In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

4 Scouting and the School in East Africa, 1910–45 ALTHOUGH THERE WERE several significant experiments in adapted Scouting in East Africa in the interwar era, the th Nairobi troop at Kenya’s Alliance High School (AHS) was one of the most accomplished formal Scout groups, African or otherwise, in the region. In  school authorities established a class to introduce students to the movement. Official Scout status for Africans in the colony was less of an issue than in South Africa, and European Scout leaders at the school convinced the Kenya Boy Scout Association (KBSA) to recognize the troop two years later, after the boys had demonstrated sufficient understanding of the Scout canon.1 Although the Kenyan settlers guarded the color bar jealously , they paid little attention to African Scouting because there were very few African schools that had the capacity to support fully active troops.Therefore the expansion of the movement to non-Europeans was not a significant political issue in East Africa in the s and s. In  the Alliance Scouts won an interracial competition among Nairobi troops.The th Nairobi’s score of  for “general efficiency” was substantially higher than the  posted by its closest European rival. With Scouting a sanctioned extracurricular activity at AHS, the troop met on Mondays after school at : P.M. and on Thursday mornings before school at : A.M. Scoutmaster Stephen Smith, a missionary and Alliance teacher, de-emphasized Scout ranks and badges because he worried Scouting at the school would “degenerate into academic competition for badges.” Instead the schoolboys focused on “open-air work” during 113 You are reading copyrighted material published by Ohio University Press/Swallow Press. Unauthorized posting, copying, or distributing of this work except as permitted under U.S. copyright law is illegal and injures the author and publisher. weekend camping trips. The troop’s bugle band was popular, and uniformed Alliance Scouts put on Scouting displays at Government House and provided a guard of honor for Armistice Day ceremonies.2 Not surprisingly, Scouting became one of the most prestigious extracurricular activities at the school. The original troop included future leaders like Eliud Mathu, an AHS Scoutmaster and the first African representative on the Kenyan legislative council; MaguguWaweru, an influential chief; the Reverends Obadiah Kariuki and Festus Olang, the first African Anglican bishops; and James and Walter Mbotela, noted authors. Julius Gikonyo Kiano, the first Kenyan African to earn a Ph.D. and a future minister in the postindependence Kenyan government, joined the Alliance troop in . Drawn by the troop’s dedication to excellence, he considered Scouting a worthwhile activity for boys who aspired to push the boundaries of colonial society. As a Scout, Kiano ran the school library and conducted religious classes at local Christian churches.The Alliance High School troop’s success lay in its ability to draw the most ambitious and academically gifted students in interwar Kenya.3 Clearly, East African Scouting differed substantially from the southern Pathfinder model. The development of African Scouting in Uganda, Kenya, andTanganyika followed the political and social realities of British colonial rule in the region.There were virtually no permanent European residents in Uganda other than missionaries. British plans to develop Kenya as a “white man’s country” came to naught, and its small but vocal settler community failed to dissuade the Colonial Office from declaring African interests paramount in the colony. Similarly, when Britain seized Tanganyika following the First World War, it expelled most of the German residents of the territory. British colonial administrators adapted variations of the Lugardian system of indirect rule to govern the African majority in all three territories through “native authorities.” Yet as in South Africa, Western education undercut the legitimacy of these chiefs and headmen.The East African governments relied on educated Africans to offset the high cost of colonial rule, and schools provided tangible proof that Britain was fulfilling its obligation to promote African development. These schools produced highly individualistic graduates who rejected the premise that the interests of African individuals should be subordinate to their “tribe” and challenged the collectivist “traditional” authority of the chiefs and headmen. In seeking to reconcile these contradictions through adapted education, colonial officials and teachers looked to Scouting to discipline and socialize this potentially dangerous class of educated “detribalized” Africans. Almost 114 chapter 4 You are reading copyrighted material published by Ohio University Press/Swallow Press. Unauthorized posting, copying, or distributing of this work except as permitted under U.S. copyright law is illegal and injures...

Share