T H E EFFECTS OF URBANISATION ON EDUCATION IN AFRICA: THE NIGERIAN EXPERIENCE by SABURI BIOBAKU,Lagos Urbanisation raises several crucial problems in developing countries but it is essential to remember that towns are not a new phenomenon in Africa. Education in the western sense of formal instruction and prolonged pupillage certainly came in with the advent of European missionaries and empire-builders but African society has always had its own system of instilling its mores and norms in the young and preparing them for life in the adult communities. In order fully to understand the situation in Nigeria, which m a y be regarded as typical of West Africa, a brief sketch of traditional education is indicated. It must be admitted t h a t much research is yet to be undertaken in this field in order to unfold a coherent system. Nevertheless, an outline can be attempted and the essence of the traditional African philosophy of education enunciated. First, the bearings must be checked. In this article, the Nigerian scene would be used as an example and, in particular, Western Nigeria, where the interaction of indigenous Moslem and Christian influences can be closely studied. Much of what is said can apply with equal force to other parts of Nigeria and, indeed, the educational system in the country in the modern period is based upon a common code after the abandonment of the attempt to operate a different system in the North in deterence to traditional Moslem opinion. The basic traditional concept of education was much the same, with the village as the unit of society or the small town. The latter featured prominently among the Yoruba of Western Nigeria who have been described aptly as "farmers who dwell in towns." ttence the appositeness of using Western Nigeria as the example for the study of the effects of urbanisation on Education in West Africa. The traditional Yoruba society was based upon a civic settlement: an enterprising hunter usually led his friends and relatives to a suitable place, a clearing in the forest, and there the foundations of a new town were !aid. They hunted animals for food and farmed nearby, bringing the products of their hunt and of their farms to the markets which they had established in front of the house of their chief, the hunter-leader. The products were first exchanged by barter, and later as they made contact with the outside world they adopted cowries and gradually entered the cash economy. The men hunted or farmed; the women assisted on the farms and traded in the markets. In their leisure they provided enter-

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tainment for themselves through their religious festivals which featured masquerades and dancing and re-enactments of historical events; their art provided the masks and carvings of ancestors which were prominent in the polytheistic religion and ancestor-worship. Their learning was essentially oral and remembered and so an elaborate tradition of oral literature was built up in praise poems, folklore, proverbs and wise sayings. The business of traditional education was how to impart all this to the young: how to ensure the continuity of the farming communities with their bases on the smaU market towns. There were no formal schools except in the groves where the young were initiated into the mysteries of traditional religion as practised in the Oro (the bull-roarer) cult, or the Egungun or Agemo 1) masquerades. Traditional education rested upon voluntary apprenticeship or clientage. The little boy followed his father to the farms or to the forest while hunting and gradually acquired some of his skill through imitation and "copying." He followed his father also to the meeting of elders and learnt much of the history and tradition of the people during their discourses. The young girl also went to the markets with her mother and began to learn the canons of trading by participating in the endless polite bargaining and haggling that went on. Some time, boy or girl was sent away from home to be apprenticed to a famous farmer, medicine man or trader and in this way additional practical education was gained. In essence, the education was aimed at fitting the individual into the community: he or she might live on the distant farm but at least annually during the festivals, the farmer returned to the town to participate in the communal town life. Neither did the advent of Islam in the Yoruba country change the situation too radically. It added learning through reading and writing in Arabic b u t the Koranic schools were conveniently arranged to hold their classes in the mornings and later in the evenings so that the middle portion of the day could be spent running errands for one's parents or going to the farms or the markets as in the indigeneous societies. It was when western education came in the wake of the Christian missionaries that the goal of education changed markedly.

Christian Missionaries and the Goals o] Education Christian missionaries came into Western Nigeria in the 1840's and were quickly followed b y British traders and Government officials. Starting from the coast in the Lagos area, the frontier of British influence which they established had to be pushed into the interior and either for the propagation of the Gospel or the extention of trade and colonial rule, literate indigeneous allies were essential and schools were founded for the

