African concept of Time

[Kahuni_Maisha]

Digging on John Mbiti book, african religions and philosophy

[messiahette]

I have thoroughly enjoyed this thread on X, minus the racist responses of course. Explains some of the inner conflict I’ve felt around future projections and deadlines. I think African time is the experience of Eternity in the physical realm. Timeless!

ABOUT ‘AFRICAN TIME’

In Ryszard Kapuściński’s Book ‘The Shadow of the Sun’, about his time in Africa, there is a chapter where he describes his own experience of ‘African Time’ when he enters a bus and has to wait many hours for it to depart -

“We climb into the bus and sit down. At this point there is a risk of culture clash, of collisions and conflict. It will undoubtedly occur if the passenger is a foreigner who doesn’t know Africa. Someone like that wil start looking around, squirming, inquiring “When will the bus leave?"

“What do you mean, when?” The astonished driver will reply. “It will leave when we find enough people to fill it up."

The Europeans and the Africans have an entirely different concept of time. In the European worldview, time exists outside man, exists objectively, and has measurable and linear characteristics. According to Newton, time is absolute: “Absolute, true, mathematical time of itself and from its own nature, it flows equably and without relation to anything external”.

The European feels himself to be time’s slave, dependent on it, subject to it. To exist and function, he must observe its ironclad, inviolate laws, its inflexible principles and rules. He must need deadlines, dates, days and hours. He moves within the rigor of time and cannot exist outside them. They impose upon him their requirements and quotas. An unresolvable conflict exists between man and time, one that always ends with man’s defeat - time annihilates him.

Africans apprehend time differently. For them, it is much looser concept, more open, elastic, subjective. It is a man who influences time, its shape, course and rhythm (man acting, of course, with the consent of gods and ancestors). Time is even something that that man can create outright, for time is made manifest through events, and whether an event takes place or not depends, after all, on man alone. If two armies do not engage in a battle, then that battle will not occur (in other words, time will not have revealed its presence, will not have come into being).

Time appears as a result of our actions, and vanishes when we neglect or ignore it. It is something that springs to life under our influence, but falls into a state of hibernation, even non-existence, if we do not direct our energy towards it. It is a subservient, passive essence, and, most importantly, one dependent on man.

The absolute opposite of time as it is understood in the European worldview. In practical terms, this means that if you go to a village where a meeting is scheduled for the afternoon but find no one at the appointed spot, asking “When will the meeting take place?" makes no sense. You know the answer: “It will take place when people come”. Therefore the African who boards a bus sits down in a vacant seat, and immediately falls into a state in which he spends a great portion of his life: a benumbed waiting.”

By @kunley-drukpa on x

[Landlord]

Which is a more efficient use of resources between a bus that starts a trip just because 8am has arrived (even when it has only one passenger), or the bus which departs only after all seats have been taken?

[Landlord]

@Kahuni_Maisha

…Digging on John Mbiti book, african religions and philosophy

You plant because the rains have come, not because April 1st has arrived.

[Ndindu]

@Kahuni_Maisha

…Digging on John Mbiti book, african religions and philosophy

I AM VINDICATED FVCKING EVERYDAY. NEGRO IS A LOW IQ PRIMATE THAT DIDN’T HAVE

• UNITS
• SENSE OF TIME
• WRITING SCRIPT (Don’t tell me about Ethiopians, those had a connection with Hebrews) (Don’t tell me about about Egypt, there was a cataclysmic event that wiped off all those high IQ blecks of that time, saa hii negro wa leo ni MJINGA WA KUZALIWA HIVYO, FVCKING DENSE ANIMAL)

[Landlord]

@Ndindu

…n religions and philosophy

I AM VINDICATED FVCKING EVERYDAY. NEGRO IS A LOW IQ PRIMATE THAT DIDN’T HAVE

UNITS
SENSE OF TIME
WRITING SCRIPT (Don’t tell me about Ethiopians, those had a connection with Hebrews) (Don’t tell me about about Egypt, there was a cataclysmic event that wiped off all those high IQ blecks of that time, saa hii negro wa leo ni MJINGA WA KUZALIWA HIVYO, FVCKING DENSE ANIMAL).

You are an idiot! Africans had a sense of time. Among my okuyu people every hour of the day had its own name, each day had a name, and every month had a name. Activities were carried out following strict timelines. Future activities and events were planned well in advance. They knew when to start preparing for the next planting season, the next circumcision season etc. So wacha upus.

[Kahuni_Maisha]

@Ndindu

…n religions and philosophy

I AM VINDICATED FVCKING EVERYDAY. NEGRO IS A LOW IQ PRIMATE THAT DIDN’T HAVE

UNITS
SENSE OF TIME
WRITING SCRIPT (Don’t tell me about Ethiopians, those had a connection with Hebrews) (Don’t tell me about about Egypt, there was a cataclysmic event that wiped off all those high IQ blecks of that time, saa hii negro wa leo ni MJINGA WA KUZALIWA HIVYO, FVCKING DENSE ANIMAL)

Hii imekupita

[gekakoy]

@Landlord

Which is a more efficient use of resources between a bus that starts a trip just because 8am has arrived (even when it has only one passenger), or the bus which departs only after all seats have been taken?

The bus that departs on time and full because everyone arrived on time knowing it’ll leave with or without them

[Landlord]

@gekakoy

The bus that departs on time and full because everyone arrived on time knowing it’ll leave with or without them.

So why don’t matatus use this system?