The African ‘gentleman’

I am not the ‘lady-type’, I grew up around guys who would at any moment hold you in a wrestling position for no reason, or would run to get to the house first so they can lock you out for fun, on our way back from wherever. It was ‘adapt or die’ in that house. Well, it was all for laughs, which I should emphasise, before I start making it sound like I was being abused.

However the way I relate to guys was shaped by my interaction with my brothers. This explains the culture-shock I got when I met the door-holding, jersey-sacrificing, ‘ladies-first’ guys that I call my friends. It had never occurred to me before that; men should be treated differently from women, or the other way around.

What I say (jokingly) every time any one of my guy friends offers me anything, whether it’s a jersey or the last piece of cake, is “there is no such thing as ‘gentle-man’ in black culture”. I do not know how true this is but my argument is always that, in black culture, we dish up for the man first, hold seats for him and bend a knee when we greet him. 

So the other day I was walking out of class with my friend, and I repeat this unfounded, unresearched statement that I love so much. He strongly disagreed, and it got me thinking about things such as ‘the patriarchal system amongst Africans’; ‘whether black culture condoned the subjugation of women’ and ‘the irony of black women adopting a Eurocentric feminism’.

In the discussions that I have had with people about this, I know now that Africans were very ‘heteronormative’ we believed that men and women have different but equally important roles. They both deserve respect for their contribution to the society, the home. One good friend of mine [Ras Mbaza] mentioned that in ancient South African culture a woman would be attracted to the proficiency of a particular ‘hunter’, and immediately know that he is a man that would be able to provide. And at the same time the man would be attracted to her capability and wisdom in ‘gathering’, and know that this is a woman that would be able to sustain them. African men respected African women. I mean, consider what a married woman is called in the Xhosa language: Inkosikazi, as opposed to ‘misses’ in the English language. The direct translation of Inkosikazi is (what I call kingcess) Queen. Who knows whatever the hell ‘misses’ means (lol). Women are carriers of the divine, mothers of all life, those that walk with God. Both men and women had adopted the nurturing nature of God, but lived out the love for their children and their communities in different ways. Men would work, women would teach, but they were both providers.

Not to say that African culture was picture perfect and immune to human rights abuses. African men had their flaws, but so did African women.

Patriarchy is a system imposed on us by colonialism, and it has emasculated our men. If any black woman is to adopt any form of ‘womanism’, they should do it within the context of African ideals. Reason being, we do not want self-empowerment as just women, we want empowerment for our men, and our families as well.