Gatherings in Zambia: girls’ initiation

Gatherings in Zambia: girls’ initiation. The Cisungu was an important rite of passage for girls in former days.¹Descriptions of the Cisungu of old can be found for the south of the Lala region in Stefaniszyn (1964) and Stefaniszyn (1974), for the Congo part of the Lala region in Lambo (1946), and for the Lamba region: Doke (1927) and Doke (1931). And it has recently become important again. Based on the old practice, a new variant of the Cisungu has been introduced in the 2000s. It is still a rite of passage, with the safe-guarding of the position of women and of the reproduction of culture as its most important aspects.

A very short overview of the Cisungu of old

When a girl menstruated for the first time, she would hide outside the village and eventually was sequestered in a house for a period of one to two months. During that time, she was instructed by special instructresses (banacimbela) about all aspects of being a woman. Instruction was largely through singing and dancing, and the initiate (kamwale) spent most of her time practising on this. When she had learned enough, the coming-out of the cisungu was prepared, the occasion at which she appeared for the first time before her family and neighbours as a woman. This was a big feast at which often ing’omba were invited to historicise the occasion and to heighten its quality by their performance.
The Cisungu was extremely rich in ritual, music and dance, and teachings, in its representation of the feminine, and the importance of women and reproduction of knowledge in local society. The teachings of Cisungu were to ingrain orderly life²Mensah 1971b: The cisungu ceremony is really a consumation of an educational process which is geared towards the inculcation of orderly life. in the initiate but at the same time had a general teaching function (kufunda bonse mu calo) that was further ingrained by women at the Pa kwisha and at other occasions, also for men to hear. In the 1980s, older men generally knew many Cisungu songs.

Song 42

A Cisungu song sung by women of Kapampalwe seksioni, 1981.

Text of Song 42 ∵ Be seen by your father’s relatives

Kabongabonga kamwale we
Alalala na bena wiso batambeko ee

Do the kubonga dancing, you kamwale
Alalala so that your father’s relatives can look at you

When the blanket is lifted of the initiate (kamwale) at the Coming-out of the cisungu that concludes the Cisungu period, the initiate performs a special dance (kubonga) moving her torso and arms while on her knees.³A Cisungu song with the same first line can be found in Stefaniszyn (1964b:51, Cisungu song 6).
Kabongabonga kamwale
Iyaya iyayayele Iyaya iyayayele
Yaye sumbelongo
A girl with a bent head
Iyaya iyayayele Iyaya iyayayele
Yaye, the row of locusts.

He adds:
Kabongabonga: bending the head and swaying it to the right and the left like the movements of this dance. Sumbelongo, corrupt from masombe (plur.) locusts. Longo, usually mulongo, a line, a row. Here is meant a line of locusts, the allusion being to the numerous progeny the girl is hoped to have.)

Disappearance of Cisungu

Gatherings in Zambia: girls’ initiation. In the eyes of the officials and missionaries who were involved with the people who lived in Chibale, Cisungu was fraught with sexuality. They believed it promoted a way of life that was no longer relevant.

Cisungu was never banned, but it disappeared under the influence of the white man in the 1940s. Schools also made and make it difficult because they only give two days off for it.
Chief Chibale Teneshi Njipika Mukosha ∵ personal communication, 1985.

As a result, in the 1980s, girls’ initiation was practically non-existent. It was said that some parents kept the girl in the house for instruction for two days or a week, but nobody was able to say which part of the old Cisungu was performed during this short period. In Survey 1985/86, there was a clear relation between the generation to which the women interviewed belonged and the fact that they claimed to have undergone Cisungu: of the oldest generation practically all and of the youngest generation none. At that time, Cisungu songs still played a role in the Pa kwisha and in the healing rituals of the Mwami.

Song 43

A Cisungu song as remembered by Mika Mwape Chungwa, 1986.

