In 2004, the Ministry of Transport in Kenya through John Michuki introduced stringent measures in road transport. These included the compulsory use of seat belts, speed governors, and standardized vehicle painting, complete with a yellow line showing the specific route of each vehicle. Among these reforms, the most significant shift was the introduction of seat belts.
I still recall the one time I got the rare chance to buckle a seat belt for the first time in my life inside ROSPA, one of the two matatus that operated from Katangini to Nairobi besides Kathi no Kakoka. With this change came a major adjustment: the number of passengers allowed in a matatu. What we now call a 14-seater which is allowed to carry a maximum of14 passengers, including the driver. Before then, a matatu never really “filled up.” For those who used matatus in those days, you’ll remember how sometimes you could just squeeze in, insert your head, and hang onto the side for the entire journey. Sometimes you even travelled the whole way without ever stepping on the floor of the vehicle.
The new discipline meant that everyone had to sit properly and buckle up. It may have been one of the most successful cultural shifts in Kenyan public transport even though, over time, some people have slowly eroded it. But this cultural change also redefined respect for elders. You see, previously we were taught that whenever an elderly person entered a matatu and there was no seat, you gave up yours as a sign of respect. Now, if an elderly person saw the vehicle was full, they simply didn’t board. No one was willing to surrender their seat, because if the police stopped the matatu, the person standing would be responsible for not wearing a seat belt. The law, in essence, excused you from the social obligation of giving up your seat.
It was a complete cultural shift in how respect was expressed in public transport. The current generation, who never experienced the “infinite” carrying capacity of public service vehicles, may not even understand what I’m talking about.
I don’t travel often and much less by air but I’ve read how air travel works, with all the dos and don’ts. Passengers select their seats in advance, voluntarily. A colleague once shared with me a little trick they use to increase their chances of keeping the middle seat empty on long flights perfect for sleeping. I can’t share the secret here for business purposes, but if you ask me privately, I’ll tell you… at a fair fee, of course. Juu ni wewe. Na usiambie watu nimekupea na hio bei.
Anyway, on the rare occasions I applied this hack, it worked. I had the middle seat free, but then my neighbour asked me to exchange with her so that she and her mother could sit with their children, who were seated in front of us. My mind immediately processed everything I’ve just written above, and I wondered if this was going to turn into one of those social media “airplane drama” cases.
I struggled, but finally told her, “Once the seatbelt signal goes off, we can exchange.” At first, I wasn’t excited because why didn’t they check in and select favorable seats for the family, but when I later saw each of them seated with one of their babies, I felt some satisfaction. I thought, surely, whoever said “every rule has an exception” must have travelled with that family before.
Then I recalled something I learnt in the communications and culture class, the Symbolic Interactionism. First developed byGeorge Herbert Mead (1934), later advanced by Herbert Blumer (1969), this theory explains how people create meaning through social interaction. Symbols (like seatbelts, empty seats, or gestures of respect) don’t carry inherent meaning but instead, meaning emerges through shared interpretation and is constantly negotiated.
The Key Elements of Symbolic Interactionism include:
- Meaning – People act toward things based on the meanings those things have for them (e.g., offering a seat used to mean “respect,” but after the seatbelt rule, the meaning changed).
- Language – Meaning is created through social interaction (e.g., rules and public discourse about safety belts created new cultural norms).
- Thought – Individuals interpret and modify meanings through inner dialogue (e.g., I wrestled with whether to give up my seat on the plane, weighing social expectations against security rules).
- Role-taking – People anticipate others’ perspectives and adjust behaviour (e.g., you eventually empathized with the mother and child, redefining “the rule” in that context).
- Social construction of reality – Culture and institutions redefine behaviour (e.g., law reshaped respect in matatus).
References
- Blumer, H. (1969). Symbolic interactionism: Perspective and method. University of California Press.
- Mead, G. H. (1934). Mind, self, and society. University of Chicago Press.
- Griffin, E., Ledbetter, A., & Sparks, G. (2019). A first look at communication theory (10th ed.). McGraw-Hill Education.