The Evolution of African Funerals in Democratic Dispensation- Some Perspectives from Kenya and South Africa

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Death, dying, and funerals have been processed and conducted within the frameworks of particular cultures and religions around the world, and Africans are no exception to this practice. This paper examines how the adoption of the colonial agenda led to the displacement of certain African epistemologies regarding funeral practices. It exposes why Africans are burying their own people outside the confines of their cultures and religions. The scope of this study has been narrowed to South Africa and Kenya to explore the erosion of traditional burial and mourning practices, which resulted from the colonial agenda and led to the dislocation and discarding of African practices. The qualitative data utilised in this paper were amassed through participant observation of several burials witnessed in both Kenya and South Africa, combined with a critical review of secondary resources. It is argued that the transformational agenda of decolonisation does not ignore or undermine the voices of all people within rural communities, regardless of age or social status. The paper thus recommends an inclusive engagement with the shifts affecting burial rites, to the extent of including the gatekeepers within the community and incorporating these phenomena into teaching curricula. It should be noted that this article is part of an ongoing research project entitled Erosion of African Burial Traditions, based in Limpopo, South Africa. The intention of this study is not only to make a comparison but also to argue how African identity has been influenced and to chart new pathways towards decolonisation in the face of inevitable change.

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