Joseph Wahome Kamau Nairobi, Kenia Borsa di studio universitaria, Dottorato

Nairobi, Marzo 2005

Mi chiamo Joseph Wahome Kamau e ho 25 anni. Sono nato a Nyahururu, una cittadina di campagna a 200 Km da Nairobi.Sono il sesto di dieci fratelli e, sebbene spesso ci mancasse il cosiddetto necessario, i miei genitori sono sempre riusciti a garantirci un buon livello di educazione. Il mio percorso accademico è stato piuttosto faticoso. Per mantenermi agli studi dovevo lavorare, il che voleva dire saltare le lezioni, alcune volte anche per un quadrimestre intero. Queste difficoltà mi hanno costretto a chiedermi il perché di tanta fatica, e la mia determinazione a non arrendermi è frutto di questo percorso.

Dopo aver conseguito la laurea in Education Arts - Kiswahili and Literature - presso la Kenyatta University nel 2003, ho lavorato come insegnante volontario per circa 20 mesi presso la St Justino Secondary School nei Soweto slums a Nairobi.
L’esperienza più incredibile è stato il rendermi conto che per educare i miei studenti dovevo prima essere educato da essi stessi circa le loro aspettative, le loro preoccupazioni e le loro speranze. Ho capito inoltre che per riuscire nell’insegnamento bisogna amare di ciò che si fa.

L’esperienza accademica mi ha portato a voler approfondire ulteriormente i miei studi e nel 2004 ho iniziato un Master in letteratura presso la Kenyatta University.I miei approfondimenti letterari si focalizzano sulla dicotomia “self” e “others” (se stessi e gli altri), dove il termine “self” si riferisce ad un gruppo di persone che condividono la stessa cultura e gli stessi valori, mentre “others” indica chi non condivide la stessa cultura dei primi. In particolare nel mio lavoro, con “self” mi riferisco alla comunità keniota, per quanto eterogenea in termini culturali, essa comprende infatti 43 differenti comunità, mentre con il termine “others” mi riferisco alle comunità non del Kenya.

Scopo del mio lavoro di tesi sarà quello di mostrare come, Ngugi wa Thiong’o e Francis Imbuca, due affermati scrittori kenioti, siano riusciti mediante un’accurata descrizione delle differenze culturali esistenti nel nostro Paese a delineare uno "human character" keniota. Questo lavoro di definizione del “se”, rappresenta nelle mie intenzioni un primo passo per abbracciare la cultura degli “altri”.

Per contribuire al mio mantenimento agli studi, lavoro come insegnante part-time presso la Cardinal Maurice Otunga Secondary School.
Grazie alla borsa di studio di YES posso pianificare il mio futuro con un po' più di certezza. Per quanto riguarda i miei progetti per il futuro, mi riprometto di diventare un insegnante eccellente, e i guadagni che deriveranno da questo lavoro assicureranno una vita migliore a me e alla mia famiglia.
Desidero infine ringraziare il mio tutor, Paolo Sanna, che si è offerto di seguirmi in questo stimolante percorso accademico.

Joseph Wahome Kamau

Nairobi, March 2005

My name is Joseph Wahome Kamau, I am 25 years old. I was born in Nyahururu a rural town 200km away from our capital city Nairobi.
I am a sixth born in a family of ten. My family background is a humble one.  In terms of finance, growing up in this family has really been an experience. Most are the times when we lacked the basics in life. But one of the greatest this that our parents assured us, was a good education.
My academic journey has been a tough one.  Most are the times when I was out of school, doing manual jobs to earn my school fees. On some occasions I missed school for a whole term.  But all in all these were the most rewarding moments of my life.  I have been able to question myself on the reasons for all these my sufferings.  My desire to succeed in life sprung due to these questions.
After graduating from Kenyatta University with a Bachelor of Education Arts degree (Kiswahili and Literature) in the year 2003.  I worked as volunteer teacher for almost 20 months in St Justino Secondary School in Soweto slums, here in Nairobi.
My greatest experience was the realization that for me to educate my students, I needed them to educate me on their desires, their worries and their hopes.  I also learned that, for me to be effective in my teaching, I have to love what I am teaching.
As an undergraduate student I was really provoked by the academic experience I had and I wanted to go deeper to this experience Hence, I enrolled for a Masters degree in Literature in Kenyatta University in September 2004.

Course Content
I have focused all my literary energies in verifying and answering the question: “Could my human experience be part of the wider human experience? Is there what we can call a common human experience, that which goes beyond geographical, racial and sociological order?”  This would be a personal thesis which I will derive my academic thesis.

I have engaged myself in Intensive and Extensive readings of world literatures. As part of my course work, I am studying African literatures, Afro American Literatures, Caribbean literature, African Drama, Literary Theories, Oral Literature theories, Research methodology among other courses.  All these are aimed at enriching my literary knowledge, which in turn will open up new frontiers of defining the “self” in terms of “others”.

The term “self” and ‘other’ will be of importance to me for they form the backbone of my thesis (‘self’ will refer to people who share the same cultural values whereas ‘others’ will refer to those who share different cultural values from the ‘self’).
In this context, ‘self’ will refer to the Kenyan community that is very heterogeneous in terms of culture, having over 43 communities.  ‘Others’ would refer to non-Kenyan communities.

The culmination of my course work would be writing of a thesis in which I will review the works of two renowned Kenyan canonical writers: Ngugi wa Thiong’o and Francis Imbuga.

My main interest would be to show how they have succeeded in tapping the positive cultural diversities hence offering us a Kenyan human character.  Which in turn help us (self) to embrace the rest of the world cultures (other).

Other important information
As a graduate student I have also decided to double my studies with a part-time teaching job in Cardinal Maurice Otunga Secondary School.  This in turn has offered me an opportunity to continue on dialoguing and verifying Fr Giussani method of education in The Risk of Education.  An exercise we began with others teachers while I was an undergraduate student.
I am also earning.  A fact that\ has eased some of my financial constraints here in the University.

Thank YES, for your scholarship, now I can plan for my future with a lot of certainty.  I want to be not only a teacher but a good one and with Masters Degree, I am also assured of good financial rewards, which in turn means a better life for my family and myself too.
I am also grateful to my YES tutor Paolo Sanna, who has offered himself to accompany me in this rewarding academic experience.

Joseph Wahome Kamau