Non Western Educational Traditions

Local Approaches to Thought and

Practice Timothy Reagan
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NON-WESTERN EDUCATIONAL
TRADITIONS

Informative and mind-opening, this text uniquely provides a comprehensive

overview of a range of non-western approaches to educational thought and
practice. Its premise is that understanding the ways that other people educate
their children—as well as what counts for them as “education”—may help
readers to think more clearly about some of their own assumptions and values,
and to become more open to alternative viewpoints about important educa-
tional matters. The approach is deliberately and profoundly pedagogical, based
in the author’s own teaching practice. Designed to be used in pre-service and
in-service teacher education courses where substantial critical discussion and
debate are encouraged, the text is enhanced by Questions for Discussion
and Reflection in each chapter.

Updates and Features of the Fourth Edition

• NEW! Chapter 2 exploring key features of the ‘western educational tra-
dition’, and information about the contemporary educational systems in
different countries
• NEW! Chapter 10 on traditional educational thought and practice in
­Oceania, with special focus on the Maori in New Zealand, the Hawai’ians,
and the Australian Aboriginal peoples
• Updated chapter on Africa includes fuller explanation of the diversity
within the indigenous African experience, as well as several contemporary
cases of state education in Africa
• Updated Chapter 4 is designed to help non-Muslims to understand the
Muslim educational heritage and the growing issue of Islamophobia
• Exploration of Chinese education now includes a special emphasis on the
thought of Confucius, the role of the imperial examination system, and the
impact of political and economic changes in the 20th century
• Updated analysis of contemporary educational practices in Hindu and
Buddhist educational thought and practice and brief discussions of Jainism
and Sikhism

Timothy Reagan is Dean, College of Education and Human Development,

University of Maine, USA.
Sociocultural, Political, and Historical Studies
in Education
Joel Spring, Editor

Spring • Political Agendas for Education: From Make America Great Again to
Stronger Together, 6th Edition
Reagan • Non-Western Educational Traditions: Local Approaches to Thought and
Practice, 4th Edition
Spring/Frankson/McCallum/Banks, Eds. • The Business of Education:
Networks of Power and Wealth in America
Bowers • A Critical Examination of STEM: Issues and Challenges
Spring • Deculturalization and the Struggle for Equality: A Brief History of the
Education of Dominated Cultures in the United States, 8th Edition
Spring • American Education, 17th Edition
Spring • Economization of Education: Schools, Corporations, World Markets
Martusewicz/Edmundson/Lupinacci • EcoJustice Education: Toward Diverse,
Democratic, and Sustainable Communities, 2nd Edition
Spring • Globalization and Education, 2nd Edition
Portes/Salas/Baquedano-López/Mellom, Eds. • U.S. Latinos and Education
Policy: Research-based Directions for Change
Wolfmeyer • Math Education for America?: Policy Networks, Educational Business,
and Pedagogy Wars
Spring • Political Agendas for Education: From Race to the Top to Saving the
Planet, Fifth Edition
Picciano & Spring • The Great American Education-Industrial Complex: Ideology,
Technology, and Profit
Spring • Education Networks: Power, Wealth, Cyberspace and the Digital Mind
Hemmings • Urban High Schools: Foundations and Possibilities
Spring • The Politics of American Education

For additional information on titles in the Sociocultural, Political, and Histori-

cal Studies in Education series, visit www.routledge.com/education
This page intentionally left blank
NON-WESTERN
EDUCATIONAL
TRADITIONS
Local Approaches to
Thought and Practice

Fourth Edition

Timothy Reagan
Fourth edition published 2018
by Routledge
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and by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
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The right of Timothy Reagan to be identified as author of this work
has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
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All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
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‫פָאטער מיין צו דעדיקַאטעד‬
This page intentionally left blank
Brief Contents

Preface xvii
Acknowledgments xx
Abbreviations xxi

1 Non-western Educational Traditions 1

2 ‘The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly’: The Western

Educational Tradition 33

3 ‘A Wise Child Is Talked to in Proverbs’: Indigenous

Educational Thought and Practice in Africa 60

4 ‘No Gift Is Better than Education’: Educational Thought

and Practice in the Islamic World 119

5 ‘Developing the Chün-tzu’: Confucius and the Chinese

Educational Heritage 166

6 ‘An Intelligent Man Attends on a Wise Person’:

Educational Thought and Practice in the
Dharmic Traditions 198

7 ‘Finding the True Meaning of Life’: Indigenous Native

American Education 238
x Brief Contents

8 Training ‘Face and Heart’: The Mesoamerican

Educational Experience 266

9 ‘Familiar Strangers’: The Case of the Roma 294

10 ‘Handed Down from the Ancestors’: Indigenous

Educational Thought and Practice in Oceania 321

11 ‘The Whole World is One Town’: Toward New

Perspectives on Local Educational Traditions 347

Author Index 361

Subject Index 365
Contents

Preface xvii
Acknowledgments xx
Abbreviations xxi

1 Non-western Educational Traditions 1

The Challenge of Ethnocentrism 4
Epistemology and the Study of Educational Traditions 8
‘Tradition’ and Its Limits 9
The Western/Non-western Dichotomy 9
Learning from Oral Traditions 10
E.T., the Lost Continent of Atlantis, and Cannibalism:
Credibility and the ‘Other’ 12
Commonality and Diversity in Indigenous Traditions 14
Issues of Culture, Power, and Domination 15
Understanding Culture 16
Misrepresenting Culture 19
Positionality 23
Conclusion 25
Questions for Reflection and Discussion 25

2 ‘The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly’: The Western

Educational Tradition 33
The Liberal Arts and the Concept of the ‘Educated Person’ 35
xii Contents

Reason, Rationality, and Science 39

Literacy and the Rise of Mass Schooling 44
Democracy and Civil Liberties 46
The Western Tradition and Christianity 48
Conclusion 49
Questions for Reflection and Discussion 50

3 ‘A Wise Child Is Talked to in Proverbs’: Indigenous

Educational Thought and Practice in Africa 60
The History of Africa: An Overview 61
Human Origins and Prehistory 62
Indigenous Political Systems in Africa 63
Traditional African Education 66
The Goals of Traditional African Education 66
The Oral Tradition in Indigenous African Education 69
Indigenous African Education as Moral Education 76
Initiation Rites and Ceremonies 77
Vocational Aspects of Traditional African Education 79
European Colonialism in Africa 84
Schooling in Postcolonial Africa 85
Federal Republic of Nigeria 86
Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia 89
The Republic of South Africa 91
Neocolonialism, Globalization, and Africa 102
Concluding Thoughts 104
Questions for Reflection and Discussion 105

