Radio Miraya
2655: Women Leaders: Producing Local Knowledge, Understanding Communities
We are profiling women who want to understand our society better and we are doing research that focuses on the divorce and they are doing research that is focusing on the divorce lives of women in South Sudan and South Sudanese in general. Will their work span spiritually, spirituality, leadership, economic practices, to cultural practices and our guest is part of the South Sudan's research network facilitated by the Rif Valley Institute and supported by the European Union. So we are starting off with Marlene John Serafino and she texts us to wow where she sought to understand how the Faratite communities of western Baragazan state seek the meaning of traditional healing and spiritual protection. Good morning and welcome to the program. Good morning. Right, so let's start with you. What drew you to this particular research? Thank you so much for hosting me here again and like any other women I was inspired and motivated by the fact that indigenous knowledge production is one of the common agenda which is now happening in South Sudan and growing up in a community where traditional healing and spiritual protection is commonly practiced in my country. So this driven me to do this research project and apart from that there is a big gap in the field of the research which is being conducted by the women. Like what my colleagues say that some of the research has been done externally. So as a woman it is you who knows yourself and you know the experience of how to be a woman. So you cannot allow yourself to be defined by anyone else. So it is you to take up that role. So it is one of the factors that driven me to do the research and then I see that knowledge production in South Sudan is not only for male alone but it is something which is gender equal and we are the pillars of this nation. So once I don't cannot move forward I see this as one of the factors that I can advocate mostly for this continuation of gender equality. So what sort of support does the Women's Research Network offer to develop your research skills in the work? Yeah it was until now thanks to the Rift Valley team and the European Union support the project and then Rift Valley Institute also implemented this project fully. So the kind of support we got was in terms of the trainings we received so many trainings from Rift Valley Institute which is we were trained by different expats from across the country and then providing mentorship and supervision from other people which is mostly like me I was supervised by the mentor from UK which is a little bit far from South Sudan but it wasn't challenging to me. And then the simulation process and then RBI also conducts seminars at the universities and conducts public lectures and those things. So RBI is really doing great in order to support this Women's Research Network project. Yeah and recently we have second cohort which is another impact of this research project. Right well in your research you conclude that there is an interlinking of clinical medicine and traditional medicines. What role does spirituality play here when people are embracing both clinical and traditional medicine? Yeah as I will say that South Sudan is profoundly spiritual and we embrace both because before the coming of the missionaries to Sudan we were also having kind of our belief system. So spirituality is one of the most important things which is now which is commonly practiced among the differentities communities and it is not only among differentities South Sudanese in general they do belief in spirituality. So drawing into the medical or clinical perspective in regards to the traditional healing or spirituality they both have interlinked perspective because in the traditional healing and in most interviews that I have conducted most of the interviews they think like sickness itself alone is not being caused accidentally or there are some spiritual aspect of it which caused a problem in the families and then if you embrace those spirituality like the spirits of the ancestors the spirits of the twins and the mountains and those things. So if you embrace both meaning there will be something good happening to the community and if you reject them it is very unfortunate that something wrong is going to happen. So now you cannot leave that one alone because ancestors are part of us they were one who were living with us so having lost their love when we have to respect or recognize them as they are one of the family members. And Marilyn I would like to still stay on the conversations or the interviews that you held with the people in WoW. So what were some of the stories that were maybe unexpected or interesting to you? Yeah we have so many interesting stories one of it that motivated and impressed me mostly was one of the students of which I interviewed and he told me he lost her mom and you know how people handle the dead is in a very unique way. So after the disease has been buried and the family said that the disease should be allowed for the room where he was sleeping should be left close and then the candle should be light in that room for seven days so that the spirit of that person can go and meet with the ancestral wall. So after seven days then they went and called the firstborn of that family to come and return the spirit of her mom inside the room. So I asked like did you do it and he said yes. So how would that person then return the spirit after the candle burning out? Yeah they light a fire then they call that firstborn to blue the whistle and then he was blueing while calling the name of her mom and matching towards the room where her mom died in. So they went inside that room and they clean it and retain everything like in a normal place believing that her mom's spirit is in that room now the mother will be guiding the family or looking at the family in a way that if there is anything wrong going to happen they believe that it will protect they call the name of that mother and the family so that they can be protected or any misfortune things that happens in the family the mom will be called. Right and from what you narrate it's very possible for this to be perceived as which craft. What problem is this posing in the area where you did your research? Yeah you see in the communities when people embrace their culture and belief system some people took it in the wrong way thinking that it is a witchcraft but during my field work I came to realize that spiritual protection or traditional healing is not a witchcraft. So which is I believe that witchcraft is there but it is not in a way that people do the African system of belief systems and those things so retaining the spirit of your mom inside the room is not a witch it's just that you are recognizing that this person has been one of us and we lost her and we are now recovering from us but we feel her presence. Yeah we feel her presence and it is kind of appreciating and valuing the life that she has lived on ours for a long time so it's not a witchcraft. This research is very important because it will provide the government of South Sudan with the fast-hand crucial information about the practices of traditional healers and spiritual protection although it is only focused in one communities but it is kind of bringing insight new insight so that later on someone can come and build on it for further research in the field of spiritual protection and regarding the government during the interviews most of the interviewers were telling me that traditional healers should be certified because some of them are misinterpreted and mistreated and there is no any supportive document that can protect them some traditional healers people may come and pretend that they are healing but they are doing this for a business so there should be a document that can satisfy that this person is legally a traditional healer in order to avoid negative perception on the practices that they are doing. This research is one of the best of the knowledge production in South Sudan although some of the research has been done in the field of witchcraft and poisoning I remember reading the book which was written by Ivan Spritchett among the Azan de people so finding literature regarding such kind of a recitopic is too hard so I think like these findings will help in producing more knowledge in the field of indigenous knowledge production in the South Sudan. Right well some of your observations also speak about women tradition or healers being valued the same way as the male as the male counterpart so tell us a bit more about that finding. In the literature review that I read during the research process it was like people things like women are the one practicing this traditional healing or witchcraft and to my point of surprise was because we are here fighting for for gender equality looking at it in an intellectual way so our women's long ago they were also doing it in order to avoid male domination so in order to avoid this patriarchal system or male dominant society women tends to practice witchcraft and poisoning in order to reduce or to fill in the gaps of women responsibility in the house and they are all valued the same because all of them are offering the same services in wow among different communities so there's no way that women are being valued less than men traditional healers they are all working for the common good of the society so there's no any gender gap between the women traditional healers. All right and Marilyn thank you so much for making our time to speak to us so for others who are interested in researching on such issues or many more what would you recommend that they focus on yeah I'll say that despite the fact that we have high level of education and then Western system of education and Christianity traditional healing and spiritual protection has never been demolished since it is still continuing so because this recital was only focusing in Western Baha'u'llah and I was just looking at traditional healing and spiritual protection so I think maybe someone can just go and research about how traditional healing and Western medical system are being interlinked or why is it not disappearing in the state of regardless of the level of education that is going on. All the times that we live in. Right and what's your message to women on this upcoming international women's day? Yeah to all the women outside they are like to say that happy international women's day in advance and to all of us we are very unique in one way or another so we have to be determined and passionate about learning new things there is much outside there that needs to be exposed out to the public so don't feel less human and don't feel like yeah this is for a man and this is for a woman all of us are the same so we have to embrace the goodness that is in us right there. Right Marlene John Serafino thank you so much for your time.