Traditional Healers of South Africa - White Sangomas

White Sangomas

While there are recorded instances of white sangomas before 1994, since 1994 an increasing number of white people have openly trained as sangomas in South Africa. The question of authenticity is still an ongoing discussion. According to Nokuzola Mndende of the Icamagu Institute, a Xhosa sangoma and former lecturer in religious studies at the University of Cape Town:

An igqirha is someone who has been called by their ancestors to heal, whether from the maternal or paternal side, they can't be called by ancestors.

Philip Kubekeli, director of the Traditional Medical Practitioners, Herbalist and Spiritual Healers Association, and Phephsile Maseko, spokesperson of the Traditional Healers Organisation, see nothing wrong with white sangomas. Kubekeli and Maseko maintain the position that traditional healing knows no colour.

Several white sangomas, interviewed by The Big Issue in 2010, claimed that they have been welcomed by the black community in South Africa, aside from isolated experiences of hostility. On the other hand, there have also been reports that white sangomas have been less readily accepted by black sangomas.

A number of the South African traditions (e.g. Swazi and Tsonga/Shangaan) believe that a foreign or alien spirit can call one to become a traditional healer, especially if there is a significant extreme relationship between one of the healer's biological ancestors and the foreign spirit that occurred in the past. Dr Nhlavana Maseko, founder of the Traditional Healers Organisation, explains:

Foreign spirits are not of your family. That is all it means. Foreign spirits are not your ancestors. My forefathers, for instance, were warriors and they killed some people. When these people were killed, they become my family's foreign spirits. There must be a working relationship with your foreign spirit and your ancestors. They have something, an injustice, a murder that must be worked out, must be healed. During training, as the ancestors come out, you have to finish up with your own ancestors first. That relationship sorts itself out, then you are ready to work with the foreign spirits. It happens in a natural way. The ancestors do the work through you. Maybe the foreign spirit want to be the important or senior ancestor; when the ancestor of your clan comes, well, they may have to fight it out. You might feel some aches during this time. It is friction among them that is working itself out.