4 ‘No Gift Is Better than Education’: Educational

Thought and Practice in the Islamic World 119
Islam: An Overview 123
Muhammed: The Prophet of Islam 124
The Core Beliefs of Islam 127
The Five Pillars of Islam 129
 Contents xiii

The Qur’ān 131

Sharı̄’ah 134
Sunni and Shia Islam 137
Toward an Islamic Philosophy of Education 138
Traditional Islamic Educational Practice 141
Contemporary Educational Practice in the Muslim World 144
Republic of Turkey 144
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia 147
Islamophobia 150
Conclusion 151
Questions for Reflection and Discussion 152

5 ‘Developing the Chün-tzu’: Confucius and the

Chinese Educational Heritage 166
The Role of Confucius 168
Educational Practice in Traditional China 174
The Imperial Examination System 177
Science, Technology, and Discovery in Chinese History 179
The End of Imperial China 180
The People’s Republic of China 185
Conclusion 190
Questions for Reflection and Discussion 190

6 ‘An Intelligent Man Attends on a Wise Person’:

Educational Thought and Practice in the
Dharmic Traditions 198
The Origins of Hinduism 199
The Vedic Tradition 201
Shruti 201
Smrtí 202
The Role of Sanskrit in the Vedic Tradition 202
Hindu Beliefs and Practices 203
Hindu Educational Thought 205
xiv Contents

Traditional Hindu Educational Practice 207

The Case of Vedic Science and Mathematics 209
Hinduism: Tying It Together 211
The Buddhist Tradition 211
An Overview of Buddhism 213
The ‘Eightfold Path of Liberation’ 213
Wisdom 214
Ethics 214
Meditation 215
Historical Buddhist Educational Thought and Practice 217
Higher Education in Ancient India 219
Recent Developments in Hinduism and Buddhism 220
The Jains and Sikhs 221
Jainism 221
Sikhism 223
Education in Modern India 225
Challenges in Indian Education 226
Conclusion 228
Questions for Reflection and Discussion 228

7 ‘Finding the True Meaning of Life’: Indigenous

Native American Education 238
The Core Belief System of Native American Societies 240
Indigenous American Educational Beliefs and Practices 246
Toward a Philosophy of Indigenous Native
American Education 250
The ‘Discovery’ of the New World and the Colonization of
North America 252
Schooling and the Bureau of Indian Affairs 254
Contemporary Issues in Native American Education 256
Conclusion 257
Questions for Reflection and Discussion 259
 Contents xv

8 Training ‘Face and Heart’: The Mesoamerican

Educational Experience 266
Educational Thought and Practice in Classic Mayan Society 268
The Aztec Case 271
The Aztec World 272
The Aztec Conception of the ‘Educated Person’ 277
The Educational Functions of the Family in Aztec Society 279
Formal Schooling in Aztec Society 280
Education during the Colonial Era 282
Schooling in Contemporary Mesoamerica 284
Conclusion 285
Questions for Reflection and Discussion 286

9 ‘Familiar Strangers’: The Case of the Roma 294

A Word about Labels 295
The Origins of the Roma 296
The Challenge of Studying the Roma 298
Cultural and Social Values and Norms 298
Wuzho and Marimé: Concepts of Ritual
Purity and Impurity 299
Family and Kinship Patterns 301
Gender Roles and Expectations 301
Earning a Living 303
Religious Belief and ‘Protective Coloration’ 306
Performance and ‘Impression Management’ 307
Childrearing and Education 308
Healthcare and the Roma 310
The Fears and Realities of Persecution: Even Paranoids
Have Enemies 312
The Contemporary Situation of the Roma in Europe 313
Conclusion 315
Questions for Reflection and Discussion 315
xvi Contents

10 ‘Handed Down from the Ancestors’: Indigenous

Educational Thought and Practice in Oceania 321
Indigenous Polynesia 322
The Māori in New Zealand 323
The Case of Hawai’i 329
Indigenous Australia 333
Conclusion 339
Questions for Reflection and Discussion 339

11 ‘The Whole World is One Town’: Toward New

Perspectives on Local Educational Traditions 347
Common Themes 348
Neocolonialism and the Growing Dominance of Western
Education 352
The Epistemological Challenges of Indigenous Knowledge Systems 354
‘Indigenous Knowledge Systems’ 355
Concluding Reflections 357
Questions for Reflection and Discussion 357

Author Index 361

Subject Index 365
Preface

I began working on this book around 1994, more than twenty years ago.
Non-Western Educational Traditions was written primarily to meet a pedagogical
need. I wanted to teach a course in comparative education that dealt specifi-
cally with indigenous traditions, rather than with varieties of ways in which
the western tradition was applied in different countries. To my dismay, I found
that it was incredibly difficult to find materials to teach such a course. It was
then that I decided to take Toni Morrison’s advice: “If there’s a book that you
want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.” The result
was the first edition of this book, and its popularity, through three editions,
suggests that I was not alone in having wished for such a text.
With each edition, I have tried to make changes to improve the book, often
based on feedback from friends and colleagues around the country. This fourth
edition involves more changes than any earlier edition; every single chapter
has been expanded and updated, in some instances quite substantially. I have
added a chapter exploring some key features of the ‘western educational tra-
dition’, and I have included information about the contemporary educational
system or systems in different countries, a request that was repeatedly made
about the earlier editions of the book. I have also added a chapter on indigenous
education in Oceania; its exclusion in earlier editions of the book was not an
oversight so much as a reflection of my own lack of knowledge. I do not claim
any special expertise about any of these incredibly important educational tra-
ditions, but this seems to me to be an instance in which saying something, at
least raising the topic, is definitely preferable to excluding them altogether. As
the literature on various non-western traditions has expanded over the course
of the past three decades, I have attempted to incorporate updated perspectives
and ideas, and, in some instances, my own views have changed and evolved
over this time.
xviii Preface

In all societies throughout human history, people have educated their

children. Indeed, one of the fundamental characteristics of human civilization
is a concern for the preparation of the next generation. From one generation to
the next, we seek to pass on what we know and have learned, hoping to ensure
not merely the survival of our offspring, but of our culture as well. The history
of education, as it has been conceived and taught in the United States (and more
generally in the west), has focused almost entirely on the ways in which our
own educational tradition emerged, developed, and changed over the course of
the centuries. This is understandable, but it means that many of the ways that
other societies have sought to meet similar challenges have been ignored. In
this book, an effort is made to try to provide an overview of other, non-western
approaches to educational thought and practice. An understanding of the ways
that other peoples have tried to educate their children, as well as what counted
for them as ‘education’, may help us to think more clearly about some of our
own assumptions and values, as well as to help us to become more open to al-
ternative viewpoints about important educational matters.
Unlike most areas traditionally included in the training of educators, very
few individuals have had any real exposure to non-western educational tradi-
tions, and so the audience for this book is a very broad and diverse one. The
book was written to be accessible to both pre-service and in-service teachers,
but it may also be of interest to students in other graduate programs. Although
both the book as a whole and particular sections of the book may be of con-
siderable interest to educators in other societies, the book is written from the
perspective of US readers, and it presupposes that readers are, at the very least,
familiar with that educational tradition.

