Cite as: Mugumbate, R. (2023). Ubuntu-Inspired Workshop or Seminar – An Example and Skills for Facilitators. Blog post at https://africasocialwork.net/blog

Context

I am a social work academic who values and uses decolonised methods in education and research. In this blog, I will share my experience running an Ubuntu-inspired workshop as part of World Social Work day 2023 at the University of Wollongong, Dharawal Country, Australia. Australia is divided into States and Territories but these came later on as a result of colonisation. Most derive their names from the colonial past, such as Queensland, Victoria and New South Wales. The land that hosts Australia today belongs to the land’s Indigenous people – the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. Before colonisation, the land had several countries based on language, ethnicity or other factors, just as in Africa. One of the countries was Dharawal where I currently work. Nouns such as Dharawal Country have gained prominence in recent years as part of decolonisation.

The workshop was attended by a few students, academics and practitioners. The main method of the workshop was a dare, which in Dharawal Country is called a yarn. A dare is an African method of training, teaching or research that values participation and respect. In teaching language, we say, a dare is pedagogically grounded in Ubuntu, simply meaning, Ubuntu is the philosophy behind dare. You can read more about Ubuntu here, including common misconceptions about the philosophy. You may also be interested in my first journal article as an academic which was also my first publication on Ubuntu when I was teaching at Bindura University, published in 2013 in the African Journal of Social Work. The article has been downloaded more that 20 000 times in the last five years, and has contributed significantly to the recognition of Ubuntu in Africa and globally.

This blog post is organised as follows:

Below are some considerations when planning and facilitating this kind of a workshop.

Some Key Considerations When Planning and Facilitating

The Philosophy of Teaching or Learning

There are several philosophies of teaching or learning. Some philosophies are empowering, yet others disempower. Others allow participants to think more deeply about issues, others allow them to accept what the ‘teacher’ says is the truth. In this workshop, I used the Ubuntu pedagogy because it encourages collaboration, respect and participation. It is also a decolonial approach.

The Title of Your Event

Use words that help think about decolonisation, for example, include the words Ubuntu, decolonial or indigenous. The event that I facilitated was titled Ubuntu, decolonial and indigenous social work.

Tailor Your Invitations to the Theme of Ubuntu

My workshop was one of several world Social Work Day workshops in Dharawal Country. The advertisement for the workshop in the events booklet read as follows:

Global indigenous knowledges such as Ubuntu are playing a huge role in transforming, indigenising and decolonising social work learning, teaching and practice. ‘Ubuntu: Strengthening Social Solidarity and Global Connectedness’ is one of the themes of the Global Agenda for Social Work and Social Development 2020 to 2030. This agenda was set by the International Association of Schools of Social Work (IASSW), the International Federation of Social Workers (IFSW), and the International Council on Social Welfare (ICSW). This acknowledgement of global indigenous knowledges has been appreciated across the social work fraternity. Increasingly, more information is being sought about how to use global indigenous knowledges in learning, teaching and practice. The workshop will provide a space to yarn about global indigenous knowledges and will have examples from current researches and projects.

In the message, I made it clear what method I was going to use, a yarn which is understood by the audience.

The Method of Training

Select a method that is suitable to Ubuntu. There are many methods, as you can see here. In this workshop I selected a dare, as already described. There are many advantages but also a disadvantage that many people are used to Western methods of workshopping. The main advantage is that of decolonising the way workshops are run. Another is that it allows participants to see that indeed there are other methods of learning, that are as valid as colonial methods.

Venue

Get a suitable venue with adequate space to support sitting arrangement and activities. Participants in my workshop sat in a circle. All tables were moved to create space. A circle improves communication and makes the facilitator a participant instead of a teacher.

Local Protocols

A local protocol in Dharawal, as in all other Countries in Australia, is to pay respects to Indigenous owners of the land and acknowledge their ownership of the land. This is called an Acknowledgement of Country. It is also common practice to acknowledge the impact of colonisation and to talk about what should be done to address this e.g. reconciliation, giving stolen land back, addressing Indigenous disadvantage or stopping further colonisation. For major events, you will need a Welcome to Country message from a local Indigenous person. For Africans this is not new because before an event you acknowledge the owners of the land. Where this is not done, it is probably because of western-styled urbanisation and break down of local protocols and culture.

