African Cultural Knowledge
Themes and Embedded Beliefs
Compiled and Edited by Michael C. Kirwen
As a result of this publication there is now a holistic understanding and explanation of how African cultural
knowledge promotes behavior and interprets the experiences of the ordinary African person from birth to
death and beyond.
It is this shared cultural knowledge that is the fundamental source of the cosmic and spiritual unity of more
than half a billion African people.
Also by way of comparison, these beliefs coincide with the underpinning lived values, ideals and beliefs of
many spiritualities worldwide, including those of Christianity and Islam.
The fifteen-theme structure of African Cultural Knowledge can be understood as a paradigm of the very
nature of human cultures, and as an explanation of socio-cultural integration and development.