Organization of the Book

This edition of Non-Western Educational Traditions: Local Approaches to Thought
and Practice consists of eleven chapters. In Chapter 1, a theoretical foundation for
the study of non-western educational traditions is offered, and the problematic
concept of ‘culture’ is discussed. Chapter 2, which is entirely new to this edition
of the book, then explores five core features of the ‘western educational tra-
dition’: the liberal arts and the related conception of the ‘educated person’; the
nexus of reason, rationality, and science; literacy and the rise of mass schooling;
the relationship between democracy and civil liberties; and finally, the rela-
tionship between the ‘western tradition’ and Christianity. In the next chap-
ter, a broad overview of traditional, indigenous African educational thought
and practice is presented, and several contemporary cases of state edu­cation in
­A frica are explored. The Muslim educational heritage, although technically
not really non-western, is discussed in Chapter 4, as is the growing problem
on Islamophobia. In Chapter 5, traditional educational thought and practice
in China, with a special emphasis on the thought of Confucius and the role
 Preface xix

of the imperial examination system, is presented, and the impact of the many
political and economic changes in the twentieth century are discussed. The
Dharmic religious traditions are addressed in Chapter 6, with an emphasis on
­H induism and Buddhism, though Jainism and Sikhism are also briefly discussed.
­Chapters 7 and 8 move our focus to two distinctive settings in the Americas:
in Chapter 7, the indigenous North American experience is discussed, and in
Chapter 8, the historical educational thought and practice of the indigenous
peoples of Mesoamerica are explored. Chapter 9 presents an overview of edu-
cational thought and practice among the Roma (Gypsies). Chapter 10 then ad-
dresses aspects of traditional educational thought and practice in Oceania, with
special focus on the Maori in New Zealand, the Hawai’ians, and the Australian
Aboriginal peoples. Finally, the last chapter of this book summarizes some of
the major themes and issues discussed in the book. At the end of each chapter,
there are a number of questions for reflection and discussion.
My primary goal for this book remains what it was when it was first concep-
tualized: to be a readable introduction to a variety of different ways of thinking
about and engaging in how human beings can prepare their children for life.
As John Dewey observed in My pedagogic creed, “Education is not a preparation
for life but is life itself.” This, it seems to me, was and is a very powerful in-
sight, and it is one that is reflected time and again as non-western approaches to
childrearing and education are studied.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Writing a book is an undertaking like few others, in that it is profoundly personal

and individual, but at the same time, it requires considerable patience and support
from many others. I am deeply grateful to many colleagues for their help and
assistance throughout the writing, revising, and rewriting of this work. Among
those whom I want to thank in particular are Terry Osborn, Naomi Tutu, Sharon
Rallis, Eliana Rojas, and Patricia Weibust with whom I worked at the ­University
of Connecticut, Daniel Mulcahy from Central Connecticut State University,
Rose Morris and Jan Vorster from our time together at the Human Sciences
­Research Council, Claire Penn from the University of the W ­ itwatersrand, and
Neil Collins of Nazarbayev University. The ­librarians at the University of Maine,
Nazarbayev University, the ­University of Connecticut, Central Connecticut
State University, the University of Hartford, The Ohio State University, the
Human Sciences Research Council, the ­University of the Witwatersrand, and
the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile have all been incredibly supportive
as well, tracking down difficult-to-find material and making every effort to be
helpful. Naomi Silverman has been a wonderful friend and supporter from the
very beginning of this project.

—Timothy Reagan
Orono, Maine
AbbreViations

ACT American College Testing

Af D Alternative für Deutschland
AK Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi ( Justice and Development Party)
ANC African National Congress
BBC British Broadcasting Corporation
BCE Before the Common Era (i.e., BC)
BECE Basic Education Certificate Examination
BFEM Brevet de Fin d’Études Moyennes
BIA Bureau of Indian Affairs
BIE Bureau of Indian Education
BJP Bharatiya Janata Party
CE Common Era (i.e., AD)
DNA Deoxyribonucleic Acid
ECA Europe and Central Asia
ESG East Sutherland Gaelic
EU European Union
GDP Gross Domestic Product
GEQIP General Education Quality Improvement Project
IRD Institut de Recherche pour le Devéloppement
KMT Kuomingtang
NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization
NECC National Education Co-Ordinating Committee
NEPI National Educational Policy Investigation
OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
PIRLS Progress in Reading and Literacy Study
PISA Programme for International Student Assessment
xxii Abbreviations

PTSD Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

SAT Scholastic Assessment Test
SIL Summer Institute for Linguistics
SVP Schweizerische Volkspartei
TIMSS Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study
UBE Universal Basic Education
UK United Kingdom (of Great Britain and Northern Ireland)
UNICEF United Nations Children’s Fund
US United States (of America)
USAID United States Agency for International Development
USD US Dollars
YÖK Yükseköğ retim Kurulu (Council for Higher Education)
1
Non-western Educational
Traditions

We find it pedagogically tragic that various indigenous knowledges of

how action affects reality in particular locales have been dismissed from
academic curricula. Such ways of knowing and acting could contribute
so much to the educational experiences of all students; but because
of the rules of evidence and the dominant epistemologies of western
knowledge production, such understandings are deemed irrelevant by
the academic gatekeepers.
—(Semali & Kincheloe, 1999, p. 15)

As Semali and Kincheloe noted in their book, What is indigenous knowledge?

