Appropriating and Exploiting Dreams as Technology in Kgašane’s Narrative of Conversion

Sekgothe Mokgoatšana; Moffat  Sebola

doi:10.25159/2412-4265/10106

Authors

Sekgothe Mokgoatšana University of Limpopo
Moffat Sebola University of Limpopo

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.25159/2412-4265/10106

Keywords:

dreams, Kgašane/Kgashane, divine revelation, conversion, Afrocentricity, Jung, divine promise, apocalypse, eschatology

Abstract

The study of mission history is seldom reported through imaginative literature, drama in particular, and dreams as a technique to justify conversion into Christianity. This article is based on a literary work, Kgašane, named after a Molobedu kinsman who is credited with sowing the seeds of Christianity in Bolobedu and the establishment of the Medingen Mission station of the Berlin Missionary Society. The article examines how the writer, Makwala, uses dreams as a divine revelation; an agency used to convert Kgashane. Though fictional, the narrative concerns itself with a factual tale that has dominated the Lutheran Church in the Northern Transvaal. The dreams represent various instances of multivocality and heteroglossia that this article hopes to unravel. The article uses an Afrocentric approach to the study of dreams, with touches of Jung as part of the theoretical framework. The design of the article is qualitative, using purposively selected literary works as secondary data. The choice of the work, Kgašane, is informed by the topical nature of its content within the Berlin Missionary Society and its application as the first written narrative to explain the story of a local martyr within the Medingen Mission.

Metrics

Metrics Loading ...

Author Biography

Sekgothe Mokgoatšana, University of Limpopo

Professor in Literature and Folklore Studies

References

Akombo, D. O., P. S. Gray, G. O. Griffin, and B. I. Katembo. 2020. Chapter 8: Circularity in Msonge and Music: African Genius or Just “Primitivism?” In Decolonising Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) in an Age of Technocolonialism: Recentring African Indigenous Knowledge Systems and Belief Systems, edited by A. Nhemachena, N. Hlabangane, and J. Z. Z. Matowanyika. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv10h9fqz.10. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv10h9fqz.10

Asante, M. K. 1990. Kemet, Afrocentricity, and Knowledge. Trenton: Africa World Press.

Asante, M. K. 2017. “The Philosophy of Afrocentricity.” In The Palgrave Handbook of African Philosophy, edited by A. Afolayan and T. Falola. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59291-0_16. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59291-0_16

Bakhtin, M. M. 2014. “Bakhtin on Shakespeare: Excerpt from Additions and Changes to Rabelais,” translated by Sergeiy Sandler. PMLA 129 (16) (3): 322– 57. https://doi.org/10.1632/pmla.2014.129.3.522. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1632/pmla.2014.129.3.522

Ball, P. 2003. The Complete Book of Dreams and Dreaming. https://www.amazon.com/Complete-Book-Dreams-Dreaming/dp/0517226448.

Bopape, M. L. 1998. “Northern Sotho Historical Dramas: A Historical-Biographical Analysis.” D. Litt., University of South Africa.

Chawane, M. 2016. “The Development of Afrocentricity: A Historical Survey.” Yesterday and Today 16: 78–99. https://doi.org/10.17159/2223-0386/2016/n16a5. DOI: https://doi.org/10.17159/2223-0386/2016/n16a5

Chimombo, S. 1989. “Dreams, Conversion, and Ntara’s Man of Africa.” Journal of Religion in Africa 19 (1): 48–70. https://doi.org/10.2307/1581182; https://doi.org/10.1163/157006689X00053. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1163/157006689X00053

Comaroff, J., and J. Comaroff. 1986. “Christianity and Colonialism in South Africa.” American Ethnologist 13 (1): 1–22. https://doi.org/10.1525/ae.1986.13.1.02a0001. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1525/ae.1986.13.1.02a00010

Conway, M. A., and C. W. Pleydell-Pearce. 2000. “The Construction of Autobiographical Memories in the Self-memory System.” Psychological Review 107 (2): 261–288. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.107.2.261. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.107.2.261

Freud, S. 1900. “The Interpretation of Dreams.” In The Standard Edition of the Complete Works of Sigmund Freud, Vol. 4, 5, edited by J. Strachey. London: Hogarth Press.

Hayashida, N. O. 1999a. Dreams in African Literature: The Significance of Dreams and Visions among Zambian Baptists. Amsterdam: Rodopi.

Hayashida, N. O. 1999b. “The Significance of Dreams and Visions among Zambian Baptists Series.” Current Encounter, Vol. 13.

Hofmeyer, I. 2011. “Books in Heaven: Dreams, Texts and Conspicuous Circulation.” Current Writing: Text Reception in Southern Africa 18 (2): 136–149. https://doi.org/10.1080/1013929X.2006.9678252. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/1013929X.2006.9678252

Horell, M. 1963. African Education: Some Origins and Development until 1953. Johannesburg: Institute of Race Relations.

Jones, J. C. 2013. “The Development of Attitude Leading to the Nationalist Apartheid Philosophy of Bantu Education in the Republic of South Africa.” PhD thesis. Norman: Oklahoma University.

Jones, J. W. 2013. Terror and Transformation. The Ambiguity of Religion in Psychoanalytic Perspective (ebook). Routledge: London. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315800608. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315800608

Khorommbi, N. L. 1996. “Echoes from Beyond a Pass Between Two Mountains (Christian Mission in Venda as Reflected in Some Contemporary Tshivenda Literature).” Master of Theology. Pretoria: University of South Africa.

Krige, E. J., and Krige, J. D. 1943. The Realm of a Rain-queen: A Study of the Pattern of Lovedu Society. Published by OUP for IIA.C.

