Witches Versus American Hip Hop Culture

Witches versus American Hip Hop Culture


The Bradt Malawi travel guide book reports that approximately half of Malawians are Christians, 12% are Muslim, and various other faiths comprise the remaining 38% of the population. The one thing it doesn’t discuss, but seems to have a significant cultural foothold, is witchcraft. One of the men we work with at the IKI research office, Weston, tells me that all Malawians believe that witches (mfidi) are real, that vigilance is needed over small children who are at risk of being taken and inducted into the practice of witchcraft, and that mfidi can and do cause harm to people. Weston says that Malawi also has sing’anga, the traditional herb doctors who villagers see for healing purposes. Some of the sing’anga practice witchcraft as well, a dual role that sounds much like the voodoo priests of Haiti, however most of the mfidi practice in harmful ways only. When I asked Weston if there is a conflict for Malawians who are Christian or Muslim and their belief in mfidi, he looked at me with a bit of surprise and said no, that the belief is a very old one with roots far back in African history. The two beliefs systems exist quite comfortably with dual importance in the life of many Malawians.

The mfidi are a hot topic in Mchinji right now because a school teacher at the secondary school across the road from Kayesa Inn has been accused of witchcraft, of abducting two children (of one of the staff members) one night, and is now in custody in the local jail. The children reported that the mfidi came at took them one night on the “witch plane” but they fell off and were able to get home. The whole school has been in an uproar and we are awaiting news of what will happen to this teacher. It is an unfortunate situation because this teacher has no real opportunity for defense, it seems that once the villagers have decided that the children are in danger, the fate of the person accused of witchcraft is sealed. So very Salem Witch trials!

One other encounter with witchcraft: when Emily and I were in Lilongwe last week, we ran into a group of young hardcore missionaries from Texas (teens and young adults) who were on a two week trip to Malawian to “preach and bring Christianity to the villagers who are lost souls.” I knew I might have trouble navigating the conversation when it opened with: “have ya’ll accepted Jesus Christ into your hearts? Are you believers? Do you go to church regularly?” but Emily smartly nudged me and said yes for us both (she later said she thought that no matter what our personal beliefs, it wasn’t worth the time and energy at that moment to have a discussion about faith/spirituality with this group – we most likely wouldn’t have gotten anywhere and might have received a lot of preaching). We were however, treated to a few stories from their time in Malawi one of which was about preaching against witchcraft to the villagers. It seems they were literally run out of one locality for preaching against witchcraft. They were incredulous that the villagers could hold true to their belief systems in the face of the Christian message they were delivering. I was tempted to start the - traditional cultural belief systems and how it was naïve to believe that they could eradicate this belief system with a quick message about Jesus – but contrary to my true nature :) I kept my mouth shut.

Ok this got long – so hip hop next time!