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Articles

Is Miraa a Drug?: Categorizing Kenyan Khat

Pages 803-818 | Published online: 03 Jul 2009
 

Abstract

This article examines the varied perceptions of the substance miraa/khat in Kenya, from strong approval in the Nyambene Hills region where it is cultivated to the strong disapproval evident in its frequent denunciation in various segments of Kenyan society. Perceptions are colored by various local and global discourses, and it is argued that of great importance is “war on drugs” rhetoric, which allows the conflation of miraa with other substances also termed “drugs”; much of the Kenyan miraa debate revolves around just how miraa should be categorized and to whether it can be labeled a “drug.” War-on-drugs rhetoric is countered by those more enamored of the substance by discourse in which its use is labeled “traditional,” “cool,” and an “economic miracle.”

Notes

Notes

* The journal's style utilizes the category substance abuse as a diagnostic category. Substances are used or misused; living organisms are and can be abused. Editor's note.

1 For a broad look at the farming, trade, and consumption of psychoactive substances in Africa—with some focus on Kenya—see The Drugs Nexus in Africa, a United Nations Office of Drug Control and Crime Prevention.

2 http://www.nacada.go.ke/backgroundphp (Retrieved March 22, 2008)

3 As well as a comprehensive survey of the literature on miraa, this article is based on long-term anthropological fieldwork on the substance in Kenya and the UK (1999 to present).

4 By discussing the power of such categories and terms, I do not wish to argue for a strong form of linguistic determinism in the formation of attitudes toward miraa. Clearly, the formation of such attitudes is a highly complex process (filled with such factors as mental associations, reactions to miraa's material qualities, religious beliefs, etc.). However, I do feel that such categories and terms influence this process, and that the term drug exerts an especially strong influence, offering those opposed to miraa a potent rhetorical tool.

5 In regard to the health risks of miraa consumption, Kennedy (Citation1987) is eminently sensible and remains the most comprehensive discussion. For a good recent account see Beckerleg's (2006) discussion of Kenyan and Ugandan perspectives on the substance.

6 For more on miraa's reception in the West, see Anderson and Carrier (Citation2006). The Advisory Council for the Misuse of Drug's recommendations are published on the Home Office Web site: http://www.drugs.gov.uk/publication-search/acmd/khat-report-2005/

7 Other miraa cultivation zones in Kenya include farms around Embu, Marsabit, and the Chyulu Hills.

8 For a comprehensive account of Igembe agriculture (with much mention of miraa), see Goldsmith (Citation1994). Also see Bernard (Citation1972) and Carrier (Citation2007). The Tigania and Igembe generational system has been well covered by Peatrik (Citation1999).

9 See Goldsmith (Citation1994, Citation1999) and Carrier (Citation2007) for historical surveys of the growth of the Nyambene miraa trade and the role of various people (Meru, Somali, and Arab, among others), places (such as Isiolo, a town close to the Nyambenes where demand for the substance helped encourage its commoditization early in the 20th century), and events (such as the spread of the Somali Diaspora in the wake of war in Somalia, which has spurred on the development of the international trade).

10 On khat use among the Somali diaspora, see Nencini, Grassi, Botan, Asseyr, and Paroli (Citation1989), El-Solh (1991), Stevenson, Fitzgerald, and Banwell (Citation1996), Griffiths et al. (Citation1997), Ahmed and Salib (Citation1998), Nabuzoka and Badhadhe (Citation2000), and Carrier (Citation2003).

11 Miraa is now illegal in the United States, Canada, and elsewhere, leading to many smuggling operations from London, where miraa remains legal. It is a substance that often travels in and out of a legal status, leading Cassanelli (Citation1986) to term it a “quasi-legal” commodity.

12 For a detailed look at the contexts of miraa consumption in Kenya, see Carrier (Citation2007).

13 One social ill linked to miraa in the Nyambenes is that of illiteracy and poor schooling attributed to the use of child labor. During my main spells of fieldwork, miraa was usually picked by groups of young boys who, being small and light, were considered less likely to damage trees when harvesting. Those who did so on a regular basis did not go to school. Meru I spoke with viewed this as a problem but emphasized that it was not one limited to miraa alone; the harvesting of other cash crops in Kenya, such as tea and coffee, also often involved the use of child labor.

14 Ncoolo bundles consist of high-quality miraa and are packaged differently from marketed miraa, so distinguishing them from the mundane sphere (see Carrier, Citation2005b).

15 Certainly by the time Europeans such as Arthur Neumann reached the Nyambenes in the late 19th century, miraa cultivation and consumption were already popular among the Tigania and Igembe (Neumann, 1898/1982).

16 For more on the place of miraa production in the Nyambene economy, see Goldsmith (Citation1988, Citation1994, Citation1999) and Carrier (Citation2007).

17 Some, like the Mutuati teacher mentioned above, abstain while still viewing the substance in a mostly positive way.

18 See Carrier (2006) on miraa's many varieties and their impact on miraa marketing.

19 For more on criticism of miraa by Somali women, see Carrier (Citation2007).

20 There is an economic reason for such bans, though, as chewers are perceived to linger for long periods in such places while buying only a soda or two.

21 See Weir (1985) on the constant presentation of miraa as a problem in the literature on it.

22 “What the Readers Say” or “Reader's Opinions”

23 See Beckerleg (2006) on debate about miraa among Kenyan Muslims of Lamu.

24 BBC Correspondent, 2006.

25

26 The link of miraa with impotence—and the somewhat opposed claim that miraa is an aphrodisiac—is a source of much humor, as well as a of rhetorical ammunition for anti-miraa campaigners (see Carrier, Citation2007). On the NACADA Web site, it is stated that: “Miraa reduces sexual urge in men hence the wives of miraa chewers starve for the need of their partners. This effect of miraa may cause divorce or separation in homes” (http://www.nacada.go.ke/miraa.php).

27 Another partner of “drug” is “psychosis”: see Becker and his early piece on social and cultural aspects of LSD-induced experiences (1970) for a sociological perspective on reports of LSD psychosis. There has been much talk of “khat psychosis” in the medical literature on the substance and in press coverage (see, for example, Halbach, Citation1972; Alem and Shibre, Citation1997), although accounts of such a syndrome appear to be based on a thin evidential basis. Also, Becker's (1970) comments on LSD psychosis may still be relevant in regard to “khat psychosis”: “If the drug does prove to be the cause of a bona fide psychosis, it will be the only case in which anyone can state with authority that they have found the unique cause of any such phenomenon; a similar statement applies to causes of crime and suicide” (p. 308).

28 Article posted online: www.hamarey.com/index.php/article/articleview/716/1/4 (accessed May 2004). Article originally published in the Columbus Dispatch.

29 As, of course, is the word discourse, which I have used much in this piece.

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