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purpose of teaching people how to read and write. Naturally, the schools began with the Christian converts and their children and in the early days the schools attempted to teach elements of agriculture and impart technical skills. The need for clerical workers soon became paramount and the schools responded b y concentrating upon the liberal arts to the extent that manual labour and practical training lost their appeal and gradually became despised. The effect of all this upon communities which were essentially those of farmers dwelling in small towns was traumatic. In order to gain Christian converts, schools were located in the villages which served the market towns but in these schools the children learnt to read and write and to yearn for white-collar jobs. Some entered the church as teachers and catechists and perhaps stayed in the villages b u t only after they had had further training in the big towns. The majority emigrated from their villages and traditional "home-towns" into the newly developing big towns, the seats of the missionaries and agents of the Government, in search of jobs as clerks and messengers and were, in effect, educated out of their communities. Of agriculture, hunting, trading, and local crafts, they knew nothing and when they encountered disillusionment in their adopted cities, they joined the ranks of delinquents and habitual criminals. In Nigeria, therefore, the first impact of western education was disastrous as far as the traditional society was concerned. It led to a marked dislocation of society and the neglect of the mainstay of the African economy, agriculture. The attempts to redress the balance ever since have only been partially successful and the difficulties increase as urbanisation grows and spreads in Africa. Still using Western Nigeria as our example, modern development has increased the trends towards urban agglomerations enormously. Traditionally, there were large towns in Western Nigeria, the largest being Ibadan with a population of nearly three-quarters of a million in the city and well over one and a half million if we take into account its immediate environs which serve it as a city-state. With modern communications, relative mobility of persons, location of new industries and the siting of two universities at or near Ibadan, the town continues to grow and, what is more important, to have its once homogeneous Yoruba community diluted b y the influx of other Nigerians and expatriate experts. Clearly, the traditional educational practice cannot cope with the new situation but western education has failed to grapple with the problem. The newly developing urban centres act like a magnet in attracting young persons from the rural areas, either to the secondary schools (grammar or comprehensive) or to the factories and shops which are

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springing up in the towns. The educational system, as already explained, remains largely oriented towards the supply of white-collar workers and a few artisans and has failed so far to promote the return to agriculture and the land b y the young pilgrims in search of education from the villages.

The Breakdown o[ the Traditional Concepts ot Education The first and inescapable effect of urbanisation is the breakdown of the traditional concept of education in Africa. Neither the old concept which ensures the integration of the young in the traditional community nor the relatively new concept which prepares him for the life of a mission or government clerical worker can cope with the problems of modernisation that faces Africa today. Urbanisation poses new problems for education especially in Africa since the new towns are essentially industrial rather than market towns as they were in the traditional economy. The magnitude of the problem m a y be illustrated b y a description of the situation in Lagos, the Nigerian Federal Capital. Lagos began as a fishing island with a few thousand people, some of whom were migrants from Benin. After the advent of the Europeans it was effectively linked with the Nigerian mainland and a suburb rapidly developed at Ebute Metta. As Lagos grew and became the seat of Government, commerce and the National Railway Administration a satellite settlement was established at Ikoyi as a European reservation, and Yaba developed as an extension of Ebute Metta and later Apapa, to serve growing port and industrial needs. As business, commercial and governmental expanded, more people came in and the suburbs further extended into the hinterland so that Mushin and Ikeja, some sixteen miles from the centre of the Island, provide dormitories for Lagos workers. At Ikeja also stand the Lagos Airport and another suburban settlement accommodating modern residences and industrial development. The population of Greater Lagos is well over a million and a half and, although it is predominantly Nigerian, it contains a large proportion of expatriates from Europe, America and the Middle East and Nigerians who are non-natives of Lagos. Such a polyglot community poses important problems for education. Lagos tries to cope with its educational problems by the provision of a variety of schools to post-secondary technical institutions and a university. At the primary school level, education is free and universal to the extent that it is available to anyone who cares to be registered for it at the age of six years but it is not compulsory. The number of those registering each year increases as the influx of persons from all parts of the country into the city for employment proceeds unabated. The demand for teachers is correspondingly high as new schools have to be established

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every year in order to cater for the inevitable addition to the classes. Teacher training institutions draw their trainees from the products of the secondary schools which are recruited from those passing out of the elementary schools. From the secondary schools, boys and girls go to the Trade Centre or the College of Technology at Yaba and the best qualified among them enter the University of Lagos which, of course, draws its students from the whole country as befits a federal institution. The network of schools is as it should be and through concerted action b y the Government, voluntary agencies (the missions and religious groups which are becoming increasingly Nigerian) and private enterprise, the school provision is expanded year b y year in order to meet the growing needs. The real problem, however, is whether the system is designed to cope successfully with the problems of urban life. Coming to Terms with Urbanisation The basic question is " H o w can you get them back to the farm after they have seen Lagos ?" In a country which is predominantly agricultural, how can you educate the young men and women in the cities and ensure that they return to the farms ? This is clearly impossible in Lagos and any of the booming cities of West Africa, partly because educationists have not faced up to the problem of devising an educational system that will integrate the young persons into their own communities as well as promote the development of the African economy. There have been experiments at sending "graduates" of secondary schools, which are located in the towns, to farm settlements and farm institutes in their own home areas with conscious efforts to reproduce there some of the attractions of the cities such as electricity and water supply, good living quarters and even cinemas, only to discover that the urge to return to the cities would not be overcome in this way. This article is, however, concerned with the effects of nrbanisation on education and so the fascinating problem of resettlement on the land must not detain us too long, although the two are interrelated. The challenge to education in Africa today is that it must come to terms with urbanisation. Urbanisation in Lagos means at present living in an overcrowded city, struggling with insufficient funds to begin and consolidate the process of urban renewal, provide modern sewage disposal for all and coping with the problems of unemployment, juvenile delinquency and increasing incidents of crimes of violence. The newcomer from outside Lagos often arrives with inadequate education, insufficient briefing as to the hazards of unemployment and totally loose from his traditional mooring of tribal customs and parental control. There is little that the conventional