Voices from the academy,1 most books and university courses that deal with the
history and philosophy of education include few, if any, references to indige-
nous educational ideas and practices in Africa and the Americas, and relatively
few references to those of Asia. While for some time there have been calls for
the inclusion of the perspectives of women and people of color in studies of
the history and philosophy of education, such efforts, where they have taken
place, have often entailed little more than the addition of vignettes indicating
the contributions of members of such groups to the western tradition. The idea
that there might be valuable insights to be gained from a serious examination
of non-western educational traditions themselves, indeed, that these traditions
might be fully comparable to the western tradition in their richness and di-
versity, is one that has been rarely voiced. Furthermore, where non-western
educational ideas and practices have been discussed, they are often subjected to
a treatment roughly comparable to the ‘Orientalism’ discussed by Edward Said
2 Non-western Educational Traditions

with regard to the western (and specifically, Anglo-French-American) response

to Islam and the Islamic world:

Orientalism can be discussed and analyzed as the corporate institution

for dealing with the Orient—dealing with it by making statements about
it, authorizing views of it, describing it, by teaching it, settling it, rul-
ing over it: in short, Orientalism as a western style for dominating, re-
structuring, and having authority over the Orient. … European culture
gained in strength and identity by setting itself off against the Orient as a
sort of surrogate and even underground self.2

In other words, when scholars do try to examine non-western educational

thought and practice, all too often they tend to do so through a lens that
not only colors what they see, but also one that reifies the object of study,
making it, in essence, ‘the Other’, and hence alien. Reification results not
only in the distortion of what one is trying to understand, but also in its
subjugation to one’s own preexisting values and assumptions. This problem
is not, of course, unique to the study of educational thought and practice; it
is a common criticism of western scholarship about the non-western world
more generally. In his discussion of the study of indigenous African religions
by western scholars, the Ugandan poet Okot p’Bitek wrote of the “systematic
and intensive use of dirty gossip” in place of solid and sensitive scholarship. 3
In a similar vein, the Adam Kuper described The invention of primitive society by
nineteenth- and twentieth-century anthropologists and social theorists in the
west.4 In terms of traditional African educational practices, A. Babs Fafunwa
commented that

Because indigenous education failed to conform to the ways of the

Westernised system, some less well-informed writers have considered it
primitive, even savage and barbaric. But such contentions should be seen
as the product of ignorance and due to a total misunderstanding of the
inherent value of informal education.5

At the present time, there is perhaps no better place to see this tendency at
work than in the examination and treatment of the Muslim world and Islamic
tradition in the west:

Since September 11, western discussions of Islam have typically been

conducted through a contest of caricatures. Some analysts present Is-
lamic extremism as a product of a ‘clash of civilizations’ that pits Eastern
despotism against western individualism. Others see such extremism as a
grim ‘blowback’ of America’s cold-war foreign policy. Engagement with
the Muslim faith commonly takes the form of simplistic pronouncements
 Non-western Educational Traditions 3

about [the] ‘essence’ of Islam: Osama bin Laden either represents the true
message of the Prophet or corrupts a ‘religion of peace’. … these dis-
cussions are driven more by western concerns—‘are Muslims dangerous
or not?’—than by a serious effort to understand Islam and the place of
toleration and moral decency in its conception of a proper human life.6

Such simplistic misunderstandings and misrepresentations remain all too com-

mon as we seek to understand the ‘Other’, and it was as a challenge to such
misunderstandings and misrepresentations that this book was written.
The same can be argued with respect to western treatment of indigenous ed-
ucational ideas and practices in Asia, the Americas, Oceania, and elsewhere. In
short, when we speak of the history of educational thought and practice, what
we have meant in the past has been the history of western educational thought
and practice, and the effect of our meaning has been to dismiss and denigrate,
or at the very least to delegitimatize, alternatives to the western tradition that
have developed and thrived elsewhere in the world. It is discourse itself, the
way that one talks, thinks about, and conceptualizes educational thought and
practice, that is at issue. As Ball noted in a discussion of the work of the French
philosopher Michel Foucault, “Discourse is a central concept in Foucault’s an-
alytical framework. Discourses are about what can be said and thought, but
also about who can speak, when, and with what authority. Discourses embody
meaning and social relationships, they constitute both subjectivity and power
relations.” 7
The underlying purpose of this book is to begin the process by which the
existing discourse in the history of educational thought and practice can be
expanded in such a way as to provide a starting point for a more open and
diverse view of the development of various approaches to educational thought
and practice. Needless to say, this work is intended to be only a beginning. If
the study of the various educational traditions discussed here is to be taken seri-
ously, these traditions (and many others as well) will require, and are certainly
entitled to, the same sort of concern that has long been accorded the western
tradition. Furthermore, given their differences from the western tradition, it is
essential that we learn to invite and to listen to the multiple voices and perspec-
tives that can enlighten our understanding of these traditions, just as we must
learn to recognize that different groups may, as a consequence of their socio-
cultural contexts and backgrounds, possess ‘ways of knowing’ that, although
different from our own, may be every bit as valuable and worthwhile as those
to which we are accustomed.8 As Carol Gilligan has suggested with respect to
‘woman’s place in man’s life cycle’,

At a time when efforts are being made to eradicate discrimination be-

tween the sexes in the search for social equality and justice, the differ-
ences between the sexes are being rediscovered in the social sciences.
4 Non-western Educational Traditions

This discovery occurs when theories formerly considered to be sexually

neutral in their scientific objectivity are found instead to reflect a consis-
tent observational and evaluative bias. Then the presumed neutrality of
science, like that of language itself, gives way to the recognition that the
categories of knowledge are human constructions. The fascination with
point of view that has informed the fiction of the twentieth century and
the corresponding recognition of the relativity of judgment infuse our
scientific understanding as well when we begin to notice how accus-
tomed we have become to seeing life through men’s eyes.9

A similar kind of argument can be made with respect to the differences in

perspective and worldview in non-western cultural and historic traditions. To
be sure, this argument remains largely speculative in nature with respect to
many of the traditions to be discussed in this book, while in the case of women
there is a growing body of fairly compelling empirical evidence.10 I hope that
others, from a wide array of different backgrounds, would challenge, modify,
and add to the base that is offered here, and that someday the study of the Aztec
calmécac and telpochcalli, of the imperial Chinese examination system and its
content, and the role of various African initiation schools, among others, might
be as commonly taught in courses in the history of educational thought as the
study of Plato, Rousseau, and Dewey is today. I am not, of course, arguing
that Plato, Rousseau, and Dewey (among others) should be eliminated; they,
and many others, are important figures in the development of our own histor-
ical tradition, and certainly merit serious study. My focus is not on replacing
the western tradition, but rather on trying to expand our understanding of
education, broadly conceived, through the examination and study of other ap-
proaches to educational thought and practice with which many of us tend to be
less familiar. Ultimately, as we better understand the educational traditions of
other societies and cultures, we will also be forced to reexamine and to reflect
on our own tradition in somewhat different ways, and this will be immensely
beneficial to our understanding of our own traditions.

