Christianity and the Construction of Popular Agency in Whispers

Abstract

This chapter examines how Whispers interrogates the popular concerns of the Kenyan subject through manifestations of Christian religious practices. The chapter seeks to demonstrate how these practices reflected many Kenyans’ popular concerns, particularly at a time of significant social and political upheaval. The chapter argues that as a religion so deeply integrated in Kenya, Christianity is part of Kenya’s public culture and the Christian discourse not only helps construct a ‘public’, it also offers a discursive space and material suitable for addressing a whole range of issues. The chapter further argues that manifestations of Christianity in the 1980s through the 1990s were more than just about the Church providing space for alternative social and political imaginations as has been suggested by a number of scholars. Instead, the very content of Christian discourse was revised and recast as part of, and (re-)configured as relevant to, the political process.