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educational system can do for him. If he is lucky and he secures a job, he can continue to improve his educational attainments b y entering evening classes at the Government adult education centres or at the College of Technology or the semi-professional commercial and typing classes. In all probability, however, he will remain unemployed and dependent upon the charity of his friends and relatives and thus become an easy prey to the press gangs of petty criminals. Even those at school, evening classes or regular employment, unless they are lucky to come under good influences, they are liable to join the ranks of juvenile delinquents until they become accustomed to the wiles and blandishments of insidious boon companions. Thus another important effect of urbanisation on education is to throw a heavy burden on the educational system as far as preparing the young persons to withstand the temptations of urban life is concerned. In urban life, informal education plays an essential and important role. Reference has already been made to adult education centres where the imperfectly educated newcomer to the cities can continue to broaden his horizon or acquire more knowledge in an informal manner. There are also the voluntary organisations such as the Young Men's Christian Association, the Young Women Christian Association, the Scout Movement, Boys and Girls Clubs which can play a vital role in rescuing the newcomers from falling into bad ways and focusing their attention and energies upon constructive actions. The temptations before the young worker in a large city, far away from home, are naturally great and the situation is aggravated by loneliness so that organisations which provide meaningful companionship for him are performing important educational roles, howbeit in an informal and indirect manner.

The University in the Emerging Nation It is, perhaps, natural to think that a university situated in an urban area has a special mission in meeting the challenge of urbanisation to our educational planning and development. It cannot be too strongly emphasised that education is a life-long process and for those who are fortunate to be capable of receiving higher education, the opportunity of combating some of the effects of urbanisation is golden. Perhaps a brief exposd of the philosophy of the University of Lagos which is par excellence an urban university will illustrate one way of tackling this problem. The University of Lagos was founded in 1962 and b y 1966 it has fairly well established six Faculties of Arts, Business and Social Studies, Education, Engineering, Law and Science as well as a Medical School. It provides regular undergraduate courses in these Faculties and in two of them -

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those of Business and Social Studies and of Law - there are evening classes for part-time students who work during the day and are expected to take two years longer than the full-time students in order to graduate. There are plans for post-graduate studies and research is an important element in the commitment of the university. Yet, the university feels strongly that it must extend its activities outside its normal walls and so there is a Continuing Education Centre which began as an arm of the Faculty of Business and Social Studies but is now designed to serve all the Faculties as the extension organisation. This is particularly a fruitful approach in a growing city such as Lagos because the need for continuing the education of the adult is obvious and clamant. This aspect of the work of a university in an urban setting can serve the dual purpose of enabling the students to widen their educational horizon, broaden their culture as well as improve upon their skills and competences in their day to day activities. It can, in effect, assist the urban dweller to fit himself more firmly into his cosmopolitan environment much as the traditional educational pattern served admirably to integrate the young into the more static traditional society. The continuing education apparatus can provide instruction in Music and the Arts, Traditional History and Culture no less than in Science and Technology, Economic Planning and Jurisprudence. It can also mount seminars and conferences designed to acquaint the busy medical practitioners and the peripatetic engineers and architects with the latest knowledge and discoveries in their professional world. It can bring the citizens to the university and give them a glimpse of the imperatives of the academic community just as it affords the academics the opportunity of keeping in touch with the realistic lives of the urban communities. The university, also, through its urban studies programme, seeks to shed lights on the problems of urbanisation. It is this kind of involvement which is a vital proof of the virility of modern universities and it is particularly essential that universities in developing countries must not shirk their responsibilities in this field. Urban studies can take different forms but, in essence, they are motivated b y the burning desire to come to grips with one's environment. In Lagos which is a port as well as a commercial centre and the metropolitan city of the most populous country in Africa, the need for bringing the disciplines of sociology, town planning, environmental design and health engineering to bear upon the problems of the growth and development of the city is obvious and with a properly coordinated programme much can be achieved in a short time toward the amelioration of the adverse effects of urbanisation. The appalling traffic congestion and consequent waste of time in moving from one part of the

