Time is an ontological and an epistemological issue: it is embedded in how we record our existence, how we organise our society and how we tell the story of history. Time is of the essence. Time is money. Kill time. Buy time. Behind the times. Ahead of time. These are all common English sayings, and they all imply the same thing: time is a resource, time is capital, time can be saved, time can be lost. You are either ahead of time or behind it. They almost invoke the adrenaline pinching race of the stock exchange.

We don’t think about time too much, and yet time might be the idea that is most cleverly hidden behind structures of power in the world. How do ‘we’ think of time and who are ‘we’?

A timeline

A Eurocentric construction of time follows a straight-line path that begins at some point in the past, moves through the present and extends beyond into the future. If you think of European scientific disciplines such as theoretical physics, a central goal is to explain when time began and when it might end. Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time attempts to trace time backwards into the past all the way to the big bang.

Our days are structured by linear time, especially if we work a classic 9 to 5 job: we wake up and squeeze our morning routine into the number of minutes we have available before we need to be at work or school at 8a.m. sharp. If we spend too much time in one meeting or on one project, we feel like we have lost time in our schedule, because linear time is continuously moving forward and leaving something behind.

Linear time is colonial

African critical thinkers have deconstructed linear time to show that how the world understands development — economic, political and social — is heavily biased towards a Eurocentric belief about progressiveness and development as moving ‘forward’ in time.

History is divided into periods defined by a European worldview, especially when describing spaces Europeans colonised. Africa’s history falls into pre-colonial, colonial and postcolonial periods. The constant colonial reference to Africa defines Africa as an object of European history, making no account of African history without colonialism — even the word ‘postcolonial’ is meant to refer to Africa in the present day, but somehow keeps Africa stuck in the past. If Africa is deemed to be in a postcolonial era, and Europe and the US are deemed to be in a modern and contemporary era, which are we going to assume is more ‘developed’?

Linear time is money

Capitalism is a system that notoriously exploits people and the environment for profit and breeds inequality; it also happens to be the bedrock of first world ‘development’. Even war and militarism are capitalistic endeavours — war would not be so popular if it was not an immense opportunity to make money.

Capitalism would not function the way it currently does without linear time. The eight-hour working day was introduced during the industrial revolution to increase productivity and thus increase profit. Working against the clock is the undercurrent of the capitalist economy: efficiency, fast-paced work environments, COB, deadline, Forbes 30 Under 30, Next Day Delivery. Notice the sense that you get from these examples that if time moves forward and you are not productive, you have lost something, usually money, success or accolades, but often self-worth as well.

The taken-for-granted conception of time as linear makes sure that you never get off the treadmill for fear of falling behind. Research is showing that this is becoming a crisis of health and well-being in capitalist societies.

African time is valuable

Dr Sylvia Tamale, a renowned Ugandan university professor and African feminist activist, once proclaimed that we must beat our proverbial drums to African time.

Unfortunately, African time has been juxtaposed with European time, represented as a joke of lateness, unprofessionalism and lack of respect next to a ‘standard’ of punctuality, linearity, productivity and efficiency. That is how the hegemony of linear time hides in power structures.

African time is simply more cyclical, like a spiral, and recognises the constant reproduction of social life; there is no beginning or end, nor distinction between past, present and future. African time also follows the patterns of the natural world: time is apparent in seasons and transitions; it moves in the same circular fashion as the earth revolves around the sun, day after day. Thus, time is not losable because the cycle carries on and nature begins again over and over.

African time is also compatible with feminine time: the female body understands time as cyclical and seasonal. The menstrual cycle begins and ends with the same event: the first day of bleeding. In different stages of the menstrual cycle, the female body’s needs and capabilities change — more rest is demanded by some stages and more energy to work is given by others. Linear time is thus not only Eurocentric; it is male-centric.

Time is a way of being

There is no one truth about time or righteous way of thinking about it, because the very notion of time is a social invention of humans. However, it is worth questioning time, bringing it into the light so that unequal power dynamics can no longer hide in the shadows.

Time, and how we think about it, comes to define how we live and experience our lives, and how we understand our very existence.