National heritage crucial in developing a national identity

Report of the Steering Committee on the Implementation of the Building Bridges  to a United Kenya recommends that the government provide a policy platform to nurture our national identity.

The report recommends the creation and operationalisation of the Office of the Kenya National Heritage, History and Archiving to this effect.

“We cannot build a nation of shared ideals unless we have a shared understanding of what uniquely defines us as Kenyans – the good and the bad,” it observes.

The heritage of a people is crucial to helping successive generations in shaping their identity: who they are, where they have come from, and where they are, to say nothing of where they are going or should be going.

A peculiar feature of American Education is that it exposes every generation of learners to documents that embody turning points in their history. Almost every American citizen has been exposed to speeches, letters, judgements and legislations that were created to address pressing a pressing issue, problem challenge or a crisis of the day.

Most Americans know for example, the Declaration of Independence, Gettysburg Address, Emancipation Proclamation, Martin Luther King Jr’s ‘I have a Dream’ speech, King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail, and a host of other important documents about their lives.

Primary documents on a country’s history embody their vision, fears and hopes; more importantly, they embody the ways the country dealt with an issue, problem, challenge or crisis. Some of these documents embody important principles of political, military or social policy.

President Barack Obama paid tribute to the role of documents in his first inaugural address in January, 2009; “America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because we, the people, have remained faithful to the ideals of our forebears and true to our founding documents.”

Primary documents have important implications to the realisation of national educational goals. The Ministry of Education is charged with, among other goals, cultivating in learners nationalism, patriotism, and promoting national unity, respect for and development of Kenya’s rich and varied cultures.

Exposure to primary sources helps the students or readers appreciate the tensions that defined an event—the fears and hopes of the participants in the historical event held. This cultivates empathy in the students.

We will not need to start from scratch in documenting and preserving our national heritage.

We already have The Kenya National Archives and Documentation Service. Under the Public Archives and Documentation Service Act Cap 19 revised 2015, KNADS is expected to provide for the preservation of public archives and public records and advise government on the creation, care, control, custody and preservation of public and preservation public records and archives.

The department has been doing a sterling job—away from the glare of the public—in taking care of public records and archival materials. I have personally gotten immense help from the Department when I was asked to secure information on certain events and personalities now dead. All it needs is stronger legislative and policy support to meet the recognised need for gathering and preservation of our national heritage.

Communications officer, Ministry of Education