THE LAST WORD By AUSTIN KALUBA –

WHILE ethnocentrism is usually defined as the act of having pride in the ethnic group or race that you belong to, it is rarely positive as presented.
Ethnocentrism which is derived from Greek words meaning “nation” and “centre “ refers to any instance when people’s limited experiences and perspectives cause them to regard their own cultures as the central basis for what is expected and acceptable from all others.
Because everyone’s expectations derives from their necessarily limited experiences, no one is immune to ethnocentric thinking — and usually, people even fail to realise when they make such assumptions.
While refraining from ethnocentrism altogether may be impossible, people can aim to counter the tendency’s negative effects by recognising and controlling their own biases, as well as seeking additional knowledge and perspectives when biases do surface.
Many scholars argue that positive ethnocentrism means you are not ashamed of who you are by openly embracing your heritage and you are somewhat keen on spreading this cultural knowledge to others around you.
This is simplistic since the cruel truth is that in most cases ethnocentrism is negative because it usually crosses the ‘safe’ realm becoming too extreme in the expression of one’s ethnic sentiment leading to disrespect for other ethnicities, races or nations.
It is for this reason that ethnocentrism has become a hot subject in sociology since it is usually the source of much of the conflict that we see in the world.
The very fact that ethnocentrism entails a group or a circle of individuals living  together and believing that such a group is everything to them because they share the same beliefs, norms and activities is problematic.
Ethnocentrism is one of the main reasons why division exists among member of different ethnicities, religious groups and races.
Even if humanity belonged to one ethnic group, problems will arise in relation to region, factions and other determinants that are negatively divisive.
This usually emanates from the belief that members of an ethnocentric group believe they are superior or better in a number on ways compared to others around it.
Although many people cannot identify ethnocentric groups in the current world, such groups still exist both at political and social levels.
Take the region we call Zambia for example, conflicts arose among tribes for the simple reasons that they practised different customs which created a fertile reason for military confrontation.
We can also attribute colonialism that saw white settlers displace aborigines as hinged on ethnocentrism because the former group felt it was superior and therefore had an obligation to conquer ‘inferior’ natives.
This was best defined by Rudyard Kipling in his poem White Man’s Burden a term which has been interpreted as racist, or possibly taken as a metaphor for a condescending view of “undeveloped” national culture and economic traditions, identified as a sense of European ascendancy which has been called “cultural imperialism.”
However, it is interesting to note that long before the white settlers set foot in this region, the Bantus who were perceived to have a ‘superior’ culture also displaced the Twas or Bushmen militarily or by persuasion.
Some critics argue that ethnocentrism has a positive side like allowing a group to be far more productive than any one individual.
They say this happens when a group explores the strengths and weaknesses of its members and allows people to capitalise on their strengths.
Proponents of ethnocentrism also advance the fact that it leads to pride in beliefs and traditions that fosters cohesion and solidarity among groups’ members, and also strengthens the sense of identity and self-esteem for individuals within those groups.
They argue that shared geography, national origin, language, religion, folklore, symbols and traditions help instill such a sense of group pride and become ingrained in individuals’ sense of self.
They also argue that sharing common beliefs helps societies establish and reinforce standards and expectations among coexisting people in areas of family, relationships, politics, economics, law and more.
Some scholars who defend positive ethnocentrism argue that individuals’ abilities to live up to established expectations and reflecting the common cultural identity inform the extent to which they may advance through life successfully with the benefits and privileges of their societies’ resources.
However, the disadvantages of ethnocentrism greatly outweigh the advantages as evidenced in most societies.
For example, experience of one group are usually extended to judge another group and in most cases lead to harm, offence, ill-feelings or otherwise put a damper on further relations between the groups.
For instance, Howard Culbertson, professor of missions and world evangelism at Southern Nazarene University, identified such tendencies as when people say that Europeans drive on the “wrong” side of the road or Hebrew writing is “backward,” where “opposite” or “left-hand side” would be more suitable a description in the first case and “from right to left” would be more acceptable in the second case.
Such tendencies to consider alternative practices as “wrong” rather than merely “different” lie at the root of all of ethnocentrism’s negative consequences.
Historically, some ethnic groups have suffered oppression at the hands of a larger or more powerful groups due to the latter’s internalized beliefs that their ways and identities were necessarily superior.
In Zambia, examples of this ‘superiority’ abound and is even evidenced in the perceived numerical advantage of some tribes that led to the adoption of seven languages to be broadcast on the Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation (ZNBC).
When others seem “wrong” or “backwards,” the individual groups  themselves may be viewed as unintelligent, insignificant, disposable or less than human — and treated as such.
This explains why all tribes have a word for a foreigner or outsider.
Bembas use the word mwisa, umutulatulafye for a foreigner, the Lozis use munyukunyuku (alien) while Tumbukas refer to foreigners as bantu bawaka (people of nothingness).
Ethnocentrism can be dangerous as evidenced in the US where black slaves were considered as 3/5 of a person in the US Constitution.
We can also cite efforts toward mass extermination of Jewish people during the Holocaust and discriminatory and genocidal practices that still take place internationally, such as the recent holocaust in the Darfur region of Sudan and the Rwandan genocide.
Prolonged stigmatisation of the so called inferior people and their failure to assimilate into the dominant culture can lead oppressed individuals to internalise their culture’s degradation, believing their own identities, practices and beliefs are inferior or perverse.
One needs to look at how blacks have reacted to the bigger canvas of racism at the hands of whites who consider themselves some sort of an Aryan race.
In Africa, ‘small’ tribes like ‘small’ and ‘insignificant’ races have usually resorted to resentment toward themselves, others of their own culture, their oppressors or members of outside groups which may range from conformity to violent protest.