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A Broad Outline

In thinking about one’s origins and how we come to be, it occurred to me that much of what we think of as deliberate is often merely incidental or happy chance and sometimes not so happy. My family history is a case in point. My great-great-grandfather was at the right place at the right time when he boarded a boat in Southampton that was going to Africa. He was a replacement passenger seeking adventure and before you know it he starts a tribe in Africa as large as that of the biblical Abraham.

Talents

What, you might ask, brought this line of thinking on? Talents. Yes, the ability that some people have to do certain things naturally that others cannot do very well. In my very mixed family, there are siblings with varied talents. The talent or ability that struck me as interesting in my family of ten children, ranging in age from sixty-eight to ninety, is language.  The ability to speak a language other than English, in varying degrees, is different for each of us.We think that it is mere giftedness. In effect, a great deal depends on circumstance and influence and a willingness to learn another language. And more often than not, necessity is the overriding influence.

Clarity

Perhaps some historical clarity to make my point that talent is more than giftedness will help. We can develop the ability to speak another language, depending on circumstance, motivation and necessity. I understand that we sometimes stunt our natural talent when we ignore it. We can nurture a minor talent to become more effective. However, if the natural talent is extremely minimal, can one through necessity and circumstance develop that greater effect? I think anything is possible given the right circumstance, opportunity and motivation. It’s common sense that when your education style is rote, memorised information, the ability to challenge the mind diminishes as it becomes conditioned to mere repetition. This to a great extent is the education style of the past. Thankfully, it has slowly changed over time.

 Developing Talent

Society may need a drastic mindset change regarding human development. There should not be a rejection of natural talent, be it in the sciences or the arts, because of financial constraints, formal education achievement or social distinctions. Schooling of a child should be with the purpose of stimulating curiosity, exploration and self-awareness. It must not be a pumping of information into the brain just for an exam.  An acquisition of a degree that earns one an acceptable grading and a place in society is not enough. This takes nothing away from the need for good qualifications and skills for society to function properly. However, those should also not be at the cost of inquiring minds and natural talents. With robots or computers doing most of the information gathering, for whatever purposes, this educational renewal should not be so difficult.

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Family History

The circumstance my family finds itself in is one of being developed during a pre-world war age into the post-war era of the fifties and sixties. This was during the interesting times of transition from one colonial system to another and finally into the nineties to freedom from colonial rule. Another factor of circumstance is the space we occupied as descendants of both colonialists and native tribes of Africa. The first six children grew up on the farm of our grandfather, who was a ‘chief’ in the Zulu tradition. Socialising with grandad’s ‘subjects’ was as natural as breathing, and language choice depended on how much time you spent with English speakers or with isiZulu speakers. This resulted in the first-born automatically speaking isiZulu as the first language.

Dominant

When this became a problem for schooling, our parents insisted on speaking only English to her and her siblings, so that English would be the dominant language spoken. This resulted in a fairly balanced use of both languages by the first five children. The sixth child’s experience, though slightly different, does not explain a poor grasp of spoken isiZulu. The family moved away from grandad’s farm when he was nine years old, reducing time spent with isiZulu speakers, and this reduction of opportunity to speak a language applied to all six children. Especially odd is that he is also highly intelligent–in fact, he is the ‘bright spark’ of the family as his father would describe him. Subsequently, he specialized as an educator in English. So, choice or motivation was a factor in his lapse in spoken isiZulu–because his interest was in all things English, this became for him the dominant language. Regarding the last four children, one would have to deal with them individually.

Choice and Circumstance

Number seven did not speak a second language at all, as she grew up in the city having also no contact with isiZulu speakers. Understanding the second language came later, on her moving to the country. They raised number eight in the country when the family moved, and grandad’s farm was just a memory for him. He had limited contact through domestic help and workers in his father’s varied employment appointments. Here was also a case of choosing to speak one language over another because of limited contact and dis-interest in usage–English served him well enough. These three are arguably amongst the brightest in the family, with little interest in second language usage.

Natural Talent and Effort

Number nine gradually through usage and effort to learn became fairly well spoken in the Zulu language. She did not, however, develop an interest in writing and reading, thus limiting usage. The most talented of all was number ten, who was also highly intelligent. It took just one year at age four when she spent ninety percent of her time with isiZulu speakers, that both languages found equal expression in her. This ability remained with her all her life despite many changing circumstances, where there was sometimes more opportunity for usage and sometimes none. She had an obvious talent for language amongst many of her other talents.

Motivation

Circumstance, interest and necessity as a catalyst, have been what influenced members of our family to their varying degrees of second language usage. Motivation has become a more sophisticated influence as we develop; perhaps a second and even a third language serves us better in achieving grades at school and degrees at university. Later we find that being multilingual opens up more opportunity for work and travel. So what about colonization, then? Is there something more to colonization than meets the eye?

