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The learners were given seven scenarios related to lightning and thunder. For each scenario four possible explanations were given and the learners were asked to indicate which of the given explanations they agreed with and why they agreed with that explanation or those explanations. Where they did not agree with any of the given explanations, the learners were asked to provide their own explanations and to defend them. The activity was done before and after the intervention programme. Even the first session was carried out after a number of activities on argumentation were done with the learners. Below, in this table, are the results of that survey.

The following are a few of the major observations that can be deduced from the table and from the narratives from the learners.

Initially, slightly more than half of the learners (57%) suggested that the man whose homestead was struck by lightning should consult a traditional doctor. The reasons given for this advice included: ‘so that he can know exactly what is troubling him’ which I took to mean ‘in order to get a reason why his homestead was struck by lightning’; ‘traditional

doctor can give him medicine to protect himself from lightning’; ‘so that he can be told (by the traditional doctor- my own addition) how to get rid of that lightning from his home’; ‘so that he may be told what he must do to stop the lightning.’ The two major reasons for

consulting the traditional doctor given by the learners were: (1) to know the reason for the lightning attack and (2) to prevent future lightning attacks.

Initially, nearly half of the learners (47%) felt that some people can send lightning to their enemies. ‘Sangomas are very powerful they can do that especially witchdoctors.’

Table 4.10: Learners’ pre-post views of lightning and thunder

Items Pre-intervention explanations and the popularity of each of those explanations amongst the learners.

Post-intervention explanations and the popularity of each of those explanations amongst the learners. 1: How to get

protection from lightning

 Consult a traditional doctor (57%)

 Put a tyre on roof of house (36%)

 Appease ancestors (7%)

 Fix a metal conductor (33%)  Consult a traditional doctor

(27%)

 Appease ancestors (20%)  Put a tyre on roof of house

(20%)

2: Why a house is

struck several times by lightning

 The owner of the house has powerful enemies (47%)

 Lightning is a hen that lays its eggs in one place (27%)  Owner of the house’s

ancestors want to be appeased (20%)

 The house is on a high place (60%)

 The owner of the house has powerful enemies (17%)  Owner of the house’s

ancestors want to be appeased (17%) 3 : Explaining

wounds on lightning victim

 Wounds are burns from lightning (65%)

 Wounded by enemy who sent lightning (35%)

 Wounds are burns from lightning (75%)

 Wounded by enemy who sent lightning (13%)

 Wounded by lightning bird (13%)

4: Why not play with

water in thunderstorm

 Water attracts lightning (72%)

 Water is a good conductor (22%)

 Water is a good conductor (40%)

 Water attracts lightning (40%)  Lightning likes water (20%) 5: Why not shelter

under tree in thunderstorm

 Tall trees attract lightning (62%)

 Lightning lays eggs in tall trees (23%)

 Lightning hates tall trees and will destroy them (15%)

 Tall trees attract lightning (63%)

 Lightning hates tall trees and will destroy them (25%)  Lightning lays eggs in tall

trees (13%)

6: Why lightning is  Lightning is faster than  Lightning is faster than

seen before thunder thunder (63%)

 Lightning is a fast boy while thunder is his slow mother (25%)

thunder (75%)

 Lightning is a fast boy while thunder is his slow mother (13%)

 Lightning is more angry and powerful than thunder (13%) 7: Why Moni and not

Mana was struck by lightning

 Lightning is more angry and powerful (50%)  Moni was in the path of

lightning (31%)

 Moni is taller than Mana (13%)

 Moni is taller than Mana (50%)

 Moni was in the path of lightning (36%)

Additional observations

Each learner chose one explanation for a scenario. No learner gave more than one explanation for a scenario. The importance of this observation for this research is that, at that time of the intervention programme, learners were satisfied with simplistic and monolistic

explanations of natural phenomena and that these explanations were informed by either Western science or indigenous knowledge and never by both worldviews.

 There were several explanations given by the learners that came from both Western science and

indigenous knowledge for each scenario.

 Many learners were now offering several and different explanations, borrowed from both Western science and indigenous knowledge, for one scenario.

The majority (65%) of the learners thought that the wounds on the body of somebody struck by lightning comes from the lightning because ‘lightning is like fire’; ‘lightning is very

powerful, it can even cause fire’; ‘lightning is very powerful and dangerous it would not be a surprise to see wounds on his body’; ‘lightning got into him very strong’. The rest of the

learners (35%) thought that the wounds came from ‘the enemy who had sent the lightning’;

‘the enemy sends lightning with knife to make wounds.’

Almost three quarters of the learners (72%) said that water attracts lightning. The majority of these learners thought that this was because ‘water is shiny.’ In an earlier activity, the learners were asked to indicate how they would prevent lightning attacks. Covering or hiding shiny objects came up very frequently because these objects ‘attract lightning’. Other objects that were said to attract lightning are trees and sour milk (amasi). Slightly less than a quarter of the learners (22%) gave the scientific explanation: ‘water is a good conductor of

lightning.’

Sixty two per cent of the learners were of the opinion that tall trees attract lightning. The reasons given were that ‘tall trees are near the sky where the lightning comes from’; (this same explanation was given by 7% of the learners who thought that the homestead that was struck was on high ground which is ‘closer to the lightning in the sky’); ‘these trees protect

us from lightning so the it stays there’; ‘the tall tree is where the lightning strikes so that it cannot make danger.’ I took the last two statements to mean that trees are struck by lightning

instead of people and animals.