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town to another; the difficulties of integrating new comers into existing communities which are far from stable themselves in certain sections and the avoidance of consequent miseries and loneliness; the lack of facilities for modern public health engineering and the attendant danger of endemic diseases - all these can be studied and useful light shed upon them for the benefit of the city authorities and to the enormous advantage of tile city dwellers. The universities, then, have a vital mission in developing countries; they must take in hand the problems posed by urbanisation and give powerful leadership to other educational sectors in solving them. Urbanisation as a Disruptive and Modernising Force

Urbanisation is both a disruptive and a modernising force in Africa. Its effects on education are essentially those of a challenging phenomenon which calls for a rethinking of the purpose and process of education in developing societies. Formal education provided in schools and colleges need to be oriented in such a way as to serve the requirements not only of agricultural communities b u t of the rising population of city dwellers who have migrated from rural areas into cosmopolitan communities. The flotsam and jetsam of urbanisation pose the most difficult and the most pressing problems for the educationists and only b y employing the informal as well as the formal approaches can they be successfully fitted into the stable urban communities. In tackling all these problems, the universities cannot stand aloof and esconce themselves in their ivory towers; the universities must become involved and through extension activities and deliberate studies in urbanisation they can and must play their parts in the integrated educational approach that is indicated if the new African industrial towns will not be white sepulchres harbouring semiliterates, chronic delinquents and unmitigated slum-dwellers.

REFERENCES 1) Egungun and Agemo are manifestations of the ancestor cult among the Yoruba.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

GIBBS, James L. (ed.) : Peoples o] A]rica. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston 1965. KUPER, Hilder (ed.): Urbanisation and Migration in West A/rica. Berkeley/Los Angeles: University of California Press 1965. LITTLE, Kenneth (ed.): West A/rican Urbanisation: A Study o/ Voluntary Association and Social Change. Cambridge: University Press 1965. MARRIS, Peter (ed.) : Family and Social Change in an African City (Lagos). London: Routledge and Kegan Paul 196 I.

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OTTENBERG, Simon and Phoebe (eds.) : Culture and Societies o/A/rica. New York: R a n d o m House 1960. UNESCO: A Report of the Advisory Commission for the Establishment of the University of Lagos. Paris : UNESCO 1961.

DIE AUSWIRKUNGEN DER VERSTADTERUNG A U F DAS E R Z I E H U N G S W E S E N IN A F R I K A : E R F A H R U N G E N AUS N I G E R I A yon SABURI BIOBAKU,Lagos Der Verfasser er6rtert die Auswirkullgen der Verst~tdterung auf das Erziehungswesen und beginnt mit einer f)bersicht fiber Wege der einheimischen Erziehung in Westafrika. Der Verfasser zeigt, dab diese Erziehung im wesentlichen das Ziel verfolgt, die Jugendlichen in das afrikanische Leben einzugliedern, das sich vorwiegend ill D6rfern und Marktstiidten abspielt. Mit dem EindringeI1 westlicher Erziehung erforderte der 13edarf an einheimischen Mitarbeitern der Missionare, europ/iischen H~Lndler und Regierungsbeauftragten ein Erziehungssystem, das vor allem geistlich geschultes Personal heranbildete und zur Vernachl~ssigung der landwirtschaftlichen und technischen Ausbildung Itihrte. Modernisierung in Afrika bedeutet daher Industrialisierung und Verbesserung der Landwirtschaft: aber der Haupteffekt dieser industriellen Revolution ist die Entstehullg neuer St/~dte mit kosmopolitischer Bev61kerung. Kurz, die Verst~idterung ist auch in Afrika zu einem Ph~tnomen geworden. Am 13eispiel von Lagos diskutiert der Verfasser die Versuche, mit den Erziehungsproblemen in wachsellden afrikanischen St/idten fertig zu werden. Er weist darauf hin, dab trotz der Ausweitung der M6glichkeiten formaler Bildung die jungen Leute, die auf der Suche Ilach besseren Aufstiegsm6glichkeiten aus I/indlichen Gebieten in die St~tdte kommen, die Unterstiitzullg illoffizieller Erziehungseillrichtungen wie private Organisationen und Wohlfahrtsklubs in Anspruch nehmen. Weiterhin haben die Universit~ten m i t Hilfe ihrer extension sevices organisations und mit Hilfe yon Forschullgsarbeiten auf dem Gebiet der Verst~dterung eine entscheidende Rolle zu spielen. Hier k6nnen sie ihr Forschungs- und Lehrpotential auf ein vordringliches soziales Problem anwenden. Die Auswirkungen der Verst~dterung auf die Erziehung stellen letztlich eine Herausforderung fiir die Erzieher selbst dar, und in Afrika stellt sich diese Herausforderung in der Frage, wie die ]ugend am besten in eine entstehende industrielle Gesellschaft eingegliedert werden kann. Die L6sung, die die nigerianischen Erfahrungen anbieten, liegt darin, die Bemiihungen aller Ebenen des Erziehungswesens zu integrierell, ein ProzeB, in dem den Universitgten eine dynamische und ftihrende Rolle zukommt.

