never been to school.
Never before have family breakages been as frequent as they are in today society. Customary marriage practiced in traditional society did not provide for divorce or separation. While it is still practiced today, separation is common but there is no provision for divorce. Family breakages tend to negatively affect children and women much more negatively than they affect men. Moral decay leading to infidelity and economic strive are among leading factors for family breakages. This has increased the number of single mothers straining relentlessly to provide for their children. They have no jobs, do not own land or have right to property in most cases. The gender equality campaign by the Government has been misunderstood by the public in certain situations leading to family breakages. This has increase the number of single mothers who were unheard of traditional society.
While the traditional social system is still widely accepted as a basis for family and community management, the customs, beliefs and principles on which it was based have been grossly eroded, and in communities where it is still respected , the social set up does not appropriately allow for its functionality.
There exists a clear need for appropriate legislation to address social injustices which the weakened traditional social system has exposed or social economic changes have created. The domestic relations bill is meant to bridge the legislation gap left behind by the traditional social system but it will not be passes any soon to serve its purpose as it has met stiff resistance from different sections of society for the last 30 years.
Every change manifests with both challenges and opportunities. Solutions to challenges need to be sought and opportunities need to be exploited positively. Don’t you think it is the right time that we looked at grand parents as active and functional members of society who need to be empowered to become fully functional members of society to manage the wide range of responsibilities they take care of? How about single mothers struggling to provide a living and a future for their children? How about the need for a hybrid culture which combines useful aspects of traditional and western culture?
Jambo!
After a morning of work we sat on the front porch reading books. We read a book Ester brought called Mother & Kitty and also looked through a dictionary of science definitions Hanifa brought! We read, laughed, and discussed several words in detail pointing out examples around our dorm. Soon we relaxed in the shade of our courtyard tree eating fruits brought by the children. They were delicious!
