Positioning and making citizenship through Obama K’Ogelo Cultural Festivals in Siaya County, Kenya

Abstract

This paper examines how cultural festivals are used as both symbols and instruments for producing and claiming citizenship in Kenya. It analyses in particular the Obama K’Ogelo Cultural Festival, held in 2008 and 2010, to commemorate the election and presidency of Barack Obama as the 44th president of the United States of America (U.S.A.). The two events were used in the first place to position President Obama in Kenya. More importantly, I argue in this paper, the Luo people of K’Ogelo used it in documenting their ethnographies and as an instrument of positioning themselves in Kenya’s body politic, contesting narratives of exclusion as well as claiming their human rights. This paper develops an interpretation of the K’Ogelo Cultural Festival in the light of the Kenyan Constitution-making debate on the subject of ‘culture’ and the public comments of the U.S. ambassador to Kenya at the time (Michael Ranneberger). At the local level in K’Ogelo, these festivals are primarily used by local intellectuals and their courtiers to develop an ethnography of Luos and Luoness. In addition, the festivals were used to claim the presidency of Obama in support of the argument that Luos are good enough to be leaders.