Cultural lessons from death of Queen and accession of King Charles

Kenya is quite connected at the hip to England. We may have achieved (or been given) independence some 60 years ago but we are just an extension of the United Kingdom.

How some may ask. Well, we could begin with that famed story of the Queen (then a princess) having been on holiday on these shores, enjoying her time on some tree tops in Nyeri when her father died.

Consequently, she became the Queen of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth whilst in Kenya. Which is how we are still connected to the Commonwealth, whose head is the ruler of the United Kingdom.

King Charles III is now the head of the Commonwealth. His is a ceremonial office. He has no executive power over the sovereign member states.

But who doesn’t know the power that Britain holds over its former colonies?

From the English language to its famed universities, to the Premier Football League, among others, millions of the citizens of the member states continue to live under the soft power of their colonial masters.

The second lesson concerns the rituals that have defined the accession of King Charles III.

Immediately after the death of his mother, Prince Charles assumed the throne and became King Charles III.

The transition was seamless. Despite some polls putting his popularity at below 50 per cent prior to his assuming office, Charles smoothly became the new beloved royalty of the British people.

He will soon become a man with whom many presidents, prime ministers, celebrities, the rich and poor, will be very happy to shake his hands.

He will have effortlessly transited into the hearts, minds and lives of millions of people in the world who will never meet him, who have only seen him on TV screens or newspaper pages, but nevertheless will claim to know him and speak glowingly of him.

Just because he is the king of the United Kingdom and the leader of the Commonwealth. It is a cultural masterstroke.

The third lesson is on the political front. The UK had just elected a new Prime Minister – shall we say the ruling party had just voted for Liz Truss.

The new PM is also connected to the Commonwealth. She was the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs of the United Kingdom.

Yet her election was immediately overshadowed by the death of Queen Elizabeth and the accession to the throne of King Charles III.

For a country that is democratic, in which the common people elect their leaders, but who sits in what is called the House of the Commons, the existence of the House of the Lords appears like an anachronism.

But is it not really the House of Lords and the Royal Family that rules the UK? It wasn’t even the politicians in London who were in charge when Charles acceded to the throne.

It is not the politicians at Number 10 Downing Street who hosted the hundreds of guests at the Queen’s funeral. It won’t be the politicians who will be in charge during the coronation of King Charles III next year.

British aristrocacy

Here, again, what is seemingly a very political moment and ritual is actually a cultural act, where the British aristocracy took charge of celebrating and burying their most celebrated member.

The fourth lesson is in the very public performance of the rituals surrounding the public viewing of the Queen’s body, the church memorial service and the internment of the Queen’s remains.

Queen Elizabeth was the supreme Governor of the Church of England, which position King Charles III assumed on accession to the throne.

Being the supreme governor of the Church of England means that the monarch is involved in the affairs of the church as described in these words, “On the advice of the Prime Minister the Queen appoints Archbishops, Bishops and Deans of the Church of England, who then swear an oath of allegiance and pay homage to Her Majesty. Church of England deacons and parish priests also swear an oath of allegiance to the Sovereign.”

The rituals were a combination of political, spiritual and cultural practices that signified the Queen’s symbolic powers.

The Queen was the symbolic head of the church; she represented politics from behind the scenes; and she epitomized that which is known as the ‘British culture’ by virtue of being the leader or the royal family, the essence of Britishness.

Lastly, the participation of millions of people, from all over the world, in the very public mourning of the Queen and the celebrations of the accession of King Charles III to the throne, is a very powerful reminder of the power of not just the British royalty but of political and cultural values inherent in such an institution.

There are millions of people all over the world who are subjects of monarchs.

These monarchies represent different values to different peoples. But ultimately they stand for some kind of political, cultural, spiritual or even social solidarity. How surprising was it that millions of people whose countries had declared their sovereignty and desire to rule themselves, were very much in grief because the very representative of their colonial past had died?

In Kenya, the UK is not just a former colony. The UK supports several development programs. It is a major trade partner. Hundreds of young Kenyans go to study in the UK every year.

Rich Kenyans seek medical treatment in the UK. Some invest there. But most significantly, our political, economic, cultural, spiritual, and even social lives have been formatted in a very British mould.

We even have the English language as one of our official national languages. We conduct public affairs in it. We teach in it.

We relate to visitors to this country in it. English defines our socio-cultural habits – we love in English, we sing in English, our children carry English names, we swear in English, we pray in English, and we eat following English table manners; Kenyans are probably the most ‘British’ of the many former colonised countries of the British Empire.

Consequently, if there has been a single significant lesson from the death and burial of Queen Elizabeth and the accession to the throne of King Charles III is the significance of British culture in the world today, when its political power is deemed to have waned. Surely, the Empire is still alive and ruling, just without the swashbuckling battleships, eccentric governors and famed grammar teachers.

Tom Odhiambo teaches literature, performance arts and media at the University of Nairobi. [email protected]