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par SABURI BIOBAKU, Lagos E n d i s c u t a n t des effets de l ' u r b a n i s a t i o n sur l ' 6 d u c a t i o n , l'ar~icle c o m m e n c e p a r u n s c h 6 m a des proc6d6s 6ducatifs indig~nes e n Afrique de l ' O u e s t et il a p p a r a t t q u ' e n fair, le b u t 6 t a i t d ' a d a p t e r les j eunes-gens h la c o m m u n a u t 6 africaine oscillant e n t r e des villages et des villes de m a r c h 6 . A v e c l a v e n u e de l ' 6 d u c a t i o n occidentale, le b e s o i n de c o l l a b o r a t e u r s indig~nes p o u r les m i s s i o n n a i r e s , les c o m m e r ~ a n t s e u r o p 6 e n s ou les f o n c t i o n n a i r e s du g o u v e r n e m e n t , d i c t a u n s y s t ~ m e 6 d u c a t i f q u i f o r m a p r i n c i p a l e m e n t des t r a v a i l l e u r s cl6ricaux et n6gligea la f o r m a t i o n agricole e t t e c h n i q u e . L a m o d e r n i s a t i o n e n A f r i q u e signifie l ' 6 t a b l i s s e m e n t d ' i n d u s t r i e s et le d 6 v e l o p p e m e n t de l ' a g r i c u l t u r e , m a i s l'effet p r i n c i p a l de c e t t e R 6 v o l u t i o n I n d u s trielle est le d 6 v e l o p p e m e n t de n o m b r e u s e s villes nouvelles a y a n t u n e p o p u l a t i o n cosmopolite. E n bref, l ' u r b a n i s a t i o n e s t d e v e n u e u n p t l 6 n o m ~ n e e n Afrique. A Lagos, p a r exemple, les t e n t a t i v e s de r6solution des p r o b l ~ m e s d ' 6 d u c a t i o n darts les villes africaines en d 6 v e l o p p e m e n t s o n t discut6es e t la conclusion est q u e m a l g r 6 l ' e x p a n s i o n de l ' 6 v e n t a i l des i n s t r u m e n t s 6ducatifs officiels, les j e u n e s gens 6 m i g r a n t des a g g l o m 6 r a t i o n s rurales vers les villes ~ la r e c h e r c h e d ' o c c a s i o n s meilleures, o n t b e s o i n de l ' a i d e des o r g a n i s m e s 6ducatifs inofficiels tels q u e les o r g a n i s a t i o n s b6n6voles e t les clubs d ' a s s i s t a n c e . E n outre, les u n i v e r s i t 6 s n e p e u v e n t 6 c h a p p e r au r61e qu'elles o n t h j o u e r a u sein des c o m m u n a u t 6 s u r b a i n s p a r l ' i n t e r m 6 d i a i r e de leurs o r g a n i s a t i o n s de services d ' e x t e n s i o n e t en i n s t i t u a n t des 6 t u d e s d ' u r b a n i s m e a m e n a n t ainsi leurs t e c h n i q u e s de r e c h e r c h e et d ' e n s e i g n e m e n t h se c o n c e n t r e r sur ce p r o b l ~ m e h u m a i n u r g e n t . Les effets de l ' u r b a n i s a t i o n sur l ' 6 d u c a t i o n se s o l d e n t p a r u n d6fi a u x 6 d u c a t e u r s , et e n A f r i q u e ce d6fi consiste e n la meilleure fa~on d ' i n t 6 g r e r les j e u n e s gens d a n s u n e soci6t6 industrielle e m b r y o n n a i r e . L a s o l u t i o n propos6e p a r l'exp6rience nig6r i e n n e est de c o n j u g u e r les efforts de t o u s l e s n i v e a u x d ' 6 d u c a t i o n , les u n i v e r s i t 6 s a s s u m a n t u n r61e d y n a m i q u e e t dirigeant.