African Humanism un Uganda: An Ethnographic Study

在过去的二十年中，一场世俗的人道主义运动在撒哈拉以南的非洲地区兴起。乌干达的情况尤其引人注目，该国目前拥有非洲大陆最多的人道主义机构。在全国各地社区组织的共同努力下，建立了人文中小学、成人职业培训中心、青年赋权项目、广播节目、杂志和公众反迷信运动。这一运动的理念通常被其支持者称为“非洲人文主义”，它促进人权、性别平等、科学和理性在日常生活中的实际应用，以及将人类价值置于任何宗教道德之上（Mukasa 2011; Lukyamuzi 2013; Ongere 2014; Musubaho 2016a）。用一位主要发言人的话来说，“我们在这里见证的是人文主义在其普遍承诺、可能性和适用性方面的展开”（Igwe 2012a: 2）。在最近对世界各地的人道主义组织进行评估的研究中，非洲被完全忽略了（例如Bullivant & Ruse 2013； Copson & Grayling 2015）。与此同时，世俗化理论的批评者经常援引欧洲大陆作为宗教持续公共意义的典范（Engelke 2015a）。此外，基督教在撒哈拉以南非洲的当代作用已成为人类学研究的一个突出主题（例如Engelke 2007； Boylston 2015; Haynes 2017），学者们最近将乌干达的公共领域标记为“五旬节化”，以反映灵恩教会的影响（Bompani & Brown 2015: 100）。问题是，有一种单独的倾向，将非洲描绘成一个独立和特殊的世界，一个“迷人的宗教想象”（Gifford 2015: 14）盛行的世界，灵魂被认为居住在“直接现实中，像石头、河流和山脉”（Taylor 2007; Meyer 2012）。然而，人道主义团体在乌干达继续成倍增加，与此同时，空前数量的进步社会运动正在进行，宗教行动者的公共角色正面临新的抗议。例如，乌干达的女同性恋、男同性恋、双性恋和变性人（LGBT）运动在2016年成功地领导了一场运动，起诉了一名参与制定恐同立法的美国牧师（Valois 2015; CCR 2016）。总的来说，人道主义机构和LGBT权利诉求的出现体现了“在乌干达和其他非洲国家，公民社会运动从未像现在这样主张自己的政治身份和权利”（Bompani & Brown 2015: 111）。这个民族志项目抓住机会研究乌干达人文主义运动的文化和政治影响，尽管近20年的发展，但没有得到学术关注。这项研究与最近出现的无神论、人文主义、理性主义和其他类型的非宗教的人类学研究相一致（例如，Schielke 2012; Quack 2012; Engelke 2014; Blanes & Oustinova-Stjepanovic 2015），同时也批判性地扩大了这一新分支领域的地理范围和理论关注。它通过将非宗教研究的重要见解扩展到乌干达的背景来开发一种新的方法，该方法侧重于有组织的世俗人文主义的内部特征。

In the course of the past two decades, a secular humanist movement has emerged in sub-Saharan Africa. The case of Uganda-now home to the greatest number of humanist institutions on the continent-is particularly striking. The joint efforts of community-based organizations located throughout the nation have led to the establishment of humanist primary and secondary schools, adult vocational training centers, youth empowerment programs, radio productions, magazines, and public anti-superstition campaigns. The philosophy of this movement, often called "African humanism" by its proponents, promotes human rights, gender equality, the practical application of science and reason in everyday life, and a prioritization of human values over any religiously grounded moralities (Mukasa 2011; Lukyamuzi 2013; Ongere 2014; Musubaho 2016a). In the words of one leading spokesperson, "what we are witnessing here is the unfolding of humanism in terms of its universal promise, possibility and applicability" (Igwe 2012a: 2).Africa is completely omitted from recent studies that take stock of humanist organizations across the world (e.g. Bullivant & Ruse 2013; Copson & Grayling 2015). At the same time, the continent is often invoked by critics of secularization theories as the exemplary example of the continued public significance of religion (Engelke 2015a). Furthermore, the contemporary role of Christianity in sub-Saharan Africa has become a prominent topic of anthropological research (e.g. Engelke 2007; Boylston 2015; Haynes 2017), and scholars have recently labeled the public sphere of Uganda "Pentecostalized" to reflect the impact of charismatic churches (Bompani & Brown 2015: 100). Problematically, there is a separate tendency to represent Africa as separate and exceptional, a world where an "enchanted religious imaginary" (Gifford 2015: 14) prevails and spirits are thought to inhabit "immediate reality, like stones, rivers, and mountains" (Taylor 2007; Meyer 2012). However, humanist groups continue to multiply in Uganda at a time when an unparalleled number of progressive social campaigns are taking place and the public role of religious actors is facing novel protests. For instance, the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) movement in Uganda led a successful 2016 campaign to prosecute an American pastor for his involvement in the creation of homophobic legislation (Valois 2015; CCR 2016). Taken together, the emergence of both humanist institutions and LGBT rights claims exemplify "civil society movements asserting their political identity and rights as never before in Uganda and in other African contexts" (Bompani & Brown 2015: 111).This ethnographic project seizes the opportunity to study the cultural and political impact of the humanist movement in Uganda, which as received no scholarly attention in spite of nearly 20 years of growth. This research is in tune with the recent emergence of anthropological studies of atheism, humanism, rationalism, and other types of non-religion (e.g. Schielke 2012; Quack 2012; Engelke 2014; Blanes & Oustinova-Stjepanovic 2015), while also critically widening the geographical reach and theoretical concerns of this new subfield. It does this through extending crucial insights from studies of non-religion to the Ugandan context to develop a new approach that is focused on the internal features of organized secular humanism.