Text of Song 43 ∵ The little tree stump in the field

Akashinga kamumunda mukabono kufitila
Kalya ekene munda ee

The little tree stump in the field – Don’t look at its blackness only
That really is the owner of the field

In citemi, trees are cut down one meter off the ground. The wood of the trees is spread over an area and burnt. This leaves burnt tree stumps in the field, most of which will grow again while a few will die. The little blackened tree stump may not be very exciting but it did provide the wood that fertilised the land. In other words: don’t go by appearances. Someone who looks lonely, ugly or unimportant actually has value.⁴Another, mournful, image can be found in Doke (1927:528) for the Lamba region. Akashinga ka li mu munda na palanya ni mama, nà ye Lesa a la shimbanya. – The little stump in the garden I mistook for mother, Lesa too leads one astray.

Reappearance of Cisungu

Gatherings in Zambia: girls’ initiation. From the 1940s onwards the performance of the girls’ initiation (Cisungu) had diminished gradually to have almost completely disappeared by the 1980s. The result was that no form of sexual education was left since neither the christian groups, nor the schools, nor the parents provided any. Especially girls in the age range 15 to 20 suffered a lot because of this lack of education, resulting in a heightened danger of contamination with diseases including AIDS and, secondly, in early divorces, leaving the young mother with the small children.
On the initiative of a small group of women, led by Aliyet Kabiki and banaJubili Cisungu was rekindled. This project (done without any external help) was originally aimed at problem girls. It has grown to include girls who are not (yet) in trouble. The education consists of instruction through discussion, music, dance and ritual. The beneficial results of this initiative are generally acknowledged in Chibale.

Song 44

A Cisungu song sung by Aliyet Kabiki and the girls that did Cisungu in 2004.

Text of Song 44 ∵ He went out hunting

Abalume fi bandaile nshifimwene
Baya manama
Eco tulwila nabalume/ mwandini mung’anda
Ayo baya manama yoyoyo
Pakushana ndaicebela cacine/ nemwine
Baya manama
Pakushana ndaikumbwa nemwine/ cacine
Ayo baya manama yoyoyo

What my husband promises me all the time, I have not seen yet
He went out hunting
That is why we fight with husbands/ really fight in the house
He went out hunting yoyoyo
When dancing I always look at myself, it’s true/ at my self
He went out hunting
When dancing I love myself/ it’s true
He went out hunting yoyoyo

Two banacimbusa (initiatrices) on the rekindling of Cisungu

We went through Cisungu in our youth. It lasted a month. Then the churches started advising against having your daughter go through Cisungu. Now, with the disappearance of Cisungu and the rise of Christian churches, the girls grew up astray.

The need for Cisungu increased

Gatherings in Zambia: girls’ initiation. Though the churches were against Cisungu, they did not come with an alternative, for girls or for boys. They do not go into any detail as to sexual matters. These matters are also not taught by the parents. Why throw away a good thing you have, especially if nothing comes in its place? Cisungu is teaching about the real power in the house (maka maka pa nanda).
We saw Cisungu disappear, just as the power of men grew through their labour in town. This gave them power over the money in the household.
And then there was the low opinion at that time of people of their own culture, rules and doctrines (mafunde).

This started changing from the mid 1990s.
The young marriageable girl always wants to start a family. Men can easily take advantage of this.
In 2003, there was a family having a lot of problems with their daughters. The daughters were brought to us to be mended. We were chosen by that family because we were already known to be able to help for that kind of trouble. We both have lived in town for a large part of our lives. Over there, a Cisungu is usually two weeks long. When we got back in Chibale, we found that such practices were not there. So, our first group consisted of girls who needed mending. Our second group consisted of a mixture of that type of girl and of girls who were to be taught before they would go astray. Because the parents have to pay for the teaching, some wait to put their daughter on a Cisungu group and later when she has gone astray are forced to put her on.

An old base with some new things

There are new things like condoms and contraceptives. They should know what to do. They should be aware of the things that they should not use in their appearance, such as miniskirts. There is AIDS. They should know what to do. So, the old knowledge has been extended with some new knowledge. We only rekindle (kubukulusha) what was already there.
The teaching is done in the house of the parents of one of the girls concerned. The girls stay in the house for two weeks in a row during the school holidays. They only leave the house, under a blanket, to wash and to go to the toilet.
The teaching is bundled into three-day periods. We teach by demonstration with singing and dancing in the evening. Then the girls practise and rehearse during the day, also through singing and dancing, and we evaluate that in the two hours before sunset. We are not present for most of the practicing. Girls in the group who are about to get married get more detailed information than the others.
The girl does not go into the mpanga in the beginning but there still is the coming-out on the final day (bushiku bwa kubafumya). The night before that day, they dance the whole night and, in the morning, go to wash in the river and to be dipped in the water (bebisha).

