Spaces, Societies, and Health: The Rites of Passage

The African society, mainly the Mande is complex, a true mosaic of rituals, the most powerful of our common points being a rite of passage to which all generations are confronted. It is a ritual, event or experience that marks or constitutes a major step or change in a person’s life. Rites of passage celebrate the social movement of individuals entering and leaving groups, or entering or leaving the status of critical importance to the individual and the community. The reproduction, the completion of virility and femininity, marriage and death are the main ones. Farmers in Kalassa, faced with the vagaries of climate change, have adopted various strategies to minimize the risks associated with agriculture through the use of traditional techniques of the cultural and cultic origin. Empirical indicators focus on the development of agricultural production; this local know-how integrates the diversification of revenue sources as a risk

reduction strategy. The interest of this research was to bring out the belief system, the resurgence of ancient rituals, and traditional techniques of the cultural origins of Kalassa farmers to anticipate, adapt or mitigate the climatic hazards, as occasions of rites of passage in Mande.

The article presents the reflections of the author during his research in the Mande. The interviews with the holders of local knowledge on adaptation to climate change in Kalassa has brought to light another dimension of our research: the use of local knowledge to increase agricultural production.

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