Documentation of African Traditions: The Example of Igbo Tradition in Nation-Building

Abstract

Documentation of African traditions has become a major concern not only to the Afro-centric scholars but also to the teeming Africans home and abroad who have come face to face with the reality of the need for the revival of African cultural values. The general feeling and opinion is that even though western culture, intellectualism and economics have contributed immensely to the civilization of Africa, their shortcomings have had a far-reaching impact on African traditional life and values. Indeed, African countries including Nigeria have been affected especially in the area of nation building. They have lost a substantial number of their best brains to Europe and America which could have been harnessed for national development. This problem came up because nations all over the world are now getting increasingly unified in a network of relationships called globalization.it is against this background that this paper proposed the documentation of African traditions. Descriptive method was employed for this study. It was discovered that corruption, acts of savagery, new trends in science and technology, insincerity of our leaders, brain drain and brainwashing by foreign cultures are some of the major challenges facing nation building and documentation of African traditions and culture. The paper concludes with a suggestion that the practice of liberal democracy, African languages, fundamental human rights, documentation of African technological heritage, transparency, accountability, establishment of museums at grassroots and protection of archaeological sites should be entrenched in African polity for the revival of African culture and national development.