Edward Wilmot Blyden. The African Personality and Early Intellectual Work in the Gold Coast (Ghana)

There is a commonly held view that African nationalism took shape out of contacts of African intellectuals with twentieth century Pan-African leaders. Yet, this interpretation lacked concrete evidence, as many of these intellectuals owed their ideological formulation to Nineteenth century teachings of Edward Wilmot Blyden. In his writings, Blyden articulated a thorough understanding of African’s strengths and weaknesses. For Blyden, Western civilization intended to make the African a caricature of European society. As a result, the situation of the African became one of chaos as he lived in strict psychological conflicts. A revival of the African personality rested as a solution to the distorted manhood of the African and a path to his future progress. This article examines Blyden’s theory of the African personality as revealed in early intellectual work in the Gold Coast (Ghana). Drawing on Blyden’s African personality theory, the article revealed that these intellectuals begun a vigorous campaign to oppose Europeanization of the African system of life and took an uncompromising stand against ideas of black “inferiority” and “backwardness”.

Elucidating Afrocentricity as a contemporary theoretical stance through 'epistemic disobedience'

The use of Afrocentricity as a contemporary theoretical lens has triggered remarkable debate among African scholars. There is growing contestation among African intellectuals on the future of knowledge construction in the wake of the collapse of colonization in Africa. The contestation on the applicability of the Afrocentricity as a theory is largely triggered by the assumed superiority of Western thought. One of the major proponents of Afrocentricity Melefe Kete Asante has prompted an interesting question ‘Why have Africans been shut out of global development?’ The question attracts the need for African scholarship to take into consideration a context based theoretical standpoint and methodology. Nevertheless, the quest for a purely African based thought is clashed by postmodernists who contend that there is no such thing as “Africans” because there are many different types of Africans and all Africans are not equal. It is from this standpoint that this paper seeks to position Afrocentricity as a fundamental theoretical perspective in African scholarship. Afrocentricity is considered to be a catalyst of change whose goal is to restore the African understanding of the world. As such, through what some scholars have termed “epistemic disobedience” which is a form of epistemic revolt in favour of decolonisation of thought, this paper provides a critical analysis of the relevance of Afrocentricity as a theoretical standpoint.

Addressing the Challenge of Epistemicide and African Self-Understanding through a Study of Chinweizu’s Ubuntology: Groundwork for the Intellectual Autonomy of the Black Race

In this article, I explore the forms of knowledge available among contemporary African intellectuals to identify their possible outcomes. I examine Chinweizu’s concerted effort in Ubuntology: Groundwork for the Intellectual Autonomy of the Black Race (2004). Through a critical review of this monograph, I suggest other ways to address the challenge of knowledge creation and consumption in Africa. I examine the work through the notion of epistemicide. First, I discuss epistemicide – a major claim that the knowledge design in Africa presently is against the intellectual well-being of the African people. I provide justifications of the claim to epistemicide. Thereafter, I provide a critical intervention to the challenge of epistemicide Chinweizu discussed in Ubuntology: Groundwork for the Intellectual Autonomy of the Black Race (2004). Subsequently, I argue for the need to go beyond epistemicide, and to pursue a system of knowledge creation (or knowledge acquisition, or knowledge application) that will liberate Africa.

The Ambit of Ethics in the South African Academic Institutions

The chapter examines possible use of instruments and processes such as ethical clearance in the institutions of higher learning as subtle means of perpetuating inequality and racial prejudice towards the indigenous people of South Africa who had recently emerged from the scourge of apartheid with a hope of democracy ultimately providing not only freedom of association and speech, but also intellectual freedom. Freedom to produce African-based knowledge by Black African intellectuals pursuing their postgraduate studies and academics whose careers are at formative stages. However, their vision of becoming producers of African Indigenous knowledge is thwarted by subtle and invisible activities that are aimed at perpetuate coloniality in the higher institutions of learning. Sadly, ethical clearance process has possibly been utilized to derail research outputs that some of the old guard from historically white universities are uncomfortable to witness, thus continuing to maintain the colonial status quo.

Blyden’s Philosophy and Its Impact on West African Intellectuals: Case of J.E. Casely Hayford of the Gold Coast (Ghana)

This study examines the impact of Blyden’s philosophy on J.E. Casely Hayford of the Gold Coast (Ghana). It exposes Blyden’s ideas, a philosophy on Africans physical and intellectual emancipation, and points out the similarities in the thought of both men. Blyden toured different parts of West Africa and spoke with great intensity about the African problem and ways of its remedy. His ideas had a lot of influence at the time and precipitated the emergence of nationalist messiah who undertook a mission to redefine the African universe. This study examines the ideas and intellect of J.E.Casely Hayford and revealed that his thoughts were a potency of Edward Wilmot Blyden’s philosophy. An examination of his ideas reveals how Joseph Ephraim Casely Hayford took an uncompromising stand against the derogatory and the glaring abuses of European colonialism. He shaped cultural nationalism that disdained the apparent repulsive and despotic colonial hegemony and fashioned a new outlook for fellow Africans to stand up as humans. This article concludes that Hayford, drawing on Blyden’s philosophy, succeeded in fashioning a culture of protest against all forms of black degradation and thus presented a continuity in black political thought that remained up to present.

Lost and Found

This chapter examines systems of classification supporting the front stage of museum exhibits. It traces the roots of European museum taxonomies found in colonial expositions and early museums of African art. It discusses the floorplans and displays strategies of French museums and contrasts them with theories proposed by anthropologists and African intellectuals. Museum classifications reflect inherited epistemologies and those of their era. These classifications are translated into labels and strategies for staging displays exhibitions, and expositions, that is, into exhibitionary complexes. The chapter concludes with a discussion of reconfigurations of the museum landscape with contrasting evidential support. It explores French museum closings and their deconstruction in relationship to historical antecedents and problems of labeling and reinstallation.