The Challenge of Ethnocentrism

As we begin the process of trying to broaden our perspectives on the history
of educational thought and practice, it is important for us to understand that
the activity in which we are engaged will inevitably involve challenging both
our own ethnocentrism and the ethnocentrism of others. Ethnocentrism refers
to the tendency to view one’s own cultural group as superior to others, a ten-
dency common to most, if not all, human societies. However, in contempo-
rary scholarly discourse, one seldom comes across such blatant ethnocentrism
(although such ethnocentrism was not only commonplace, but largely a given
in past scholarship).11 Rather, what is far more common is the practice of using
 Non-western Educational Traditions 5

one’s own society and sociocultural practices as the norm by which other so-
cieties are viewed, measured, and evaluated. Ethnocentrism of this kind takes
two somewhat distinct forms: cultural ethnocentrism and epistemological
ethnocentrism.12
Cultural ethnocentrism refers to manifestations of ethnocentrism in individ-
ual scholars and their work, as well as to the sociocultural context that has
helped to form and support such individual and idiosyncratic biases. We see
examples of cultural ethnocentrism when scholars allow common biases, prej-
udices, and assumptions to color their work in various ways. Racism, sexism,
linguicism, ageism, ableism, etc., all contribute to cultural ethnocentrism,
most often in ways that are unconscious. Thus, the topics that a scholar
chooses to explore, the questions that are asked about these topics, the frame-
work within which hypotheses are constructed, how conflicting evidence is
weighed, and even what counts as evidence can all be affected by personal
assumptions and biases.
The second sort of ethnocentrism, epistemological ethnocentrism, deals not so
much with individual assumptions and biases, but rather with those common
to scholars in an entire discipline or field of study. With epistemological ethno-
centrism, we are concerned with what the late philosopher of science Thomas
Kuhn called the dominant ‘paradigm’ in a discipline.13 A paradigm, on Kuhn’s
account, is far more than merely a model or a theory:

A paradigm is a world view, a general perspective, a way of breaking

down the complexity of the real world. As such, paradigms are deeply
embedded in the socialization of adherents and practitioners: paradigms
tell them what is important, legitimate, and reasonable. Paradigms are
also normative, telling the practitioner what to do without the necessity
of long existential or epistemological consideration. But it is this aspect
of paradigms that constitutes both their strength and their weakness—
their strength in that it makes action possible, their weakness in that
the very reason for action is hidden in the unquestioned assumptions of
the paradigm.14

Thus, the dominant paradigm in a field of study at any given point in time es-
tablishes the parameters within which ‘legitimate’ discourse takes place. Kuhn
explained the significance and power of the dominant paradigm in a field of
study as follows:

Scientists work from models acquired through education and through

subsequent exposure to the literature often without quite knowing or
needing to know what characteristics have given these models the status
of community paradigms. … That scientists do not usually ask or de-
bate what makes a particular problem or solution legitimate tempts us to
6 Non-western Educational Traditions

suppose that, at least intuitively, they know the answer. But it may only
indicate that neither the question nor the answer is felt to be relevant
to their research. Paradigms may be prior to, more binding, and more
complete than any set of rules for research that could be unequivocally
abstracted from them.15

In the case of the study of the history and philosophy of education, the dom-
inant paradigm has focused almost entirely on a single educational tradition
(albeit one with many branches), to the exclusion of virtually all others. The
study of traditional, indigenous educational practices has been reduced to the
study of socialization and acculturation, and has been left to anthropologists
and others. Because scholars have tended to equate ‘education’ with formal
schooling, and because they have consistently focused on the role of literacy
and a literary tradition, many important educational traditions have fallen out-
side the parameters of ‘legitimate’ study in the history and philosophy of educa-
tion. Furthermore, even in the study of the western educational tradition itself,
scholars have been somewhat remiss in examining aspects of the traditions that
seem to fall outside the bounds of their expectations. For example, even recent
works concerned with educational thought and practice in classical antiquity
generally ignore the formidable work of Martin Bernal, who has, since the
early 1980s, been arguing that the civilization of classical Greece has deep
and important roots in Afroasiatic cultures.16 Similarly, until fairly recently,
the contributions of women to the western educational tradition were largely
ignored, in part as a result of overlooking the contributions of specific individ-
ual women, but even more, by defining education in such a way as to eliminate
from discussion what might be called the ‘reproductive’ (as opposed to the
‘productive’) aspects of education.17 Thus, although throughout virtually all of
the western historical tradition women have played the central role in raising
children and educating them, this was largely ignored in formal studies of the
development of the western educational tradition.18
Although dangerous and pernicious, cultural ethnocentrism is easier to
challenge than epistemological ethnocentrism, since individual scholars in a
particular field or discipline at the same point in time may differ to a con-
siderable degree with respect to issues related to (and sensitivity about) cul-
tural ethnocentrism. Thus, many scholars today are far more aware of issues of
gender, race, and ethnicity than others, while nonetheless working within the
same epistemologically ethnocentric paradigm.
An example in which both cultural and epistemological ethnocentrism can
be seen is evident in the following passage, written in the mid-1970s:

In Africa, education was extremely limited and associated with the very
small numbers who were in contact with Islam over the land routes and
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 Babyhood of Music

