Kibicho, God and Revelation, 72168. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. In 2007, the region would explode into postelection violence, something which she had foreseen and tried hard to mitigate by cultivating a culture of peace for almost two decades. The experience of discrimination at the Department of Zoology led Maathai to look for opportunities elsewhere. As a national school, Loreto High School provided Maathai with the opportunity to interact with girls from other ethnic groups in Kenya. He also discusses the place of indigenous languages in liberation from cultural enslavement in Decolonising the Mind: The Politics of Language in African Literature (Nairobi, Kenya: Heinemann Educational, 1986). Both families migrated from the Nyeri District to the Rift Valley province in search of employment and land to cultivate. Maathais marriage produced three children, Waweru, Wanjira, and Muta, two boys and a girl. This article has benefited a great deal from discussions and interviews held toward the end of 2018 and in 2019 with Prof. Wanjiku Kabira, Rev. Thus she became Wangari Muta Maathai, asserting her African identity and freedom to be known and called by the names she wanted (Maathai, Unbowed, 147). Accordingly, she adopted new Christian names, to later abandon them in favor of her African names, a saga repeated upon marriage and divorce.13, In 1956, Maathai took another important step in her education journey by joining Loreto High School, Limuru. 55. A decision to send Maathai to school was made by her mother at the instigation of Nderitu, an elder brother. << /Filter /FlateDecode /Length 1638 >> In 1977, she founded the Green Belt Movement, a non-governmental organization, which encourages women to plant trees to combat deforestation and environmental degradation. 61. A meeting with Prof. Reinhold Hofmann from the University of Giessen in Germany provided an opportunity not only for employment but also for the advancement of her field of interest at the upcoming university. The survival of the GBM under these circumstances may be attributed to the international stature that Maathai had acquired as an environmental warrior, and the existence of supporter networks and admirers scattered all over the world. Even though some of the teaching at school undermined her cultural identity, the warmth and encouragement from the Catholic nuns and the stimulus of learning and appreciating the sciences had a lasting impact. She was presented by Professor Ole Danbolt Mjs, Chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee. Wangari Maathai is a young woman who saw deforestation turn the lush lands of Kenya into a barren desert. Updates? Awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004, Wangari Maathai spent her life fighting for and promoting democracy and peace, sustainable development, and the empowerment of women. She had already won many awards and was eventually awarded with the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004. Accounts from friends indicate that both parents were devoted to the well-being and education of their children. In her final years, she battled ovarian cancer. Wangari recognised rural women's primary interest and role in maintaining a productive landscape, for assuring food needs as well as making daily household necessities - water and fuel - easier to collect. endstream As an alternative, she chose to further her education, which led to a doctorate in the field of veterinary science from the University of Giessen, a first for an eastern African woman, for which she was widely recognized. The overall objective was to control the politics of womens empowerment.33 The National Council of Churches of Kenya (NCCK) was also a victim of a similar tactic when it became a fierce critic of the authoritarian tendencies of the Moi regime. 44. Ecologist Wangari Maathai won the 2004 Nobel Peace Prize for her years of work with women to reverse African deforestation. Wangari Maathai Lesson Plan: Write and Deliver a Persuasive Speech Grade Levels: 3-5, 6-8 In this lesson plan, adaptable for grades 3-12, students explore BrainPOP resources to learn about Wangari Maathai, a global leader for women's rights and conservation. The link was not copied. Thus, the NCWK provided an appropriate platform to develop and experiment with innovative ideas such as the GBM. In the forests of Aberdares and Mount Kenya, guerilla warfare was intense. They are, however, not responsible for the views expressed herein or the interpretations given in the article. Born in the midst of a world war and growing up among the conflicts and ambiguities of colonial domination, thereafter she cultivated, mobilized, and networked for a world of democratic and peaceful governance and sustainable development. endobj Maathai was shaped by her rural environmentin which she lived on her mothers farmas well as her missionary education and later, by her education in the United States and Germany. Wangari Muta Maathai Anchor was a prominent Kenyan environmental and political activist. Maathai, Unbowed, 7. Mwangi, on the other hand, was working for a private corporation and was a business entrepreneur with political ambitions. [i] She was born in Nyeri, part of the rural region of Kenya on the 1st of April 1940. She was allocated a mini garden by her mother to cultivate and to learn practically how to care for plants. Among these were the rapid transformation that took place in the countryside, especially in central Kenya where Maathai grew up, and the impact this transformation had on the environment, which in turn shaped the concerns that the GBM raised. (Nairobi, Kenya: Leadership Institute, 2011); and Wangari Maathai, Unbowed: One Womans Story (London: Arrow Books, 2006). The Ndegwa Report of 1971 legitimized such practices.46 These practices tended to concentrate wealth and power among few elites, predominantly from one ethnic group. An interview with Joshua S. Muiru, November 2019. The daughter of a peasant farmer and the third . Unbowed: A Memoir . These experiences emboldened her to fight against ethnic discrimination and gender inequalities which she encountered in the same institution and in the country generally. She was elected to Kenyas National Assembly in 2002 with 98 percent of the vote, and in 2003 she was appointed assistant minister of environment, natural resources, and wildlife. 