Igbo culture and Traditions: A changing trajectory.
I have pondered a long time on how this whole article would come out and what the reactions would be. I am also was mindful that there maybe others who may have been so accustomed to the nomenclature that everything that is done is seen as custom and will take offense at my premise.
For the avoidance of doubt, the Igbos of the Eastern part of Nigeria is an acephalous group with a common language, history and traditions of origin, settlement and migration. There exist commonality in Igbo customs, culture and traditions. For example, the Igbos universally present and broke kolanut in a uniform traditional pattern and manner.
The Igbos pour libations (igo ofor) in almost similar traditions with little variance in the dialectics.
But lately the Igbo customs has seen so many variations in the core area that defines the tradition of the ethnic nationalities and these changes has gone through the radar undetected and for convenience sake nobody wants to address it as a misnomer and a disturbing threat to the rich Igbo culture. Of note is the traditional marriage rites.
Lately, every traditional marriage rites posted on social media and elsewhere ignores the core “ ije abali ano” or Ije abali asato” the return of the calabash which signifies the core values and acceptance into the family and replace it with an contraption that has been copied uniformly by almost all ethnic nationalities today. Even in most traditional ceremony today, the bride and the groom now substitute the mmi- ngwo( palm wine) with water etc and this unfortunate trend shows the dangerous incursion of Christianity or western religion influence as a replacement for our traditions.
The summation and finding of Chinwe Nwoye(2011) paper entitled “Igbo cultural and Religious Worldview: An insider’s perspective “ published by international journalists of sociologist and anthropologist 3(9)304-317 ; aptly captures this that there are no dearth of ethnographic reports and writing about the Igbo people, even though there is unanimity that vast majority of such works came from Christian missionaries and British ethnographers who were primarily concerned with giving a generalized picture of the mores, custom and traditions of the Igbos, the manifest intention was to reinforce the erroneous notion that gave birth to the presentation of the Igbos as primitive people, given to unchanging cultural traits, habit and rather than agentic people known for their well articulated cultural and religious worldview.
So many believe and mentally picture the Igbo culture and traditions from the illusions created by the writings of Prof Chinue Achebe utopian Igbo society portrayed in “Things fall apart “ .
Now there is unanimity as to what constitute the original Igbo culture of traditional marriage due to the elaborateness that is promoted by social media space viz a vis non social media age bracket.
There are those that would argue that this is how traditional marriage ceremony was done in pre-colonial times. Added to this is the new novel concept added which has become the hallmarks of every Igban Nkwu. It is known as the money “spraying”factor.
This origin is recent but many will swear that it is part of Igbo culture. This phenomena is the issue of “ spraying “ money. In the Igbo society in the 1960’s, spraying money was not and did not exist as part of the culture of Igbo traditional wedding.
The origin and arrival of spraying money as a central part of Igbo traditional wedding is a product of intercultural exchange exposure and influence from the western region particularly the cosmopolitanism of lagos and this while spread culture has permeated almost all Nigerian ethnic culture and therefore one can argue that it is not aucthotonous to Igbo society.
Another most confused, misinformed self claim of Igbo culture is the practice that recently gain currency among those in diaspora. This involves the practice where Igbo male goes overseas and marries a non-African bride and brings them home and organize a celebration and dub it “ traditional wedding” what begs the question is in traditional wedding, the celebration is done at the brides home/ village. But the misnomer here is the groom takes the bride to his umunna and organize a replica and says it’s Igbo customs and tradition.
Instead of the brides family to host the groom family as it’s was done traditionally or customarily, this time the brides become the guest and the role reversal creates a false narration that people have conveniently turned blind eyes to this cultural aberration.
Given the fact that culture is dynamic, it is trait that certain fundamental should never change but can adapt the convenience of changing societal dynamics. Today there are some who may argue that conferring chieftancy titles in Igboland is part of Igbo culture. The argument can be canvassed that yes, it has become a part of a new culture and custom of the post colonial Igbo society. It was never part of pre-colonial Igbo society because the institution of chieftaincy and Ezeship were the creation of the indirect and direct rule of the colonial administration and Igbo customs and traditions pre-dates that period.
Furthermore, as more people and society bought into the chieftancy title conferment phase, manifest changes and modifications to this new changes brought about such novel introduction of Eze ndigbo located outside of Igbo land and the conundrum these creates is that the occupant of these pseudo positions end up having a conflicted role when they visit their aboriginal homestead.
As a result of these new developments, the Igbo society has witnessed an implosion of bidding or aspiring chieftaincy conferee who are mailed their certificate. No where has anyone explained by historical evidence what the exact role traditional of those chiefs because non- existed prior to colonial rule. While most culture have sought to preserve their culture, it does appear that the Igbo society allowed too much influence of foreign religion to mold and modify their culture. For example in the new yam celebration, most if not all communities in Igbo land today begin and end the celebration with church service and also claim that that is part of Igbo culture. It should be stated here that I am not opposed to anyone’s religion but the colonialist who brought religion did not amend their culture or custom with a religious replacement. They are able to separate and preserve their culture and continue its longevity.
For anyone who follows curiously other culture, in Jewish, Chinese or Indian marriages, they do not amend, modify or alter their process no matter what, but same cannot be said when the Igbo marriage is pitched against any other culture.
The Igbos shows a pendant to over allow and over accommodate and in the process leads to a new sub- culture and this is where and how all the adaptations highlighted started from and it become erroneously categorized as Igbo culture. From preponderance or total aggregate of traditional marriage rites, one can deduct that the lack of uniformity in what is expected and how the process proceeds shows clearly that what we witness today is best described as “ play as you go”. It is suggested now to streamline and make the process universal. It is imperative to note that some communities in Igbo land have seen minimal changes to their custom and traditions than others and we do applaud them and urge them to continuously uphold these traditions at its original core values.
Ritchie Ejiofor
A commentator writes from NJ