Flogging a dying horse? Our reading culture and our children’s.
I used to always be left speechless whenever I spent time with my nephews on visits to their home or the countless times I was left to babysit them whenever their mother’s schedule kept her away for longer hours than usual. These boys’ reading culture always worried me. In a bid not to sound hypocritical, I don’t expect a child to be citing Okot p’Bitek or Desmond Bagley at that tender stage but to want nothing at all to do with non-academic reading is a terrible seed to sow for our children and future generations. As African parents, we have to set aside the western parenting techniques and direct our children in the direction we want if they are to cope with the day to day problems in our world. Our problems as Africa are not the same as their (the West) problems. My Torts professor likes to joke that the West lives in the Disney channel mode where angrily barking at one’s child could attract a law suit while we are set in the hard less more real National Geographic mode. The rate at