Oga,
As always your vigour is persuasive but the way you formulate this topic is binary. Ethnic is bad and Africanist is good. I see many bad ethnic personalities evolving into evil demons of Africa whereas if we groom good ethnic personalities they will evolve into great pan Africanists.
Dividing the ethnic from the panAfrican will not genuinely advance the cause of Africa and this may be the bane of those great men Marcus Garvey and du Bois. I am also intrigued by the ethnicities you used as example. Yoruba and Igbo, Hutu and Tutsi. Are these conflicts not the same all over Africa. Luo Nuer (Riek Machar) and Dinka (Salva Kiir) or Kikuyu (Jomo Kenyata & son Uhuru) and Luo (Garamogi Odinga Odinga & son Raila) and so on and so forth replicated all over Africa.
It is the failure of the African scholar in focusing on these micro conflicts that form the bedrock and building blocks of Africa but instead building a romantic macro panAfrican illogic and counter reality that causes discourse to fissure along natural fault lines.
Until we tackle the basic fundamental relations or we engineer disruptive technologies like music or Nollywood that can force convergence without aggression and war or we engage in mass social engineering forcing mass migrations and intermarriages rosy panAfricanism will remain a subject of perpetual ivory tower debates that will not resonate with the poor peasants of Africa.
In a broad church of scholarship there is room for the ethnic and room for the panAfricanism discourse.
Cheers.
IBK
--A nationalist and Pan-Africanist voice
When this site was created, it was to be a Pan-Africanist voice, projecting visions of a transformative diaspora network that will be part of the changes in Africa and its diaspora. It was not to be a racial or ethnic site. Indeed, it was created to bring together voices that are not framed as “ethnic” but as nationalist, panAfricanist and continentalist. We were to be a collection of individuals who seek the best in our people, and who take the tools to unite.
Over time, LGBTS voices were drowned, and voices from other African countries began to disappear. More recently, it became an avenue for some to express ethnic sentiments, to defend causes and words that are not defensible, to rate the performance of one “tribal” leader over another “tribal” rival. The poor and the powerless become betrayed and subverted. Scholarship becomes an agency of narrow ideological pursuits in the cause of divisive ethnic politics.
Identities are important, but as different scholars defend those causes, they should ponder in their minds whether this is the role for contemporary intellectuals to do. To those who are not cynical and self-appointed ethnic warriors, I would like to pose some questions.
Where should the diaspora scholars stand on divisive issues, and whom should they represent?
Should the views of ethnic warriors and those of scholars be the same?
Is there no way to frame analysis other than through the prism of the ethnic?
Whether it is in the Nigerian civil war or the Rwanda genocide, why do scholars become involved as central figures?
If a Yoruba politician steals money, is this the reason why the Igbo politician should steal money? And if the Igbo politician does the same, is this a justification for the Yoruba scholar to defend the Yoruba thief? Is a thief not a thief irrespective of where he comes from?
If the diasporan scholars of this generation fall short of the remarkable contributions of Marcus Garvey and W. E. B. Du Bois, can we not dismiss them as a collective failure? What is the worth of their degrees if their views are far worse than those of peasants with consciousness to the poor?
Is Ebola, poverty, prostitution, destitution (etc.) ethnic issues? Can the collective intellectual might of scholars not be focused on issues of great concerns? Is being Igbo or Yoruba a qualification to advance democracy and sustainable development?
Africa’s population will eventually reach a staggering figure of 5 billion by 2050, according to current projection, what is the role of African scholars in coming up with discussions that will address the various issues around this?
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Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue+subscribe@googlegroups.com
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
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