Half of the learners thought that an enemy sent lightning to the boy who was struck. Their reasons were: ‘lightning wont choose Moni from Mana’ which I took to mean ‘lightning alone cannot choose between Moni and Mana, it must have been directed towards Moni’; ‘if

it was normal lightning it would have attack them both.’ The apparently fairly logical

explanation that the boy who was struck was in the path of the lightning was supported by 31% of the learners.

At the end of the intervention programme, the major observation is that the majority of the learners now seemed to accept that most of the given scenarios could have more than one possible explanation and that these explanations could come from both the science worldview and the indigenous knowledge worldview. A very good example of this observation is scenario 1 where consulting a traditional doctor is traditional; fixing a metal conductor is Western; appeasing ancestors is traditional while putting a car tyre on the roof of a house is most probably both Western and traditional. In scenario 2, although the majority of the learners (60%) have given a scientific explanation why a place is struck several times by lightning (the place is on a high place), a significant number of the learners (34%) think that the explanation is traditional (the owner of the place has powerful enemies or has not

appeased his/her ancestors). Similar conclusions can be made about scenarios 3.

Interpretive commentary

An analysis of the whole picture shows that the learners were being informed by both indigenous knowledge and science in their explanations of the nature of lightning, although the science explanation was dominant (CAT) over the indigenous knowledge explanations. Initially, at the individual learner level, the explanation was either indigenous knowledge or science and not both. In other words, the individuals were informed by the indigenous knowledge or by science. According to CAT, one of the two systems of thought was

dominant. Later, even at individual level, the learners sought explanations of scenarios in both worldviews and that the indigenous knowledge explanations were being accepted by a very significant percentage of the learners. The learners were coming to terms with the possibility of living with several but not necessarily congruent explanations of natural phenomenon. Their views were becoming truly equipollent according to CAT.

Among the Xhosa people, one explanation of lightning is that it is a message from the ancestors. It is called kuhambele umhlekazi. Kuhambele means a visit while umhlekazi means honouring or respecting. Lightning would then be seen as a respected visit from the ancestors, who would have a message to and for the living. Only a traditional doctor called igqrrha can talk with the ancestors and get their message to the living. The message could be that the ancestors need some beer. Beer (umqombothi) is brewed to appease the ancestors. Sometimes a cow is also slaughtered to appease the aggrieved ancestors. Another traditional doctor called ixhwele would be called in to the affected homestead to do the prevention ceremony, a ceremony known as ukuqinisa umzi (ukuqinisa means to strengthen or protect while umzi means a homestead) or a cleansing ceremony to erase (ukucima) the effect of the lightning and prevent further lightning attacks.

This serves to illustrate that ancestors and traditional doctors play a very important role in the explanation of lightning among the Xhosa people. This explains the high percentage of learners (47% in total) who chose these options as explanations of how to prevent lightning attacks.

Black tyres on roofs of houses, as a way of protecting homesteads from lightning, chosen by 36% pre and 20% post, is a very common sight among the Xhosa people. There are other ways of protecting their homesteads that I learnt from the knowledge holders. One such method is to use a stick from a plant they call umnquma which is commonly found in their forests. Another way is to put the umthathi plant in pots on top of the roofs of their houses or hang the plant outside or inside the house. These plants are believed to be able to prevent lightning or to minimise its effects. While there may not be scientific explanations on how these methods work, the fact that they have been used for generations must mean that the methods work or that the people think that they work. As put very succinctly by one of the learners ‘because many houses have survived using tyres’ which I translated to mean ‘because it worked in many or in all cases.’

According to the learners, there are two reasons why lightning would strike a tall tree. The tree is closest to the source of the lightning. This is in line with scientific literature which says that tall objects such as skyscrapers, mountains and radio towers are more likely to be struck

because of the narrow gap between the tall object and the oppositely charged cloud above. According to the learners, trees are also struck in order to protect people and animals from being struck since the lightning ‘chooses’ the tree instead of the person or animal. That a tree is sacrificed to save the lives of people and livestock is an explanation that would lie in the indigenous knowledge worldview in that a natural phenomenon ‘chooses’ to strike one object rather than the other perhaps directed by ancestors. If we accept this latter explanation, we can explain why indigenous people have lived “harmoniously with (their) bio-physical environments” (Ogunniyi, 2008b, p. 35). Not only did the indigenous people see their natural environment as a source for food, medicines etc. but they also saw the environment as a protector from natural elements such as floods (high ground acting as barriers), strong winds (trees acting as windbreak) and now, trees protecting them from lightning as well. This is why the people had to protect and respect their environment and use it sustainably.

The learners gave two reasons why one of the two boys was struck by lightning while the other boy with whom he was playing was not affected. The first reason was that the lightning was sent by an enemy to the boy. This explanation is coming from the indigenous knowledge worldview where there is a belief, amongst some indigenous people, that there are some people who have the power to create and control lightning and use it for their purposes, usually evil purposes. The second reason was that the boy who was struck happened to be in the path of the lightning. This is quite logical and could be informed by both worldviews. The difference, however, would be that indigenous people might want to know why the boy who was struck happened to be in the path of the lightning at that time and why not the other boy? Put differently, indigenous knowledge goes beyond scientific knowledge in that it seeks answers beyond human comprehension i.e. in the metaphysics realm.

While the scientific explanations dominate the traditional explanations (for example, 60% as compared to 34% in scenario 2; 75% as compared to 26% in scenario 3), the traditional explanations have made some very serious inroads in the minds of the learners as shown by a very significant number of the learners that have chosen those explanations. This could be taken as the major observation for this subsection of the research.