The Genealogy of Some Agīkūyū Clans
Njuguna Mwangi traces his ancestry to the two Agīkūyū clans, namely; Gathubati and Muga. Therefore he is a Mūithīrandū wa MbarīYa Gathubati. His academic and professional interests were focused on various branches of economics, which he studied at The Universities of Dar-es-Salaam Tanzania, McMaster University, Ontario Canada and Boston University in the USA.
His interest outside economics was first planted in his young mind by some scholars in sociology and social anthropology. Among those teachers, there was a distinguished scholar named Dr. Walter Rodney who wrote a seminal book “How Europe Underdeveloped Africa” as this opened his eyes to social effects by European Colonization and Imperialism.
In addition Njuguna Mwangi has read many research books on the impact of colonialization in economics, social, political and culture structures of today. One such example being, even religion being used to change/colonize cultures and impose foreign names during baptism when the bible does not require it (names are cultural specific to people born in that culture). This realisation gave the author the desire to research more on the role of culture in understanding one self and his/her origin.
As a mature adult, husband, father and grandfather, that interest in cultural issues has grown covering both his own Agīkūyū heritage and global events in particular; researching on the historiography and the evolution of The Abrahamic Religion Tree (which founded the doctrine of one God and the prophets) with its three branches; Judaism, Islam and Christianity and how they continue to impact on the social economic and political lives of Africans to this day.
He is concerned that many Kenyan youth today show increasing ignorance of their cultural heritage and even of their own family history. This project is a small attempt to remedy this ignorance at least from his own ancestry through the creation of detailed family trees that go back as far as oral memory permits.
Njuguna did not achieve this work alone, he relied on the contributions of family members, friends and professionals. His hope is that it will provide awareness of family roots and thus strengthen people’s sense of both cultural and individual identity.
ISBN: 9789966123015
