Ufundi and Tekinolojia in Independent Tanzania: Kiswahili Lexicons of Specialization in Adult Education Manuals, 1960s to 1980s
In the 1970s and 1980s, Tanzanian Publishing House, a government parastatal of the East African nation, embarked upon a project to spread practical yet specialized knowledge to its citizens through a series of twenty how–to Kiswahili manuals called Vitabu Vya Ufundi (“Books of Specialization”). The...
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| Опубликовано в: : | URI:https://journals.openedition.org/artefact, |
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| Главный автор: | |
| Формат: | Article ou chapitre numérique |
| Язык: | Anglais |
| Опубликовано: |
Artefact
2022
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| Предметы: | |
| Online-ссылка: | Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM Accès Université d'Orléans et IFPM |
| Итог: | In the 1970s and 1980s, Tanzanian Publishing House, a government parastatal of the East African nation, embarked upon a project to spread practical yet specialized knowledge to its citizens through a series of twenty how–to Kiswahili manuals called Vitabu Vya Ufundi (“Books of Specialization”). The authors who participated in this project certainly helped shape a national technical language by introducing new terms in both English and Kiswahili. Yet equally important, and the subject of this essay, is that the authors drew upon pre-existing linguistic frameworks and categories for establishing the boundaries of useful knowledge. Using seven of these manuals, this essay demonstrates how a broad, flexible, and historic Kiswahili term for specialization, ufundi, provided a framework for state entities, practitioners-turned-authors, and citizens to establish and negotiate the boundaries of knowledge production during the independent period. It further shows how the vernacularized term for technology, tekinolojia, found uptake with and through established discourses of ufundi and their relationship to two other significant terms, kilimo (farming or agriculture) and maendeleo (development). |
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