CHAPTER I
Music is Born—How, When and Where

There was once a time when children did not have to go to school, for
there were no schools; they did not have to take music lessons
because there was no music; there was not even a language by which
people could talk to each other, and there were no books and no
pencils. There were no churches then, no homes nor cities, no
railroads, no roads in fact, and the oldest and wisest man knew less
than a little child of today.
Step by step men fought their way to find means of speaking to
each other, to make roads to travel on, houses to live in, fire to cook
with, clothes to wear, and ways to amuse themselves.
During this time, over one hundred thousand years ago, called
“prehistoric” because it was before events were recorded, men had to
struggle with things that no longer bother us.
Picture to yourselves this era when people lived out-of-doors, in
mounds and caves surrounded by wild beasts which though
dangerous, were not much more so than their human neighbors.
Remember, too, that these people did not know that light followed
darkness as the day the night; summer followed winter as the
seasons come and go; that trees lost their leaves only to bear new
ones in the spring, and that lightning and thunder were natural
happenings; and so on through the long list of things that we think
today perfectly simple, and not in the least frightening.
Because they did not understand these natural things, they
thought that trees, sun, rain, animals, birds, fire, birth, death,
marriage, the hunt, caves and everything else had good and bad gods
in them. In order to please these gods they made prayers to them
quite different from our prayers, as they danced, sang and acted the
things they wanted to have happen. When a savage wanted sun or
wind or rain, he called his tribe together and danced a sun dance, or
a wind dance, or a rain dance. When he wanted food, he did not pray
for it, but he acted out the hunt in a bear dance. As the centuries
went by they continued to use these dances as prayers, and later they
became what we call religious rites and festivals. So here you see
actually the beginning of what we know as Easter festivals, Christmas
with its Christmas tree and mistletoe, spring festivals and Maypole
dances with the Queen of the May, Hallowe’en and many other
holiday celebrations.
This is how music, dancing, poetry, painting and drama were born.
They were the means by which primitive men talked to their gods.
This they did, to be sure, very simply, by hand-clapping and foot-
stamping, by swaying their bodies to and fro, by shouting, shrieking,
grunting, crying and sobbing, and as soon as they knew enough, used
language, and repeated the same word over and over again. These
movements and sounds were the two roots from which music grew.
If you can call these queer grunts and yells singing, the men of
those far-off days must have sung even before they had a language, in
fact, it must have been difficult to know whether they were singing or
talking. In these cries of joy, sorrow, pain, rage, fear, or revenge, we
find another very important reason for the growth of music. These
exclamations, however barbaric and rough, were man’s first attempt
at expressing his feelings.
We still look upon music as one of the most satisfying ways to
show our emotions, and the whole story of music from prehistoric
times to the present day is a record of human feelings expressed in
rhythm and melody.
Gradually these early men learned to make not only musical
instruments, but also the knife for hunting and utensils for cooking.
The first step towards a musical instrument was doubtless the
striking together of two pieces of wood or stone in repeated beats.
The next step was the stretching of the skin of an animal over a
hollowed-out stone or tree trunk forming the first drum. Another
simple and very useful instrument was made of a gourd (the dried
hollow rind of a melon-like fruit) filled with pebbles and shaken like
a baby’s rattle.
As early in the story of mankind as this, the love of decoration and
need of beauty were so natural that they decorated their bodies, the
walls of their caves, and their everyday tools with designs in carving,
and in colors made from earth and plants. You can see some of these
utensils and knives, even bits of wall pictures, in many of the
museums in collections made by men who dig up old cities and
sections of the countries where prehistoric peoples lived. These men
are called archaeologists, and devote their lives to this work so that
we may know what happened before history began.
A few years ago tools of flint, utensils made of bone, and skeletons
of huge animals, that no longer exist, were found in a sulphur spring
in Oklahoma; pottery and tools of stone, wood, and shell were dug up
in Arizona; carvings, spear heads, arrow points, polished stone
hatchets and articles of stone and ivory in Georgia, Pennsylvania and
the Potomac Valley. This shows that this continent also had been
inhabited by prehistoric people.
Even as we see prehistoric man using the things of nature for his
tools, such as elephant tusks, flint, and wood; and as we see him
making paint from earth and plants, we also see him getting music
from nature. It would have been impossible for these early men and
children to have lived out-of-doors and not to have listened to the
songs of the birds, the sound of wind through the trees, the waves
against the rocks, the trickling water of brooks, the beat of the rain,
the crashing of thunder and the cries and roars of animals. All of
these sounds of nature they imitated in their songs and also the
motions and play of animals in their dances.
In Kamchatka, the peninsula across the Behring Strait from
Alaska, there still live natives who sing songs named for and
mimicking the cries of their wild ducks.
The natives of Australia, which is the home of the amusing-looking
kangaroo, have a dance in which they imitate the peculiar leaps and
motions of this animal. When you recall its funny long hind legs and
short forelegs, you can imagine how entertaining it would be to
imitate its motions. The natives also try to make the same sounds
with their voices, as the kangaroo. The women accompany these
dances by singing a simple tune of four tones over and over,
knocking two pieces of wood together to keep time. If ever you go to
the Australian bush (woods or forests) you will see this kangaroo
dance. This is different, isn’t it, from sitting in a concert hall and
listening to some great musician who has spent his life in hard work
and study so that he may play or sing for you?
We can learn much about the beginnings of music from tribes of
men who, although living today, are very near the birthday of the
world, so far as their knowledge and habits are concerned.
Primitive men love play; they love to jump, to yell, to fling their
arms and legs about, and to make up stories which they act out, as
children do who “make believe.”
This love of mankind for make believe, and his desire to be
amused, along with his natural instinct to express what he feels, are
the roots from which music has grown. But, of course, in prehistoric
times, men did not know that they were making an art, for they were
only uttering in sound and movement their wants, their needs, in
fact, only expressing their daily life and their belief in God.
 CHAPTER II
The Savage Makes His Music

Fortunately for our story there live groups of people today still in the
early stages of civilization who show us the manners and customs of
primitive man, because they are primitive men themselves.
We are going to learn how music grew from the American Indian
and the African. We are using these two as examples for two reasons:
because they are close enough to us to have influenced our own
American music, and because all savage music has similar traits. The
American Indian and the African show us the steps from the
primitive state of music to the beginning of music as an art. In other
words, these people are a bridge between prehistoric music and that
of the civilized world.
In Chapter I about prehistoric man, we spoke of the two roots of
music—movement and sound. Hereafter when we speak of rhythm it
will mean movement either in tones or in gestures. Rhythm
expressed in tones makes music; rhythm expressed in gestures
makes the dance. The reason we like dance music and marches is
that we feel the rhythm, the thing that makes us want to mark the
beat of the music with our feet, or hands, or with head bobbings. This
love of the beat is strong in the savage, and upon this he builds his
music.
Our American Jazz is the result of our desire for strong rhythms
and shows that we, for all our culture, have something in us of the
savage’s feeling for movement.
 American Indians

We have a name for everything, but the American Indian has a

name and a song for everything. He has a song for his moccasins, for
his head-gear, for his teepee, the fire in it, the forest around him, the
lakes and rivers in which he fishes and paddles, for his canoe, for the
fish he catches, for his gods, his friends, his family, his enemies, the
animal he hunts, the maiden he woos, the stars, the sun, and the
moon, in fact for everything imaginable. The following little story will
explain the Indians’ idea of the use of their songs:
An American visitor who was making a collection of Indian songs,
asked an old Ojibway song-leader to sing a hunting song. The old
Indian looked at him in surprise and left him. A little later the son-
in-law of the Indian appeared and with apologies told the American
that “the old gentleman” could not sing a hunting song because it
was not the hunting season.
The next time the old Indian came, the American asked him for a
love song, but he politely refused, saying that it was not dignified for
a man of his age to sing love songs. However, the old warrior
suddenly decided that as he was making a call, it was quite proper for
him to sing Visiting Songs, which he did, to his host’s delight.
This old man had been taught to sing when he was a very little boy,
as the Indian boy learns the history of his tribe through the songs. He
is carefully trained by the old men and women so that no song of the
tribe or family should be forgotten. These songs are handed down
from one family to another, and no one knows how many hundreds
of years old they may be. So, you see, these songs become history and
the young Indians learn their history this way, not as we do, from
text books.
“What new songs did you learn?” is the question that one Indian
will ask of another who has been away on a visit, and like the
announcer at the radio broadcasting station, the Indian answers:
“My friends, I will now sing you a song of—” and he fully describes
the song. Then he sings it. After he finishes, he says, “My friends, I
have sung you the song of—” and repeats the name of the song!
So great a part of an Indian’s life is music, that he has no word
meaning poetry in his language. Poetry to the Indian is always song.
In fact an Indian puts new words to an old tune and thinks he has
invented a new song.
 What Is Indian Music?