In my own Acknowledgement of Country, I always emphasize respect and try to make the Acknowledgement as personal as possible and avoid reading prepared statements as this looks fake and routine.

“(Clapping hands) I am clapping my hands as a show of respect to the Dharawal peoples, their elders, past and present. But also as a way of say thank you for the beautiful environment and land that I have come from far to work on”.

In my culture, we clap hands to show respect.

Resources and Artifacts of Training

Usually, when you run a workshop you bring some resources or artifacts to help you do the job, for example you could bring some music, charts or some food. The most important advice here is to make the resources or artifacts support the theme of Ubuntu. In the workshop, I brought an African musical instrument, mbira shown below.

I used mbira in two ways. First, I to demonstrate how touching the real thing is different from seeing it on paper or playing a mbira app on a phone. Second, as an icebreaker – entertain and make the workshop interesting. The two goals were easily achieved.

Think Carefully About Technology, at Times it is Not Necessary

For my workshop I avoided using slides to connect more with participants. Not using slides aligns with doing a dare because you want to engage more. However, I used my phone to play mbira from an application called Kalimba. The app is free and can downloaded from application stores.

How Many?

I suggest between 8 and 15 participants. In my workshop, we were 10. If you have more than 15 participants, and you have less experience running an Ubuntu workshop, them I suggest co-facilitation.

Create a Script with Notes and Instructions for the Workshop

My own notes and instructions are provided under Part 1 to 10 below. A script helps you to test your time and visualise the flow of the workshop and to direct you as you facilitate the workshop.

Make the Program Ubuntu-Focused

My own program was divided into 10 parts as follows:

1. Setting the theme (5 minutes)
2. Introductions (10 minutes)
3. More about Ubuntu (10 minutes)
4. The importance of experiential knowledge (15 minutes)
5. Artifacts (15 minutes)
6. Ubuntu stories (10 minutes)
7. Ubuntu experience (10 minutes)
8. Researches (5 minutes)
9. End (5 minutes)
10. Evaluation (5 minutes)

The total time was 90 minutes (1 hour 30 minutes).

How I Facilitated the Workshop

Part 1 Setting the Theme

I set the theme by saying My starting point for decolonising and indigenising social work is philosophy. There can’t be decolonisation without decolonising philosophy, there can’t be indigenisation without indigenising philosophy. Not only for Africa but for Australian indigenous people, Pacifica people and many people around the world whose philosophy was colonised.

Part 2 Introductions

Let us say our names, what our work involves, if you have interacted with Africa or person from Africa. What have you learned about African philosophy?

My name in Rugare Mugumbate, I am happy to be with you today.

Part 3 More About Ubuntu

Showing a printed map of Africa (below). Ubuntu is Africa’s view of being human. About 4000 years ago, Africa had groups of Black people – the Masarwa (San), the Khoi, The Ba, the Hadzabe, Sandawe, the Kush, the Nile-Sahara and the Bantu. While they had diverse livelihoods, they shared common values of collectivity, familyhood, communality but also spiritual and environmental values. They integrated for years, and the largest group migrated to fill the whole of Sub-Saharan Africa, and the result was a common philosophy called Ubuntu today. My own ancestry is Bantu and Kush.

For more information about the groups and places shown on the map, visit this blog.

Part 4 Experiential Knowledge, the Importance of

I showed an A3 size print of mbira and asked what it was. I then said This is an African musical instrument. Does it make a difference if you test how it sounds? I then open a mbira application on my phone and asked two people to play it and asked Was there a difference between seeing it on paper and playing it on the phone, what was the difference? Will it make a difference if you see, touch and play the real thing? What could be the difference?

I then took the real mbira from a bag and passed it o to three people to play it after which we talked about how it feels to play the real thing and the differences. I then debriefed saying:

When we do a dare, what you call yarn here, there are usually several artefacts or objects of philosophical significance. Today I brought mbira. In African philosophy, music represents togetherness. It also represents decolonisation and indigenisation at the same time – dance to your own tunes and instruments, drums or mbira.

