INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGE SYSTEMS PROGRAMME
1. CONTEXT
1.1 Ideological
The ideals expressed in the notion of African Renaissance inform the process. This notion promotes the rebirth of our people and the forging of a new identity, as we emerge from the dark ages of colonialism and apartheid.
We aim to restore Indigenous Knowledge and Technologies - what Deputy-President Thabo Mbeki has referred to as "the unique creation of African hands and African minds" in his I AM AN AFRICAN speech.
Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IKS) are our national heritage. Our collective cultural and historical experience and wisdom must inform our endeavours to develop ourselves as a nation.
Knowledges and technologies that were denied, destroyed and suppressed in the past will form the basis of our rebirth.
Those indigenous knowledges, folklore and technologies that have the potential to assist in the rebirth of our nation will be maintained and developed.
1.2 Economic
The broad context is that of GEAR, whose aims are growth, empowerment and reconstruction. The Government has embarked on a programme of economic growth and sustainable development.
The indigenous knowledges of our people are in the process of being audited and examined for their potential to generate wealth for communities and individuals by being transformed into enterprises or industries.
African Renaissance is concerned with sustainable reconstructive social and economic transformation. This links with the notion of a National Innovation System as proposed by the White Paper on Science and Technology, whereby indigenous technologies might result in economic advancement, and, through research and development, serve public needs.
2. THE LINK BETWEEN INDIGENOUS KNOWLEDGE, IDENTITY AND AFRICAN RENAISSANCE
Alienation and exclusion remain the legacies of the past. Our people have suffered not only alienation from traditional forms of knowledge but also exclusion from science and technology.
The experience of many people continues, therefore, to be the sense that they are strangers in the land of their birth, without a past, without a heritage, without a history.
It is crucial to the identity of our people that a programme of restoration of living, traditional knowledges be implemented. For it is only if individuals and communities have a sense of social embeddedness that identities may be forged.
Knowledges need to be "re-membered", i.e. recalled as well as put together again after the destruction wrought by colonialism and apartheid. These knowledges need to be unearthed, promoted, and to be codified and protected, if a South African identity is to be born and the economic advancement associated with African Renaissance is to occur.