When the Indian sings, he starts on the highest tone he can reach
and gradually drops to the lowest, so that many of his songs cover
almost two octaves. He does not know that he sings in a scale of five
tones. For some reason which we cannot explain, most primitive
races have used this same scale. It is like our five black keys on the
piano, starting with F sharp. This is called the pentatonic scale,
(penta, Greek word for five, tonic meaning tones). This scale is a
most amazing traveler, for we meet it in our musical journeys in
China, Japan, Arabia, Scotland, Africa, Ireland, ancient Peru and
Mexico, Greece and many other places. The reason we find these five
tones popular must be because they are natural for the human
throat. At any rate we know that it is difficult for the Indian to sing
our scale. He does not seem to want the two notes that we use
between the two groups of black keys which make our familiar major
scale.
It is very difficult to put down an Indian song in our musical
writing, because, the Indians sing in a natural scale that has not been
changed by centuries of musical learning. They sing in a rhythm that
seems complicated to our ears in spite of all our musical knowledge,
and this, too, is difficult to write down. Another thing which makes it
hard to set down and to imitate Indian music, is that they beat the
drum in different time from the song which they sing. They seldom
strike the drum and sing a tone at the same time. In fact, the drum
and the voice seem to race with each other. At the beginning of a
song, for example, the drum beat is slower than the voice. Gradually
the drum catches up with the voice and for a few measures they run
along together. The drum gains and wins the race, because it is
played faster than the voice sings. The curious part of it is, that this is
not an accident, but every time they sing the same song, the race is
run the same way. We are trained to count the beats and sing beat for
beat, measure for measure with the drum. Try to beat on a drum and
sing, and see how hard it is not to keep time with it.
The Indian slides from tone to tone; he scoops with his voice,
somewhat like the jazz trombone player.
 Indian Instruments

The Indian’s orchestra is made up of the rattle and the drum. The
white man cannot understand the Indian’s love of his drum.
However, when he lives among them he also learns to love it. When
Indians travel, they carry with them a drum which is hidden from the
eyes of the strange white man. When night comes, they have song
contests accompanied by the drum which is taken out of its hiding
place.
These contests are very real to the Indians and they are similar to
the tournaments held in Germany in the Middle Ages.
The drummer, who is also the singer, is called the leading voice
and is so important that he ranks next to the chief. His rank is high,
because through knowing the songs he is the historian of his tribe.
The drum is made of a wooden frame across which is stretched the
skin of an animal, usually a deer. Sometimes it is only a few inches
across, and sometimes it is two feet in diameter. When it has two
surfaces of skins, they are separated four to six inches from each
other. It is held in the left hand by a leather strap attached to the
drum frame, and beaten with a short stick. (Figure 1.)
The Sioux Indian sets his drum on the ground; it is about the size
of a wash tub and has only one surface. Two or more players pound
this drum at the same time and the noise is often deafening. The
Ojibway drum always has two surfaces and is usually decorated with
gay designs in color. (Sioux drum, Figure 2.)
The drum makes a good weather bureau! The Indian often
forecasts the weather by the way his drum answers to his pounding.
If the sound is dull, he knows there is rain in the air, if it is clear and
sharp and the skin is tight, he can have out-door dances without fear
of a wetting. You could almost become a weather prophet yourself by
watching the strings of your tennis racket, which act very much like
the drum skin.
Another instrument beloved of all Indians is the rattle. There are
many different sizes and shapes of rattles made of gourds, horns of
animals and tiny drums filled with pebbles and shot. Some of them
are carved out of wood in the shape of birds and animal heads.
(Figure 3.)
The Indians also have the flute, and although there is no special
music for it, it is of great importance in their lives. No two flutes are
made to play exactly the same tones, that is, they are not drawn to
scale. They are like home-whittled whistles made of wood in which
holes are burned. (Figure 4.)
The flute is never used in the festivals or in the dance but it is the
lover’s instrument. A young man who is too bashful to ask his
sweetheart to marry him, hides among the bushes near her teepee,
close to the spring where she goes every morning for water. When he
sees her, he plays a little tune that he makes up just for her. Being a
well brought up little Indian maid, she pretends not to notice it, but
very soon tries to find out who played to her. If she likes him, she
gives him a sign and he comes out of his hiding place, but if she does
not wish to marry him, she lets him go on playing every morning
until he gets tired and discouraged and returns no more to the loved
spring near her teepee in the early morning.
And this is the reason the Indian love songs so often refer to
sunrise, spring and fountains, and why we use the melancholy flute
when we write Indian love songs.
Because of the ceaseless beating of the drum, the constant
repetition of their scale of five tones, and the rambling effect of the
music like unpunctuated sentences, we find the Indian music very
monotonous. But they return the compliment and find our music
monotonous, probably, because it is too well punctuated. Mr.
Frederick Burton in his book on Primitive American Music, tells of
having given to two Indian friends tickets for a recital in Carnegie
Hall, in New York City, where they heard songs by Schubert and
Schumann. When he asked them how they enjoyed the music they
politely said, “It is undoubtedly very fine, it was a beautiful hall and
the man had a great voice, but it seemed to us as though he sang the
song over, over and over again, only sometimes he made it long and
sometimes short.”
 Indian Societies

