Town and diaspora: carrying culture beyond the highlands

Kisii town in the 1960s was a modest administrative centre of a few streets; today it is a dense commercial hub, and the district's population has grown into one of Kenya's most urbanising rural regions. Soapstone carvings made in Tabaka workshops sell in Nairobi craft shops and on overseas stalls; Kisii tea and coffee reach world markets.

The people travelled too. Large Gusii communities live in Nairobi and other Kenyan towns, and a significant diaspora works in the United States, the Gulf and Europe — sending remittances, funding schools and churches at home, and returning for weddings, funerals and December homecomings that fill the highlands with visitors.

For a community spread so widely, the question of cultural continuity is real: children of the diaspora often speak Ekegusii less fluently and know home only through visits. That is precisely why a digital museum matters — culture that can be visited online can be carried anywhere. Our diaspora readers are among this platform's most engaged audiences.