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Beyond Reaction: (Re)-Imagining African Agency in the Decolonization of Knowledge

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Decolonizing African Studies Pedagogies

Part of the book series: Political Pedagogies ((PP))

Abstract

From the 1960s to the contemporary times, African scholars have spent considerable energy and time debunking, negating, and carrying out epistemic disobedience against the tyranny of Eurocentrism. From the Ibadan School of History, where orality was advanced as a valid source of data to Makerere School in Makerere University, where African Socialism and Marxism were presented as valid alternatives to capitalism through to the nascent decolonial turn in knowledge production, Africans have always reacted to theories, narratives, and assumptions that deny or otherwise silence the knowledge produced from the continent. Using a qualitative methodology, this chapter seeks to critique the tendency to knee-jerk reaction and argues for a more nuanced approach to re-imagining decolonization of knowledge. It does so by examining the possibilities for recovering, recentering, and promoting African knowledge systems authentically and unapologetically. It finds that from foundational knowledge on philosophy, governance, engineering to mathematics, through theory building and methodology, the decolonization of knowledge in Africa can be done by reengagement with Africa’s ritual archives, gatekeepers of knowledge, traditional institutions, and daily experiences of Africans.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Political Sciences, University of Pretoria, Pretoria, South Africa

    Zainab Monisola Olaitan

  2. Institute of African Studies, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON, Canada

    Samuel Ojo Oloruntoba

  3. Thabo Mbeki School of Public and International Affairs, University of South Africa, Pretoria, South Africa

    Samuel Ojo Oloruntoba

Authors
  1. Zainab Monisola Olaitan
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  2. Samuel Ojo Oloruntoba
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Correspondence to Samuel Ojo Oloruntoba .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada

    Nathan Andrews

  2. School of Built Environment and Development Studies, University of Kwazulu-Natal, Howard College, Durban, South Africa

    Nene Ernest Khalema

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Olaitan, Z.M., Oloruntoba, S.O. (2023). Beyond Reaction: (Re)-Imagining African Agency in the Decolonization of Knowledge. In: Andrews, N., Khalema, N.E. (eds) Decolonizing African Studies Pedagogies. Political Pedagogies. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-37442-5_2

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