Abstract
Decolonisation of knowledge in Africa should be seen within the context of the initiative to wrestle back control over our destiny as a people – it is itself a critical corrective endeavour and an act of self-recovery. The correlative task is to reorient our philosophical thinking so as to reignite that spirit to build from our own resources and to our design. At the intellectual level, this means jettisoning the inordinate influence of imposed conceptual structures and models in the production of knowledge in Africa. In this essay we invoke not only the philosophical ideas of some of Africa’s champions of liberation, but even the name Africa itself to make this point. We argue that commitment to Africa often indicated by the expressed desire to name centres of knowledge production ‘African centre of this or that’ must translate into an equal commitment to accord voice to the African and with it the path to intellectual independence. Our submission is that the significance of the aphorism ‘knowledge is power’ is yet to be celebrated for what it means for those of us in Africa. It is this, which brings us to the need to champion the idea of knowledge as emancipation.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
Notes
- 1.
Kwame Nkrumah, The African genius: Speech Delivered by Osagyefo Dr Kwame Nkrumah at the Opening of the Institute of African Studies, 25 October 1963, cited in the article by Allman, 2013, p. 183.
References
Allman, J. 2013. Kwame Nkrumah, African Studies, and the Politics of Knowledge Production in the Black Star of Africa. The International Journal of African Historical Studies 46 (2): 181–203.
Dladla, N. 2017. Racism and the Marginality of African Philosophy in South Africa. Phronimon 18: 204–231.
Dussel, E. 2013. Ethics of Liberation: In the Age of Globalization and Exclusion (trans. E. Mendieta et.al.). Durham: Duke University Press.
Hountondji, P.J. 2002. The Struggle for Meaning: Reflections on Philosophy, Culture, and Democracy (trans. J. Conteh-Morgan). Ohio University/Centre for International Studies.
Hountondji, J.P. 2002a. Producing Knowledge in Africa Today. In Philosophy from Africa: A Text with Readings, ed. P. Coetzee and A. Roux, 501–507. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Hountondji, P. 2006. Global Knowledges: Imbalances and Current Tasks. In Knowledge Power and Dissent. Critical Perspectives on Higher Education and Research in Knowledge Society, ed. G. Neave, 41–60. UNESCO Publishing. https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000148591 Accessed 16 April 2021.
Ki-Zerbo, J. 1981. General Introduction. In UNESCO General History of Africa Volume 1, ed. J. Ki-Zerbo, 1–23. UNESCO/University of California Press.
Matolino, B. 2020. Philosophers’ Debt to Their Students: The South African Case. Transformation in Higher Education 5 (87): 1–9. https://doi.org/10.4102/the.v5i0.87.
More, P. 2004. Philosophy in South Africa Under and After Apartheid. In A Companion to African Philosophy, ed. K. Wiredu, 149–160. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing.
Mungwini, P. 2016. The Question of Recentring Africa: Thoughts and Issues from the Global South. South African Journal of Philosophy 35 (4): 523–536.
———. 2019. The Quest for epistemic Liberation: What Can be Done to be True to Both Philosophy and to Humanity? Journal of World Philosophies 4: 70–77.
———. 2020. Struggles for Self-Liberation in African Philosophy. Phronimon 21: 1–12.
———. 2021. Decolonisation Debates in African Higher Education. In African Higher Education in the 21st Century: Some Philosophical Dimensions, ed. A. Ndofirepi and E.T. Gwaravanda, 106–121. Leiden: Brill.
Nyerere, J.K. 1968. Freedom and Socialism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Ramose, M.B. 1999. African Philosophy Through Ubuntu. Harare: Mond Books.
Serequeberhan, T. 2009. African Philosophy as the Practice of Resistance. Journal of Philosophy: A Cross-Disciplinary Inquiry 4 (9): 44–52.
Shivji, I.G. 2014. Utu, Usawa, Uhuru: Building Blocks of Nyerere’s Political Philosophy. In Ubuntu: Curating the Archive, ed. L. Praeg and S. Magadla, 137–149. Pietermaritzburg: UKZN Press.
Weiler, H. N. (2006). Challenging the Orthodoxies of Knowledge: Epistemological, Structural and Political Implications for Higher Education. In G. Neave (Ed.), Knowledge Power and Dissent. Critical Perspectives on Higher Education and Research in Knowledge Society, 61–87. UNESCO Publishing., https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000148591. Accessed 16 April 2021.
Wiredu, K. 1996. Cultural Universals and Particulars. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press.
Yunus, M. 1999. Banker to the Poor: Micro-lending and the Battle Against World Poverty. New York: Public Affairs.
Zeleza, T.P. 2002. The Politics of Historical and Social Science Research in Africa. Journal of Southern African Studies 28 (1): 9–23.
———. 2007. The Study of Africa Vol.2: Global and Transnational Engagements. Dakar: CODESRIA.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2022 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Mungwini, P. (2022). Decolonisation as Self-Recovery: The Path to Intellectual Independence. In: Masaka, D. (eds) Knowledge Production and the Search for Epistemic Liberation in Africa. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-07965-8_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-07965-8_4
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-07964-1
Online ISBN: 978-3-031-07965-8
eBook Packages: Religion and PhilosophyPhilosophy and Religion (R0)