Why the privileging of colonial chiefs, feudal lords and lumpen governors in empiricist research? The weaver who wove the kente wrapper of the chief and the driver of the governor or the cattle herder of the emir may tell you more about the culture of struggles than an out of touch elite.
Adiele Afigbo critiqued such nationalist historiographies that privileged kingdoms and empires as a way to measure up to the supposedly superior colonizers while neglecting the rich texts in indigenous textiles, for instance.
What would an elite tell you that you do not already know? Nkrumah, Azikiwe, Nyerere, Rodney, Achebe, Ngugi, Soyinka, Mazrui, Armah, Amadiume, Senghore, Nzegwu, Ake, Diop, Chinweizu, Fanon, Oyewunmi, CLR James, Du Bois, Slovo, First, Mbembe, Stuart Hall, Gilroy, Derruda, Marx, Gramsci, Lenin, Mao, Mamdani, Shivji, did not obsess about the wages of whiteness with which to interview elites and yet they made lasting contributions by concentrating on theory and activism.
The hierarchy of credibility always privileges the oga on top but Howard Becker warns in 'Whose Side Are We On' that the underdog perspective may be more credible because elites rely more on power than on truth to validate their claims.
To radicalize African Studies more, add the missing 'a' and transform all those programs to Africana Studies.
Biko
-- On Wed, Jan 9, 2019 at 10:16 AM, Kwabena Akurang-Parry<kaparry@hotmail.com> wrote:Oh these stories. A Ghanaian scholar then teaching in a Canadian University (by now retired) took some students to the Fante area of Ghana. In his case, the students were even undergraduate students on a study abroad trip. The Ghanaian scholar wanted to use the occasion to interview one of the Abora chiefs and so visited the palace several times, but to no avail. One day, he sent the oldest of the students to find out when the interview could come on. The story is becoming more interesting. Lo and behold, the Chief granted the student the interview. I have seen how our own lecturers panic in the presence of white scholars. My brother what is African studies for? My answer is simple indeed! To cherish European activities in Africa, while denigrating our own activities. I recently did a paper for Afrika Zamani on a forest grove based solely on oral history and material culture refracted through what had already been done on Africa. And I realized that my whole education has been a joke.
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Moses Ebe Ochonu <meochonu@gmail.com>
Sent: January 9, 2019 2:02 AM
To: USAAfricaDialogue
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Who is African Studies For?A reinforcing perspective and my own addendum and response below:
This resonates with me. She forgot to also note that the white privilege extends to the research academic/sphere. I have been trying to interview a northern Nigerian emir for almost two years now because I need his voice for a project I'm working on. Every lead I've pursued has failed, and trying to reach him directly is impossible. However, I guarantee you that if I sent my white American student, even an undergraduate, to the city and the student introduced himself as someone working on a research who wanted to interview the same emir, all the doors to the palace would open immediately and the big man would grant my student an audience. In fact I learned that the same emir I have trouble tracking down for an interview not only granted a white foreign researcher who sought to speak with him on a short notice an interview but also in fact personally made tea for her to entertain her during the interview. My brother and colleague, Omolade Adunbi, told me the story of how he traveled to a South-South city to try to interview a governor for his research but failed to secure access to the man only for a recent student of his, now a freelance journalist, to secure an interview with the man on a very short notice. In fact the governor had the man chauffeur her around and put her up in a nice hotel at the state government's expense. Interview over, he gave her his direct phone line in case she had follow-up questions. I will not even tell the story of the elderly distinguished Cameroonian professor who told us how, when he led a student exchange group to South Africa, his white students were let through immigration courteously while he, their leader, was detained, questioned, and humiliated by his fellow black immigration officers.
--On Tue, Jan 8, 2019 at 7:06 PM Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju <toyin.adepoju@gmail.com> wrote:
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