Krige, J. D., and Krige, E. J. 1954. “The Lovedu of the Transvaal.” In African Worlds: Studies in The Cosmological Ideas and Social Values of African Peoples, 55–82, edited by D. Forde. London: Oxford University Press.

Krige, J. D., and Krige, E. J. 1980. The Realm of a Rain Queen. Johannesburg: Juta.

Kristeva, J. 1966. “The Bounded Text.” In Desire in Language: A Semiotic Approach to Literature and Art, 36–63, edited by L. S. Roudiez.

Kristeva, J. 1980. Desire in Language: A Semiotic Approach to Literature and Art. Columbia: Columbia University Press.

Mahashe, T. G. 2012. “Dithugula tša Malefokana: Paying Libation in the Photographic Archive made by Anthropologists E. J. Krige and J. D. Krige in the 1930s Bolobedu under Queen Modjadji III.” Online published mini-dissertation in partial fulfilment for MA in Art and Fine Art. University of Cape Town: Cape Town. https://open.uct.ac.za/bitstream/handle/11427/14569/thesis_hum_2012_mahashe_george.pdf?sequence=1.

Mahashe, T. G. 2019. MaBareBare, a Rumour of a Dream. Faculty of Humanities, Michaelis School of Fine Art. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/30544.

Mashale, F. K. 2009. “The Provision of Education at Medingen Mission Station Since 1881.” MA dissertation. University of South Africa.

Makwala, S. P. N. 1958. Kgašane. Northern Sotho drama, 47 pages. Pretoria: Van Schaik. ISBN: 0627003133, 9780627003134.

Masumbe, S. M., and J. A. Coetzer. 2002. Self-Reliance and Self-Sufficiency as True Key Principles in the Missionaries Transformative Efforts 1879–1968.

Mayemba, B. 2009. The Notion of Eschatology in African Ancestral Religions: A Category of Deliverance, Promise and Remembrance. Theology Dept., Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA.

McComiskey, T. E. 2019. The Covenants of Promise: A Theology of the Old Testament Covenants.

Mlambo, O. B., and T. R. Mukahlera. 2014. “Tradition and Adaptation in African Initiated Churches: Analogies with Pre-Christian Greek Religion.” In Multiplying in the Spirit: African Initiated Churches in Zimbabwe, 79–91, edited by E. Chitando, M. R. Gunda, and J. Kügler. Bamberg: University of Bamberg Press.

Mokgoatšana, S. N. C. 1999. “Identity: from Autobiography to Postcoloniality: A Study of Representations in Puleng’s Works.” PhD thesis. Pretoria: University of South Africa.

Mokgoatšana, S. 2020. “The Monstrous and the Grotesque: (De)Scribing and Unmasking Eschatology in Sepedi Folktales.” Theologia Viatorum 44 (1). https://doi.org/10.4102/tv.v44i1.72. DOI: https://doi.org/10.4102/tv.v44i1.72

Mokgoatšana, S. 2021. “Manche Masemola: Rebel or Revolutionary? Resistance and Subversion in the Manche Masemola Narrative.” Southern African Journal for Folklore Studies 30 (1). https://doi.org/10.25159/2663-6697/7553. DOI: https://doi.org/10.25159/1016-8427/7553

Mönnig, H. O. 1967. The Pedi. Pretoria: Pretoria.

Mudyiwa, M., and S. Mokgoatšana. 2021. “Revisiting the Mystery of Life in the Hereafter: Reflections of Fr Augustine Urayai of Zimbabwe.” Studia Historiae Ecclesiasticae 47 (2): 1–25. https://doi.org/10.25159/2412-4265/8602. DOI: https://doi.org/10.25159/2412-4265/8602

Munyai, A. S. 2016. “The Tenacity of African Traditional Religion in Venda Christianity: A Missional Investigation.” PhD thesis. Pretoria: University of Pretoria.

Nabudere, D. W. 2012. Afrikology and Transdisciplinarity: A Restorative Epistemology. Pretoria: Africa Institute of South Africa.

Okeke, I. 2021. “Religious Change and African Traditional Religion in Ubomaland.” Journal of African Studies and Sustainable Development 4 (2): 82–98.

Potgieter, F. J., J. L. van der Walt, and C. C. Wolhuter. 2009. “The Divine Dreams of a Sample of South African Children: The Gateway to their Spirituality.” International Journal of Children’s Spirituality 14 (1): 31–46. https://doi.org/10.1080/13644360802658735. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/13644360802658735

Sim, D. C. 1996. Apocalyptic Eschatology in the Gospel of Matthew. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511555084. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511555084

Schweitzer, R. D. 1983. “A Phenomenological Explication of Dream Interpretation Among Rural and Urban Nguni People.” D.Phil. Rhodes University.

Shai, K. B. 2021. Scholarship and Politics in South Africa’s Higher Education System. London: Adonis and Abbey Publishers.

Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy. 2020.

The Holy Bible (New King James Version). 1982. Nashville: Thomas Nelson.

Udechukwu, G. I. 2019. “The Significance and Use of Cultural Symbols in the Contemporary African Society: Igbo Symbols as a Paradigm.” Mgbakoiba, Journal of African Studies 8 (1): 110–116.

Von der Heydt, V. 1994. “Jung and Religion: Its Place in Analytical Psychology.” In Jung and Monotheisms: Judaism, Christianity and Islam, edited by J. Ryce-Menubin. London: Routledge.

Zang, W., and B. Gou. 2018. “Freud’s Dream Interpretation: A Different Perspective Based on the Self-organization Theory of Dreaming.” Frontiers in Psychology. Accessed February 3, 2022. https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01553/full. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01553. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01553