Dialogues: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - RE: NYTimes: Death Has Many Names

Well the challenge is to emphasize the realities, on an individual basis, without inadvertently perpetuating the lies and distortions.

I guess it is not what you do but how you do it.

The decolonization of knowledge necessitates new pedagogical instructional and writing skills.

Professor Gloria Emeagwali
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU
africahistory.net; vimeo.com/ gloriaemeagwali
Recipient of the 2014 Distinguished Research
Excellence Award, Univ. of Texas at Austin;
2019 Distinguished Africanist Award
New York African Studies Association

From: Harrow, Kenneth <harrow@msu.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, February 17, 2021 10:06 AM
To: Emeagwali, Gloria (History) <emeagwali@ccsu.edu>; usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - RE: NYTimes: Death Has Many Names

Please be cautious: **External Email**

well i suppose it depends on circumstances. in our professional life we attempt to correct the lies or distortions, but i prefer emphasizing the realities rather than taking defensive postures, when possible. say in a newspaper interview or in class. i am retired now, so this is simply my opinions here. when i started teaching african humanities, some decades back, i'd evoke the commonplace misconceptions and media distortions to which students had commonly been exposed, say in movies like tarzan. as time went by i decided i wanted the time wasted on the misinformation to focus on worthy material. a very good example was, in fact, religion. perhaps in passing i'd mention the missionaries and the horrors of their practices in burning statues and defining eshu as the devil, but i'd really prefer detailing the realities of african religions in readings and lectures.

we want to think we can change people's minds by giving them the truth. i don't quite agree. we can change people's attitudes by giving solid teaching. the real bigots won't believe anything, but students in class were receptive, and in avoiding defensiveness i was able better to be heard out by them.

i've had to respond to public venues over things like the rwandan genocide, in the past, and even now; there it is a question of countering real lies and propaganda, over and over, and i agree w you there, gloria, we have to call out the lies, and try to point to credible sources.

and it isn't simply a question of eurocentrism. as well all see daily on this list, put the word "fulani" in a sentence and you will get immediate arguments over the truth.

ken

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

harrow@msu.edu

From: Emeagwali, Gloria (History) <emeagwali@ccsu.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, February 17, 2021 9:40 AM
To: Harrow, Kenneth <harrow@msu.edu>; usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - RE: NYTimes: Death Has Many Names

I disagree with you on this, Ken.

To respond to European condescending

attitudes on Africa, we have to do both.

We would have to challenge the Eurocentric gaze, daze, and programs of deceit by dismantling the building blocks of lies, distortion, false information and eurotriumphalism block by block, case by case, incident by incident.

We also have to dismantle the philosophy and ideology of geographical, regional and ethnic chosenness, manifest destiny and white supremacy in all its forms, religious or otherwise.

Along the way we would also stem the tide of epistemological genocide and the larger mindset of which you rightly speak.

From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Harrow, Kenneth <harrow@msu.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, February 16, 2021 12:16 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - RE: NYTimes: Death Has Many Names

Please be cautious: **External Email**

biko, if we are talking strategies to respond to european (or asian) condescending attitudes toward africa, i would probably respond without being defensive, i.e., by saying you have your own backwardnesses, or we did this first or whatever. no matter how truthful the response, the issue for me is one of attitude. mostly i quietly respond you don't really know anything about this.

at one point a friend, australian of english extraction, blew up when i criticized british colonialism, esp in kenya. i quietly said this was really my own field of specialization and i knew what i was talking about; but it turned ugly, and i just gave up on her.

it isn't about communicating facts to the person, but rather addressing the larger mindset, the way they frame the world, see the world, construct the world.

as mudimbe said, how they invent africa.

like talking about truth to a trump supporter. is there really any point in it?

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

harrow@msu.edu

From: 'Biko Agozino' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, February 16, 2021 12:06 PM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - RE: NYTimes: Death Has Many Names

Anytime anyone asks you condescendingly if Africans still believe in superstitions, remind them that the word is a European one that has no equivalent in African languages and no European would walk under a ladder today if it can be helped.

If Yoruba religion has elements of monotheism and polytheism, remind the inquisitor that it was Africans who introduced the idea of monotheism to Europeans and that Europeans still maintain beliefs in saints, witches, and gods of war.

In a country where the life expectancy is less than 50 years from birth, the rumor that an enemy died after being chased by the ghost of the dead victim is no proof of spirituality but a consolation to the bereaved.

Abiku or Ogbanje is not the only one who goes and comes given that Africans and Asians believe that everyone has the ability to reincarnate multiple times to fulfill unfulfilled destinies.

Biko

On Tuesday, 16 February 2021, 10:40:03 GMT-5, Abidogun, Jamaine M <jamaineabidogun@missouristate.edu> wrote:

I agree with you observations, Ken. Much of my research is grounded in tracing these encounters/interactions and the resulting levels or incidents of resistance, adaptation, and transformation. Even more of a concern to me is the need to recognize Traditional belief systems' and traditional African epistemologies' continued roles in knowledge production and its disbursement across African societies. The issue of recognizing and supporting African indigenous knowledge systems is of critical importance to find ways to create syncretic education systems that place African epistemologies' on equal footing within national and local areas. While the article is about Yoruba religion, the ties between Traditional religious knowledge and knowledge production in most fields is often a direct one, similar to Islamic knowledge systems.

Cheers,

Jamaine

From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Harrow, Kenneth
Sent: Monday, February 15, 2021 11:42 AM
To: usaafricadialogue <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: NYTimes: Death Has Many Names

CAUTION: External Sender

thanks for this posting of the conversation between yancy and olupona.

on the one hand, it gives informed answers to questionns about yoruba beliefs, without the trivializing tendencies a newspaper publications usually includes. it avoid apologetics or whatever.

however, it is marred in one respect, a respect that often appears when the word or concept of tradition or traditional is applied to african thought or practice. it is described as frozen, as if it never changed, as if its adherents learn and repeat and obey, and don't change rethink revise etc.

one might imagine nothing happened ever since it was created. that the influence of outside encounters never occuered.

ken

kenneth harrow

professor emeritus

dept of english

michigan state university

517 803-8839

harrow@msu.edu

From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Abidogun, Jamaine M <JamaineAbidogun@MissouriState.edu>
Sent: Monday, February 15, 2021 8:17 AM
To: usaafricadialogue <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - NYTimes: Death Has Many Names

Death Has Many Names https://nyti.ms/3rSxx0j

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Wednesday, February 17, 2021

Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - RE: NYTimes: Death Has Many Names

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