Do Nudist Cultures in Africa Still Exist?
Here are shocking nudist African cultures that will never change, or maybe they will. In this video, we explore how Africans perceive nudist cultures and how they have been influenced by western civilizations.
About this video
This video is part of the series #TalkAfricawithMichaelUkwuma #Nudist #NakedAfrica
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Do nudist cultures in Africa still exist?
Let me start with a word. Nudity.
Many of the people we are about to talk about do not use that word for themselves. For them it is not nudity. It is culture. It is who they are. To call it shameful is an insult, and to show them as a joke is humiliation.
Now to the question. Every human being is born without clothes. At some point in history, every people on earth lived that way. Civilizations grew on their own, in different places. Some discovered clothing early for their own reasons. Some came to it much later. Some communities have never felt the need for it.
So let us answer two simple questions. Do nudist cultures still exist in Africa, or are the clips online just scenes made to show Africans as primitive? And where such cultures exist, do they need to change?
Do they still exist?
Yes. They do.
There are African communities today that live without Western dress, and there may be others that outsiders have still not met. Think of the Koma people of Adamawa State, Nigeria. The wider world only learned of them a few decades ago, when a hiker found them on a mountaintop. Their neighbours below had no idea they were there.
The Koma have lived peacefully in the mountains. Visitors can meet them today. But they have chosen not to be shaped by Western civilization. Many do not go to school. Many do not follow the foreign religions. They put on clothes when they go down to the city to trade, to sell their goods or to buy what they need. Once they return home, the clothes come off.
It is the same story elsewhere in the world. The Sentinelese people of the Andaman Islands live apart. In Africa too we have mountain tops, hills and hard terrain where communities have kept to themselves.
Are you African and do you know of such a community in your country? Tell me the country and the name of the people in the comments. I want to see how wide this reaches.
Climate has a say
Notice something. Even communities that kept this way of life often keep some part of it at home and dress when they go out. How much a person wears has a lot to do with climate. In a cold place you cover up all the time. Arctic peoples wore leather and animal skin a thousand years ago. A thousand years ago most Africans wore very little, because the climate is not the same.
It is not a crime. What a person practises does not make him a bad person. We should see people as human beings who have values and cultures, and we should respect those cultures.
Why I did not censor it
In an earlier video, someone asked me to censor the footage. I thought about it. Then I decided against it. This is African culture. If I do not show people the way they want to be seen, I do no justice to them. It is not my job to change what people practise. It is not my job to decide what is right or wrong for them. They will work that out for themselves.
Do they need to change?
Personally, I do not think so.
Globalization is here. Cultures will meet. There will be some melting points. It is fine to pick up a few things from other cultures. But we must not forget who we are. We must not lose the essence of our traditions and our existence.
So what is the future for nudist cultures in Africa? I think they will remain, and I hope they do. I hope the people can ask their governments for the right to preserve their culture and practise it without discrimination. This is also a human rights issue. We cannot claim to respect people’s rights and dignity if we do everything to stop them from being who they are meant to be.
In every tribe some people want to be different. They want to dress differently and see the world a different way. If they choose that, fine. But it would be wrong for anyone to play god and force change on people against their will.
That is my opinion. What is yours? Tell me in the comments.