Identifying Notable Threats to the Sustainability of African Art and Culture

Abstract:

Studies relating to African cultures and sustainability have increased patently over the last few decades - a trend that has not yielded much for the sustainability of the African cultural identity and Art. This mounting unsustainability of African culture is partly due to the methods and perspectives adopted as many of the studies approached the sustainability challenge from the colonial, post-colonial or westernised viewpoints which considerably subtly exclude vital aspects of the pre-modernised African culture. Therefore, this study approached the sustainability of the African culture via a proposed Traits-Threats-Sustainability (TTS) theory view point in which specific threats to shared cultural traits/values (of the pre-modernised African culture) were identified. The neutralisation of the threats, the theory proposed, will ensure the sustainability of the shared cultural traits. 12 core threats to 11 shared African cultural traits were identified as derived from a review of relevant literatures, genealogical tales and direct observations. This study therefore recommended an unbiased neutralisation of the identified and other related threats as a means of ensuring the sustainability of African Art and culture without hindering the sustainable development of Africa.