It is in the stealth of Night that crickets bewail the approach of Dawn. And so it is often at the resting places of those who left too soon that we contemplate our own paths of departure, in a life lived in a void. That certitude of eventual leave-taking in the void of life is the eternal plague of the mind and paralysis of spirit. Where the soul flies is a matter of faith for the faithful. That is also a thought distilled in life's void because when birds chirp at dawn, it is not all about the delight of an approaching day; it is also a dirge to the uncertainties of another life in the forest.
This Earth, My Brother! Kofi Awoonor said it best in that evocative title of his novel. In the village bar, where I once witnessed life's intolerable stories, there was not a single person, young and old, who swallowed a bitter drink without wiping her lip or shaking his head. A potent liquid shows its ripples on the face. It is not the force of the gulp that subdues the strong, but its numbing effect.
Life is meaningful only in its meaninglessness, and makes every day in the Void a moment to behold. It is like arriving at multiple intersections that lead to nowhere or to uncertain destinations. We make our own turns at life's multiple junctions only in the hope that we get somewhere, to a Destination. Osibisa captured life's void so well it its song "We are going. We don't know where we are going. We hope we will...get there."
Where, we know not, but go we must, mindful of the void! It is this void that made the tortoise live its life entombed in its own casket, prepared for life's many turns into the Void. The Void has meaning in Hope even in Hope's hopelessness.
Edward Kissi
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com [mailto:usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju
Sent: Monday, March 18, 2019 10:27 PM
To: usaafricadialogue <USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Training Scholars in Critical Generalization and Application of Such Abstractions, also Known as Theory
'Increasingly, African scholarship is associated with the production of empirical fact and socio-economic impact rather than theory, with ostensibly local rather than international publication, and with other forms of disadvantage that undermine respectful exchange and engagement. This discourages our engagement with Africa as a place of intellectual production in its
own right.'
'The future of African Studies: what we can do to keep Africa at the heart of our research'
Insa Nolte
True?
African tertiary education is an outpost of the Western academy headquartered in Europe and North America.
The ideas produced in those locations are spread through the rest of the system like blood pumped through the body by the beating of the heart.
The vehicles of this blood, the means of transmission of these ideas, books published in the West, are now too expensive to easily acquire in economies not operating at the same strength as the Western economies. Digital media could make a significant difference but Internet access is expensive in Nigeria, for example.
But....
What is theory but the creation of explanatory generalizations?
Do you need access to theory developed in the heartlands of the Western academy and its publishing houses to theorize?
No.
All peoples theorized in creating meaning for their societies.
All large scale explanatory systems are forms of theory.
Proverbs are demonstrations of theory.
Myths are forms of theory.
Cosmologies are forms of theory.
Many theories can be traced ultimately to such sources.
Why not develop your own theories and share amongst each other, cross-fertilizing each other as Europe did to create the critical mass it enjoys today?
Why not create theories that aspire to explain not only your own realities but all reality relevant to that theory?
This can be done in open access platforms online, escaping costs associated with physical congregation.
Theory is a necessary activity of the human as it makes meaning of existence.
Consciousness implies theorizing, extrapolating from the known to the unknown, creating interpretive webs that justify existence and help navigate its landscapes.
--
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