Kulala panshi

During the night before that eve the girls who went astray go to their parents dressed in only a loincloth (mubinde) to beg for forgiveness for their misbehaviour (kulala panshi). The girl lies on the ground just before the threshold and pleads with her parents to reconcile. When they do not react, we start mistreating the girl, for instance by pouring cold water on her, until the parents come out to ‘rescue’ her. They now believe that she has learned something.

Further developments

The first group was visited by the chief and he invited us to give a demonstration at the Kabwelamushi festival [of 2004, see the film below]. The group at the festival consisted of two girls who went through Cisungu and four girls who only rehearsed for this occasion and are to go through Cisungu later.

In our [societal] system, young men can misbehave but we can’t have young women misbehave. Then the whole system will be rotten. To hold Cisungu, therefore, is to take care of the area for the benefit of all (kusunge calo).
Although the churches pay special attention to those who are about to marry, those marriages do not last long. Marriages following a Cisungu last a long time.

What is to be developed further is the teaching by women of each other like it was done in former days during the pa Kwisha.

Aliyet Kabiki and banaJubili ∵ personal communication, 2004.

Womens’ meeting (ukwisha)

Gatherings in Zambia: girls’ initiation. The rekindled Cisungu reproduced and produced a growth of women power. In the years after the reintroduction, women have organised themselves and they hold meetings, with women coming from a larger area than with the original paKwisha, sharing songs and dances and, through those, knowledge.

Maybe it is good to add that women power should be understood here in the Chibale sense of the word: maka maka pa nanda (the real power in the household). The women power is directed to influence the men, not to copy or supersede them. Secondly, when the women of many nanda (households) connect, it becomes possible to really take care of the area as a whole (kusunge calo). Men have shown that they are not always experts at that…

Cisungu in spirit possession cults

Gatherings in Zambia: girls’ initiation. In the Cibombe ca Cisungu of the Mwami cult, the coming-out of the possession patient as a possessed medium, we encounter some parallells, but also differences with the Cisungu.

Names

• The possession patient is only called and treated as a cisungu during the Cibombe ca Cisungu, not in the period before that when he or she is called mwana, child.⁵A surprising connection between the two rituals is that in colonial times in the towns Cibombe were not understood and when requesting a pass for the ritual it was therefore better to suggest to the whites that it was a Cisungu. ∵ Based on personal communication with Chiselwa, Luanshya, 1986. Also when the possession patient is a man, he is cisungu during the Cibombe ca Cisungu.
• After a successful ritual, the possession patient is a medium and changes name. Successful possession by the spirits is understood as a conjugal union. The medium is called the consort of the spirit(s), for example bamukaNdubeni: the consort of [the possessing spirit] Ndubeni.

Repertoires

• The Mwami and the female repertoires have a lot in common.

Treatment and ritual

• There has been a period of treatment and instruction –in average two to three months– before the coming out of the possession patient as a medium. The patient stays at the shing’anga‘s farm in this period. Music, dance and ritual definitely play a role but conversations are more important than in the Cisungu. Teaching is done by the shing’anga and, mediated by the shing’anga, by the spirits possessing the possession patient. Subjects are how to live with the possession (which in that phase is a disease), how to use medicines and how to follow life rules (mushila). The medicines given to the cisungu and the possession patient are different.
• At a given moment in the ritual, the possession cisungu is brought out (into the dance circle) under a blanket and is placed on a reed mat. See the photos in the article comparing various Cibombe ca cisungu. There is singing of Cisungu songs for the cisungu and at some point the blanket is pulled away revealing the cisungu. When the Cibombe is successful, the cisungu will start dancing, meaning that the spirits possessing the patient do the dancing through him or her. The skin of the patient can also be painted (kupenta) with red and white dots.

The reason for these similarities is that in both cases someone becomes new and is being shown to others for the first time. Both occasions prepare for a marital bond.
BanaSibilu ∵ personal communication, 1985.