But there is another deeper meaning today, seeing, touching, feeling, doing, experiencing the real thing will not be the same as reading about it or seeing it on media eg phone. When you are working with other cultural groups, knowledge of their culture that is obtained through interaction with them is the most important compared to what comes from journals, social media, public media, mass media…..

More often, in our education and teaching, we rely on theory, not the real thing. It is important to know, touch, see, interact with, the real thing.

Indigenous theories are real, you need to sing the songs, listen to the songs, see the dancers, listen to stories, walk with, to understand what it is.

Indigenous philosophy exists in orature

Instead of using ‘theories’, at times we use songs and stories

Indigenous philosophy exists is artifacts, symbols and rituals, see them, touch them, interact with them.

Part 5 Artifacts | Adinkra Symbols

For this part of the training, I used Adinkra symbols from West Africa, mainly Ghana (see them below). I asked What are artifacts, symbols and rituals? Have you seen them used by other groups before? What artifacts would you use in your groupwork (practice or research).

We then discussed artifacts from across the world, and there were examples from different countries. For Indigenous Australia, I talked about the lil-lil (club), the boomerang, the spear, shield and smoking ceremony.

I then said I would also want to introduce you to African symbols specifically the Adinkra symbols from West Africa. These are relevant to social work, but have been misrecognised as useless, at times demonised but they are the theories of Africa.

I gave out a handout (below), asked participants to select symbols of interest and discussed. An option was to discuss in pairs.

This previous blog covered the symbols in detail.

Part 6 Stories of Ubuntu

I shared two short stories of Ubuntu.

Story 1 was about an African man working for a Chinese employer. The employer first father died, and he was given compassionate leave. After some years, his other father died and asked for compassionate leave of which the employer refused, accusing him of lying because his father was already deceased. The moral of the story is, in African, one has many mothers and fathers, many grandmothers and grandfathers, many sisters and brothers etc. There is no uncle for your fathers brother and there is no aunt for your mother’s sister and there is no cousin-sister or brother.

Story 2 is a popular story of the children demonstrating collectivity. You can watch the animated video below.

Part 7 Experiences

We were joined by a social work academic (Associate Professor Mim Fox) who is using Ubuntu in teaching, has experience of working in Africa and The Social Work Stories Podcast. The podcast has covered Ubuntu before where Janet Ncube, a social worker and myself spoke. A podcast featuring a social worker from Nigeria about COVID-19 and hospital social work can be accessed here.

Part 8 Researches

In part 8, I shared two handouts, and talked about them.

Handout 1: A literature review on mentoring young people. Ubuntu mentoring focuses on collectivity, group activities, family activities, and transformational activities. The handout was from this report.

Handout 2: I shared a piece from a current research project on cultural competence. Cultural competence is not just about practitioners knowing through reading or training but learning from the people concerned, people showing their culture and knowledges.

Part 9 End

I ended by saying Until we go to the root, philosophy, we can’t honestly decolonise or indigenise.

We then did a final discussion and closed the workshop.

Food was served.

Part 10 Evaluation

In my evaluation, I was guided by Made in Africa Evaluation (MAE) approach. The approach supports dialogue and decolonisation. I asked these questions:

1. How did you find the workshop plan, what would you improve?
2. How did you find the stories?
3. How did you find the artifacts?
4. What ideas have you gained about indigenisation or decolonisation?

Some feedback was that the artifact and the Adinkra signs were liked for offering new insights. Other feedback was I needed to provide more information on Ubuntu and more time for the workshop, perhaps two hours.

Final message

In this blog, I shared ideas about decolonising workshops and seminars and the information can be used for lectures and tutorials. For academics, students and practitioners, decolonising is an imperative. However, often the confidence to do so lacks, and in other cases, the tendency to imitate western ways of training is higher. By sharing what we are doing to decolonise, we are sharing skills and building confidence to use indigenous methods in tutorials, lectures, seminars, workshops and all methods of learning, teaching and continuous professional development. More of these indigenous methods are crucial not only for tertiary education, but for all education from early childhood education through primary, secondary to high school.

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Do you have a workshop to share, please email asw@africasocialwork.net

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