Colonization

As a mixed-race South African, with the background depicted above and coming under varied circumstances and influences, my experience tells me that colonialism comes in many shapes and forms. The colonialist British imposing their way of life on the natives of Africa through language may have consciously, or not, seen this as useful to rule. Considering that the benefits of learning the native languages may have led to a better understanding of the indigenous people, this was a short-sighted tactic.With language usage comes respect of another’s culture, and taps into a wisdom that could’ve made for a richer and better way to develop a relationship. Unfortunately, motivation comes into action in all relationships.

Colonial Motivation

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Colonial motivation was to control sea routes and then control over land for resources in the new countries they occupied. The overriding motivation being more and more power over others. If language can help me get that power, then I will force you to use my language. Result? You lose a sense of who you are once you abandon your language and culture. So language is as a tool to dominate, right? I am in control when I force you to function in a certain way because I then make the rules and you must follow my way. This, of course, works very well for a while but has the obvious limitation of self-exclusion.

Knowledge

Before very long you know less about the other and he has more understanding of what makes you function and we all know knowledge is genuine power. The smarter way is an exchange of ideas and talents through good communication. We can’t go back and re-write history, but we can learn from those historical mistakes where the winner takes all–for a while.  Picture a South Africa where a free exchange of ideas and culture brought warring factions to a place where all sides benefited from a mutual understanding of their differences! Impossible? Who knows? Was it ever tried?

Domination

What then will make it possible for this to happen? Nothing comes to mind, but I can say that the domination of one nation over another is not working so well. Look at any present-day nation and you find that there are always a few at the top oppressing the many below. Powerful nations dominate in every circumstance affecting performance, industry and commerce through to individual’s personal survival. My question is:  when all the greedy, power-hungry nations have gobbled up the others, what remains to feed their insatiable appetites, each other? Okay, and then what? Who will the winner dominate next when there is no one left?

Britain

Let’s take a step back to colonisation. Looking back, Britain appears to have been pre-occupied with developing the colonies for King/Queen and Country with the chief aim of enriching Britain. For survival many talents developed, for good and sometimes not so good. They made trade with the east easier and more lucrative. The primitive tribes of Africa discovered novel ways of fighting, with the help of guns rather than spears.  And today more people have died for no good reason other than that gun use is out of control. This since some very talented and curious person invented the gun, I may add! Britain knew that their superior firepower would keep them in control in the colonies, while they looted natural resources, just as long they did not help to develop the indigenous people. Superior firepower still dictates the rules of the power game, as in the control of nuclear power, and now a third world war looms.

Juxtaposed

The rampant, insatiable need for more and more stuff to consume is ironically fed by our need to feed our curiosity and express our many talents too. We have not only a need to dominate or shine, but we do this at what cost to ourselves or the planet we occupy? So too with our reliance on fossil fuel to power the planet’s modern engine. If the very wealthy, stable and functionally successful countries like Norway had not invested in fossil fuels to become as successful as they are in the name of development, would they reduce the availability of fuel ?  And reduced to where the pollution produced by fossil fuel use would be too low to harm? Which came first, the demand or the product?

Motor Cars

Who could even imagine a world without motorcars, the biggest polluters? Yet, insatiable curiosity and talent drove the inventors of the motor car–good things in themselves. So, if talent, curiosity, circumstance, effort, motivation and chance are the combined cocktail mix for the successful development of humanity, why is the current situation on planet earth so precarious? A comforting thought is that the very same cocktail that has brought us to the precipice will also find a way back to safety.

Modern Colonisation

Colonisation has taken a new turn in modern times, though. No longer do the powerful occupy foreign territories physically, except as an adjunct to war when the colonialist country has a business interest in a country it targets. The more insidious occupation involves cultural influence in a foreign territory. Again, it is the more powerful nations who can wield influence to any extent. The most successful in modern times is the western world over Africa and the East, particularly after the second world war. Long colonised by the old guard, with France and England dominant in Africa, the aftermath of WW11 saw the USA come into its own.

United States of America

Coca-cola, movies and technology, particularly the internet, and a plethora of products made in America abound in the rest of the world. No country has succeeded so well in placing itself at the centre of other country’s agendas as America has. Migration to that country has exploded as other cultures seek the mythical American Dream. American colonisation spread its tentacles under the auspices of help and modernization to where, if something is not American, it has no value be it music, art, technology, education or medicine. The buzz word developed out of this is ‘globalisation’. It is a phenomenon that appears incidentally as a by-product of growth and development. I sometimes get the impression that the USA has overplayed its promotional hand, though, and their chickens are now coming home to roost.

China

With America in retreat, under the current administration since 2016, by trying to stop the flow of people to the USA, China is poised to take on the position of top world leader. It will interest me to see how China colonises the world.  What extraordinary talents will China contribute to the new colonies that it occupies?  China tends not to impose its culture on other nations and perceived to be a different animal altogether. If what I suspect is true, that China will dominate through business and money, then heaven help us when China runs the world the same way it runs China. It will leave us gasping for clean air! One consolation is that China is keen, unlike the American administration, to find ways to make the world pollution free. Any world leader must make this a priority.

Lynda Stephen©

lyndarogle@gmail.com

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