A woman wearing the traditional Kikuyu clothing with many necklaces. Kikuyu cultural clothing worn by a group of Kikuyu women above. The Kikuyu have different types of clothing for different age sets, the clothing are vary from the young to the old. Children in the traditional kikuyu tribe wear skins around their waist, they normally wear no cloth on their upper body. Men also wear skins on their waist and walk bare chested but during the cold seasons, the cover themselves up to the knees with shukas.
Women in the Kikuyu tribe normally have their whole bodies covered with a shuka that is tied on their left shoulder and extends all the way to their ankles. They also wear earrings, necklaces, bracelets and anklets that are made from multi-coloured beads and cowrie shells. In the Kikuyu culture, earholes were large, which was believed to be a sign of beauty.
The ear lobe would hang all the way down to the shoulder. Picture dictionary. Similar phrases. Am tired and I love you goodnight night. Am tired and I love you goodnight. My heart has loved you so much. Examples Add. Love for Jehovah is the purest motive we can have for reading his Word. A husband and wife typically lived in separate houses. The woman's house had space for her children and her sheep and goats.
Well-built homes sometimes lasted for ten years or more, although rethatching the roof was an annual event. Traditionally, the Gikuyu preferred large families living in big compounds. It was considered a religious obligation to have children. Four children—two boys and two girls—was the ideal. Boys were desirable because they carried on the family name, which was passed on through the male line.
Girls were desired so the family could collect bride wealth gifts to her family from her husband-to-be's family , which could in turn be used to obtain wives for their brothers.
A married woman became more powerful as she bore more children. Her children stayed with her in her home, separate from their father. Polygyny one man having multiple wives was valued as a means to provide large families. Women, too, often preferred polygyny to monogamy one man and one woman ; they often helped their husbands find younger wives. Elder wives had clear authority over younger wives and supervised them in affairs of the compound.
Events leading to marriage began with an initial meeting of the aspiring son-in-law with his perspective parents-in-law. The young woman's agreement was required at this meeting before events could proceed. Later stages included parental visits, exchanges of goods as bride wealth, and finally the young woman moving into the home of her husband. The marriage itself was finalized when, prior to moving in with her husband's family, the young man and his relatives visited the young woman's house bearing special gifts.
Today, marriage no longer involves these traditional rituals and exchanges. Nevertheless, there is still bride wealth, significant involvement of parents in the choice of their children's spouses, and the high value placed on having children. Marriage ceremonies no longer involve Gikuyu religious rituals, which have given way to Christian and Islamic marriage practices. In the past, Gikuyu adults dressed in animal skins, especially sheep and goat skins. Skin tanning was a vital industry for which many men were renowned as specialists.
Women's clothing includes three pieces—an upper garment, a skirt, and an apron. Men wore a single garment covering the entire body. Young men preferred bare legs made possible by wearing short skirts, especially those made from kidskin lambskin or goatskin because of its smooth hairs.
Elders wore more elaborate costumes—often made of fur. European clothing is now commonplace throughout Gikuyuland. In rural areas, women wear multicolored cotton dresses or skirts and blouses. Men generally wear Western-style trousers and shirts with jackets and ties for formal occasions. Women who prefer to dress in African fashion wear long pieces of colorful cloth as skirts and wrapped around a dress. Farm produce and meat are abundant and provide excellent nutrition. Maize corn made into a thick porridge, called ugali , is the national dish of Kenya.
Ugali is eaten with meat, stews, or traditional greens known as sukuma wiki. Irio, a Gikuyu dish, is a mixture of the kernels from cooked green corn boiled with beans, potatoes, and chopped greens. In the past, beer brewing was a cooperative activity between men and women. Beer was made from sugarcane, maize, and millet. Gourds were used to contain the strained juices for fermenting. Today, bottled beverages generally have replaced traditional beer for daily and social consumption.
Distilleries in Kenya provide an assortment of beer and soft drinks. Eating meat is standard for all ceremonial occasions. A popular meal, especially on Sundays, is nyama choma roasted meat. Goat meat is the most popular choice, although it is more expensive than beef. Chicken is also a regular treat. In the past, the Gikuyu had a ceremonial calendar that involved feasting. Boiled and roasted meat was eaten on these occasions, and beer was the beverage of choice.
Although the traditional ceremonial calendar is largely a thing of the past, Gikuyu maintain an intensely social existence involving regular attendance at funerals and weddings. These events are always accompanied by an abundant supply of meat and bottled beverages. Infants were sung lullabies emphasizing tribal values. As a child grew, he or she listened intently to tales, riddles, and proverbs having moral messages. Even after the advent of formal schools during the colonial era, a special time was set aside for the telling of folktales.
In the past, boys played games emphasizing leadership roles that involved bows and arrows, spears, and slings to teach marksmanship skills. Girls cooked imaginary dishes and played at making pots and grinding grains. Dolls, made with local clay and grass, were also standard play items for girls.
As children matured, boys were trained by their adult male relatives, and girls by their mothers, grandmothers, and older sisters. For example, boys were taught to differentiate large herds of cattle or goats by their color, size, and horn texture.
Fathers and grandfathers also taught youngsters the boundaries of their land, techniques for preparing land for farming, and family genealogy. Mothers taught girls about crops, soils, weather and other significant details of food production.
