The joys and challenges of heritage

LEARN TO APPRECIATE OTHER CULTURES AND TRADITIONS

- DR RAYMOND PERRIER

IN SEPTEMBER, we find ourselves inundated with events to celebrate Heritage Month. This is a great opportunity for all of us to engage with cultural elements of the past that can inform our present - but we should also be aware of the dangers of how we present and celebrate heritage.

The month itself has an interesting heritage. It carries this name because of the public holiday on September 24, which is now called Heritage Day. But older readers may recall that this used to be commemorated (in some parts of the country) as King Shaka Day, marking the date of his death in 1828.

When the IFP, as one of the junior members in the first Government of National Unity post-1994, failed to have Shaka's Day converted into a new national holiday, the compromise was to keep the date but rename it as "Heritage Day". So the Zulus could still celebrate the heritage of King Shaka, but this date could now provide a platform for all parts of the new nation to celebrate their various heritages.

All very well intentioned, but how has this now evolved?

Here in Durban with its very strong and diverse cultural roots - principally Zulu, Indian, British but many others as well - I am conscious that these celebrations of heritage tend not to be occasions that unify.

In fact, unintentionally, they can have the result of reinforcing divisions. So the Zulu celebrations of Zulu heritage are attended only by Zulus; the Indian celebrations of Indian heritage are attended only by Indians and so on.

In fact, all events are actually being attended by South Africans, but in this context it is not South Africans that we see but "Zulus" and "Indians". It is good that we have these opportunities to help people understand their ancestral heritage and appreciate better the music, costumes and customs of the past.

However, they are rarely designed in a way to make them accessible or even appealing to people from outside that community.