Prof. Januarius Asongu

The recent passing of the Fon of Kom has brought renewed attention to one of the Kingdom's most distinctive royal mourning rites. Images of women mourning with uncovered chests have circulated widely, provoking admiration, discomfort, criticism, and vigorous debate. In response, Professor Paul Nkwi and other defenders of the tradition have explained that the rite is neither an act of indecency nor degradation. Rather, within the symbolic universe of Kom culture, it signifies profound grief, complete humility, reverence for the throne, and the community's surrender before the ancestors during the transition of royal authority.

Their explanation deserves to be heard. Anthropology performs an indispensable service by helping us understand cultures on their own terms rather than through the lens of our own assumptions. Before criticizing a practice, we should first understand what it means to those who practise it.

I have no disagreement with that principle.

The present debate reminds me of a conversation I had with Professor Paul Nkwi in Buea, Cameroon, around 2015. Our discussion was not about the Kom mourning rites. Rather, it concerned a broader methodological question that the present controversy illustrates remarkably well. Although I have profound respect for Professor Nkwi as one of Africa's foremost anthropologists, I told him that I become uneasy whenever anthropology moves beyond explanation and begins to function as moral justification.

My concern is not with anthropology as a descriptive discipline. My concern is with any intellectual approach that confuses cultural explanation with moral justification and, in doing so, replaces objective moral reasoning with cultural consensus.

Some anthropological approaches begin with the entirely legitimate observation that a community regards a particular practice as honourable or morally right. The problem arises when that observation quietly becomes the conclusion that outsiders ought to regard the practice as morally acceptable simply because the community itself does.

That is no longer merely anthropology.

It is moral philosophy.

Ironically, many advocates of cultural relativism reject objective moral standards while simultaneously making normative claims. They have not eliminated normativity; they have merely relocated its source. Instead of grounding morality in objective principles, they ground it in cultural consensus.

That, too, is a normative position.

The implications are profound.

If a community's sincere belief were sufficient to establish moral correctness, then every society throughout history would have been justified in whatever it practised. Slavery, human sacrifice, ritual discrimination, the oppression of women, and countless other customs would become morally immune simply because they were culturally accepted. Few of us would be willing to embrace such a conclusion.

Understanding a practice is therefore not the same as endorsing it.

Anthropology asks an indispensable question: What does this practice mean within this culture? Philosophy and ethics ask another: Should this practice continue? These are different questions, and confusing them does a disservice to both disciplines.

The responses to the current debate illustrate precisely why this distinction matters.

Professor Nkwi has sought to explain the symbolic significance of the rites. Dr. Nicholas Tar, writing from the perspective of the neighbouring Nso' tradition, observed that his own people express similar reverence for a departed ruler without requiring women to expose their breasts. His observation is significant because it demonstrates that the values underlying the rite—grief, reverence, communal solidarity, and respect for royal authority—can be expressed through different cultural forms.

Others have gone further, arguing that Kom people neither need nor should justify what happens in their palace because it is their tradition and an expression of their identity. I understand and respect the pride that many Kom people rightly take in their cultural heritage. Every people should cherish the traditions that have shaped their identity across generations.

Yet cultural pride, by itself, cannot settle a moral question.

The claim that "this is our tradition" explains why a practice exists; it does not establish that the practice is morally beyond evaluation. History is filled with customs that once distinguished particular societies but were later abandoned because those societies themselves came to recognize that some traditions, however ancient, required reform. Cultural distinctiveness deserves respect, but it cannot be the final criterion of moral truth.

From the perspective of my own philosophical framework, Critical Synthetic Realism, the deeper issue is what I have elsewhere called Epistemic Fracture—the tendency to confuse perspective with truth, consensus with morality, and explanation with justification. Epistemic Fracture does not deny the importance of culture; it denies that culture is the final court of appeal in determining what is true or good.

This article is not an attack on the Kom people, nor is it a dismissal of their rich cultural heritage. Every culture—including my own—contains enduring wisdom as well as inherited limitations. The proper response is neither uncritical celebration nor reflexive condemnation, but thoughtful moral reflection.

The proper question is not whether a practice is traditional, but whether the tradition serves authentic human flourishing. Traditions exist for persons; persons do not exist for traditions.

Culture deserves to be understood before it is judged.

But culture is not above moral judgment.

To understand a practice is an achievement of anthropology.

To evaluate it is the enduring responsibility of philosophy and ethics.