In Kenya, including Gikuyuland, there has been an attempt in recent years to make formal education more sensitive to traditional values and knowledge. A hazard of teaching only modern subject matter is that traditional wisdom—such as, for example, knowledge about wild plants potentially edible during famine—becomes lost to future generations.
Reaching a reasonable balance between the old and the new in the school curriculum is a constant challenge faced by Gikuyu educators.
Harambee which means "let's pull together" primary and secondary schools are being built throughout Gikuyuland and elsewhere in Kenya. The literacy rate percentage of people able to read or write in Kenya is about 50 percent, but it is lower in Gikuyuland. Music and dance, along with storytelling, were all emphasized in the past. Dancing by men and women was mandatory at initiation ceremonies, weddings, and other public events.
People of all ages enjoyed dancing. There were three kinds of musical instruments in the past: drums, flutes, and rattles. The last were used for private pleasure, while drums and flutes were played publicly at dances. Song was woven into the fabric of everyday life. There were songs for babies; songs sung by girls while threshing millet; songs sung by boys while practicing archery; songs sung by families and community members during weddings and funerals; songs sung by community members and initiates during ceremonies; songs about everyday problems of life and love that were sung around the campfire; songs for drinking; songs about cultural heroes both past and present; and songs sung in praise of ancestors and the High God, Ngai.
One such book, titled Nyumba ya Mumbi, graphically illustrates the Gikuyu creation myth. Perhaps the most famous twentieth-century writer is Ngugi wa Thiong'o, whose many stories, plays, and novels have chronicled the Gikuyu struggle for national identity. In the past, there was a very strong division of labor by gender.
Nevertheless, men and women worked together as well as separately in tasks that complemented each other. Each woman had her own plots of land where she cultivated crops such as sweet potatoes, millet, maize corn , and beans. Men were responsible for heavy labor, such as clearing the land and cutting down trees.
Household tasks for women involved maintaining granaries and supervising the feeding of sheep, goats, and cows. A polygynous husband one with multiple wives had his own hut apart from his wives where he ate with friends or his children and was served food by his wives.
On a daily basis, women, together with their children, collected firewood, water, and produce from the garden. There was also a division of labor by gender concerning industries. Some men were ironsmiths, manufacturing knives, arrowheads, bracelets, axes, hammers, spears, and other utilitarian tools.
Only women were potters. Pottery provided for household needs. Women also excelled in making baskets. Men tended to specialize in skin tanning. The informal educational system of the Gikuyu involved children and young people learning economic tasks from adults and specialists through direct observation and often apprenticeship.
Today, the Gikuyu remain intensely agricultural and devoted to their land. Cash crops are now significant, but the traditional division of agricultural labor is still very much in place.
Through formal education and accumulation of private assets, many Gikuyu are now wealthy and enjoy affluent lifestyles. Professional occupations, as well as employment in factories and other working-class jobs, now differentiate the Gikuyu into social categories based on income. Nevertheless, among most Gikuyu, there is still a strong sense of ethnic solidarity and shared cultural heritage. Throughout Gikuyuland, schools sponsor competitive sports for boys and girls.
Spectators enjoy soccer football and track and field. In the past, Gikuyu boys enjoyed games such as wrestling, weightlifting, and club throwing. There were district mock fights pitting young boys from each area against their counterparts from elsewhere. Wrestling produced stars who were widely praised throughout the country. Girls played hide-and-seek and jumping games while still young, but became increasingly more involved with household responsibilities and marriage as they approached their midteen years.
Like other Kenyans, the Gikuyu enjoy watching television, listening to the radio, and going to movie theaters. Radio and television regularly feature tradtional Gikuyu material. People of all ages play a board game known as bao in which players attempt to capture the seeds of their opponents. The game involves a wooden board containing holes in which seeds are placed. A player seeks to capture his opponent's seeds using a complex strategy whereby his opponent's seeds end up on his side of the board.
This indigenous native African game of strategy is widespread in Africa and is now played elsewhere in the world. Traditional industries and crafts have been largely replaced by tourist and commercial markets. The most notable traditional activity still in existence is basket making, which is done by women. The Gikuyu kiondo basket is now popular in Europe and America, where it is widely used by students as a handbag or bookbag. The kiondo is a knitted basket made in various shapes, colors, and sizes.
These baskets are knitted from strings gathered from shrubs. They are sometimes decorated with Gikuyu geometric designs. Another traditional folk art is the manufacture of figurines made from local materials such as clay, discarded wire, and grass.
They depict scenes from solitary or communal daily life such as children playing, elders in various kinds of clothing, people dancing, bicycling, and singing. Perhaps the primary social problem of the Gikuyu is how best to manage their comparative success in Kenyan commerce and politics.
The Gikuyu are often opposed by groups trying to lessen the political power they hold by virtue of their large population and their relative wealth among Kenya's ethnic groups.
The Gikuyu have expanded into regions outside of their central highlands homeland. Many Gikuyu, therefore, are now wealthy "immigrants," seen by groups elsewhere in Kenya as intruders and landgrabbers. Problems in Kenya as a whole include alcoholism and the spread of human immunodeficiency virus HIV. Consumption of alcoholic beverages is common. This combines with poorly maintained roads to produce one of the highest rates of accidental death due to driving anywhere in the wor.
Garam Masala Appetizers are originally Indian food but of recent, many Kenyans use it. Therefore, on this site, we will guide you on how to make it easily.
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