24. Her family had established the precedent of educating girls, just as an older uncle had done.6 Together with her mother, Maathai left a settlers farm in Nakuru, where her father was working, to return to Ihithe village in the Nyeri districtone of the rural areas designated for Africans, termed native reserves,so that she could attend school. Future research could explore further the tensions that marriages of educated elites encountered, while still embedded in their ethnic traditions. 3. She sat for the Kenya Primary Examination in 1951 and scored Grade One. Children like Maathai, who were born near a missionary settlement, and whose parents allowed them to venture into the new teachings by Christian missionaries, had early access to Western education. Maathai, Wangari. She was brought up, taught, encouraged, and mentored by womenher mother, village women, and teachers (nuns in particular). In 1960, she benefited from what in Kenya was called the Tom Mboya Airlift to the United States, for education in preparation for independence. When you do it alone you run the risk that when you are no longer there nobody else will do it. It was an area populated by the Gikuyu people who lived in scattered homesteads around which they cultivated food crops and kept livestock.1 British settlers engaged in large-scale farming within the district, while colonial administrators entrenched colonial rule. Forest cover was also decimated as large-scale farms were subdivided and select forest reserves were hived off for settlement purposes. However, they were still straddling the line between their traditional culture and Western values.27 Their wedding was solemnized according to Gikuyu traditions and Western Christian trappings. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. She had a job offer in the Department of Zoology at University College, Nairobi, only to discover the shocking news that the job had meanwhile been given to another person who was not even in the country. Your recognition as a Nobel Peace Prize laureate has without doubt now confirmed your extraordinary identity in Tetu, Nyeri, Kenya, East Africa, Africa and the World.60. As more funds were secured and more international attention gained, the GBM was assured of survival, both financially and politically. stream Fresh Air Weekend Fresh Air Weekend: NPR host Mary Louise Kelly; Josh Groban. Among them were the activists and the brokers of power. Characteristically, Maathai turned this misfortune into an opportunity which in the final analysis worked for the good of the GBM and her work with the NCWK. Roland Hoksbergen and Lowell M. Ewert (Monrovia, CA: World Vision International, 2002). In the midst of her demanding career as an environmental and political activist, Maathai enjoyed motherhood and was very protective of her children. She challenged this in court, but her petition was dismissed. 50, Institute for Development Studies, University of Nairobi, 1987; and Njuguna, Ngethe and Karuti, Kanyinga, The Politics of Development Space: The State and NGOs in the Delivery of Basic Services in Kenya, Working Paper, Institute for Development Studies, University of Nairobi, 1992. The first attempt in 1982 was blocked; in the 1997 attempt, she failed to secure a seat. Wangari Maathai (1940-2011), the first woman to obtain a PhD in East and Central Africa, was a scholar, and an environmental and human rights activist. She resigned from her comfortable position at the University of Nairobi to contest a by-election in a rural constituency. A Tiny Seed: The Story of Wangari MaathaibyWritten by Nicola RijsdijkIllustrated by Maya MarshakIn a village on the slopes of Mount Kenya, a little girl work. When she was globally recognized with the award of the Nobel Peace Prize, she became an instant national icon.59 Duncan Ndegwa, an outstanding public servant from Nyeri County, brought out this ironic situation in his congratulatory letter to Maathai when he wrote: Lest you forget, and far away from any vestiges of dignity, we have seen you being shoved aside if not totally ignored by the government, labeled feminine chauvinist and treated like a common criminal all for being principled and living for a cause. Political activist and environmentalist Wangari Maathai was trained to be a leader. Researching ticks at the University of Nairobi also exposed Maathai to the environmental degradation taking place in rural Kenya and its impact on the livelihoods of rural women. This left the NCWK in a precarious financial situation and effected the severing of relationships with many grassroots organizations. 27 0 obj While undertaking her studies, Maathai learned how Christianity practiced in American, European, and African societies blended well with their dominant cultures. 26. The socioeconomic impact of policies of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund on the environment and poverty in Africa should be noted at a time when the thinking within UN circles was questioning the prevailing development orthodoxy. Local experiences also infused global thinking and appreciation of struggles for democratic governance, peace, and sustainable development. They returned to Kenya soon after independence. This source greatly helped my understanding of the To the school calendar. Under colonialism, indigenous Kenyan cultures were besieged. Wangari Maathai, the most prominent environmental activist in Africa, was the 2004 recipient of the Alfred Nobel Peace Prize. Initially, the NCWK was an organization led by urban elite women and intended to give a voice to womens organizations. The attendant inequalities in the country were analyzed and flagged by the International Labour Organization Report of 1972. Most people think of Ms. Maathai as an environmentalist, planting trees. Maathai seems to have been aware of these tensions as she juggled the roles of mother, politicians wife, and university teacher, as well as affirming herself as an African womanin manner of dressing, hospitality at home, and speaking local languages to meet the expectations of her husbands constituents.28 Hence her marriage might have become a theater of contestations of different perceptions of womanhood in independent Kenya. 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