ABSTRACT
Culture is the sum total of social behaviors, traditions, customs and a total way of life of a particular society. It looks at the regular practices of the given society such as; when or what they eat, their dress codes, greetings, their etiquettes, taboos, their beliefs and so on. Aspects that can help us in identifying a culture of a certain society are many and diversified and thus it would be a futile task trying to cover them in depth in a brief article like this. It is in that light thus, this article highlights only one aspect of Swahili Culture: Makuzi na Hatua za Maisha katika Utamaduni wa Kiswahili (The Upbringing and Life Stages in Swahili Culture). Both instructors and learners of Swahili as a foreign language are expected to benefit from the description of such an element of culture. The writer was driven to write on the subject by the challenges she has been facing through teaching Swahili and Swahili Culture to the foreign students. The challenges specifically were due to the lack of enough reference materials on Swahili Culture aimed for learners and instructors of Swahili as a Foreign Language. The fact that when we learn a foreign language we also learn its culture is obvious, thus having references on the culture of the native speakers of Swahili is prime in Swahili literature. This work should be taken as a catalyst for an in depth and sustainable literature on other aspects of Swahili Culture and African Culture at large. |