The Indian is a great club man; every Indian belongs to some

society. The society which he joins is decided by what he dreams. If
he dreams of a bear, he joins the Bear Society; if he dreams of a
Buffalo, he joins the Buffalo Society. Other names of clubs are:
Thunder-bird, Elks and Wolves.
Dreams play a great part in the Indian’s life. If he dreams of a
small round stone, a sacred thing to him, he is supposed to have the
power to cure sickness, to foretell future events, to tell where objects
are which cannot be seen.
Every one of the societies or clubs has its own special songs. The
Indians also have songs of games, dances, songs of war and of the
hunt, songs celebrating the deeds of chiefs, conquering warriors,
war-path and council songs.
In the first chapter we spoke of primitive man imitating animals
and here we find that the Indians, in their societies named for
animals, imitate the acts of the clubs’ namesakes.
They have a dance called the grass dance, in which they decorate
their belts with long tufts of grass, a reminder of the days when they
wore scalps on their belts after they had been on the “war-path.” In
this dance they imitate the motions of the eagle and other birds.
Even the feathers used in their head-dress is a part of their custom of
imitating animals and birds. Some of these head-dresses are like the
comb, and the Indian who wears this will imitate the cries of the bird
to which the comb belongs. His actions always correspond with his
costume.
The Indians have lullabies and children’s game-songs,—the
moccasin game, in which they search for sticks hidden in a moccasin.
Then too, there is the Rain Dance of the Junis and the Snake Dance
of the Hopis, in which they carry rattlesnakes, sometimes holding
them between the teeth.
Dance often means a ceremony lasting several days. The Indians
are worshippers of the Sun, and have a festival, which lasts several
days, called the Sun Dance. This festival took place particularly
among the Indians of the plains: the Cheyennes, the Chippewas and
others. The last Sun Dance took place in 1882. In this the Indian
offered to the “Great Spirit” what was strongest in his nature and
training,—the ability to stand pain. Self inflicted pain was a part of
the ceremony and seemed noble to the Indian, but to the white man
it was barbarous and heathenish and he put a stop to it.
 The Medicine Man

Have you ever heard of the medicine man? He is doctor, lawyer,

priest, philosopher, botanist, and musician all in one. The society of
“Grand Medicine” is the religion of the Chippewas. It teaches that
one must be good to live long. The chief aims of the society are to
bring good health and long life to its followers, and music is as
important in the healing as medicine.
Every member of the society carries a bag of herbs, the use of
which he has learned, and if called upon to heal the sick, he works
the cure by singing the right song before giving the medicine. The
medicine is not usually swallowed in proper fashion as a child takes a
dose, but it is carried by the sick person, or is placed among his
belongings, or a little wooden figure is carved roughly by the
Medicine Man and must be carried around with the herbs to heal the
patient. But the song, and it must be the right song for the occasion,
counts as much as the medicine. Wouldn’t you like to be an Indian?
Often the Medicine Man is called upon for a love-charm, for which
there is a song. There are also songs of cursing which are supposed to
work an evil charm when used with a certain kind of cursing herbs.
Both men and women may become members of the Great
Medicine Society, and they must go through eight degrees or stages
in which they are taught the use of the medicines and the songs. Each
member of the society has his own set of songs, some of which he has
composed himself and others he has had to buy for large sums of
money or goods. No man is allowed to sing another man’s song
unless he has bought the right to it. With the sale of a song goes the
herb to be used with that particular song. The ceremony is very
elaborate. It lasts for several days, and sounds very much like a story
book.
The Chippewa Indians have had a written picture language by
means of which they read the different songs. These pictures were
usually drawn on white birch-bark. Here are a few samples:
 Indian Song Picture

In form like a bird

it appears.
 Indian Song Picture

On my arm behold
my pan of food.
 Indian Song Picture

Wavy lines indicate

“the song.”

Straight lines
indicate “strength.”
 Indian Song Picture

I have shot straight.

 Indian Song Picture

The sound of
flowing water comes
toward my home.

When we tell you about American music we will speak again of the
Indian and how we have used in our own music what he has given us.
 The Negro and His Music

The place of the negro in the world of music has been the cause of
many questions:
Is his music that of a primitive man?
Is it American?
Is it American Folk Music?
As we tell you the story of music we shall have to speak of the
negro music from all these different sides. But, for you to understand
why there is a question about it, we must tell you where the negro
came from and what he brought from his primitive home.
When the English first came to Virginia and founded Jamestown
in 1607 they started to grow tobacco on great plantations, and for
this they needed cheap labor. They tried to use Indians, but as the
work killed so many of them, they had negroes sent over from Africa
to do it. A year before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock in 1620,
negroes were already being sold as slaves in Virginia. Until 1808
these negroes were brought over from Africa; they were not all of one
tribe, nor were they of one race. There were Malays from
Madagascar, Movis from northern Africa, red skins and yellow skins
as well as black.
These people were primitive and they all used song and dance in
their religion, their work and their games. They brought from Africa
a great love for music and ears that heard and remembered more
than many a trained musician. A well-known writer has said that
wherever the African negro has gone, he has left traces in the music
of that country. The Spanish Habanera, which we have danced by the
name of Tango came from Africa; even the name is African,
“tangara,” and was a vulgar dance unfit for civilized people. The
rhythm of the African dance and of our tango is the same.
Like other savages, the African negro loved rhythm better than
melody. His songs were monotonous and were made up of a few
tones and short repeated phrases. They used the scale, of five tones
(called pentatonic), the same as the Indian’s.
 The African negro was a master at drumming. The Indian
drumming was regular like the clock or pulse, but the negro played
most difficult and complicated rhythms, almost impossible for a
trained musician, to imitate. He had drums of all sizes and kinds.
These savages sang groups of tones which we call chords, which
were not used by any of the ancient civilized people. By means of
different rhythms they had hundreds of ways of combining the three
tones of a chord as C-E-G. It is curious that these primitive people
should have used methods more like our own than many of the races
that had reached a much higher degree of civilization.
The Africans had an original telegraph system in which they did
not use the Morse code, but sent their messages by means of drums
that were heard many miles away. They had a special drum language
which the natives understood; and the American Indians flashed
their messages over long distances by means of the reflection of the
sun on metal.
It is only a little more than a hundred years ago since we stopped
bringing these primitive people into America and making slaves of
them. Their children have become thoroughly Americanized now,
from having lived alongside of the white people all this time and
some have forgotten their African forefathers. But in the same way
that the children of Italian, German, French or Russian parents
remember the songs of their forefathers and often show traces of
these songs in the music they make, so the negro without knowing it
has kept some of the primitive traits of African music.
Later, we will tell you how this grew into two kinds of music, the
beautiful religious song called the Negro Spiritual, and the dance
which has grown into our popular ragtime and jazz.
If we were to study in detail the music of many savage tribes of
different periods from prehistoric day to the uncivilized people living
today, we should find certain points in common. They all have
festival songs, songs for religious ceremonials, for games, work
songs, war songs, hunting songs and love songs. In fact it is a
beautiful habit for primitive people to put into song everything they
do and everything they wish to remember. With them music has not
been a frill or a luxury, but a daily need and a natural means for
expressing themselves.