Is African Studies Afraid of African Philosophy?

Abstract

The province of academic African Studies is expanding without commensurate impact on the quality of life on the continent of Africa. Very few will contend the fact that the purpose of scholarship is to make meaning out of human existence and to further enhance the quality of human life. Several factors have been adduced for the failure of academic African studies, as currently organized, to make any appreciable difference in both the content and outcome of scholarship about Africa. Because of the paternal nature of Western orchestrated African studies, scholarship about Africa has neither adopted methods that are objectively granted in the selection of its subject matter nor employed in a rationally warrantable procedure. In this chapter, Falaiye argues that African philosophy constitutes the grundnorm upon which African studies can make any meaning out of the African experience about reality. It is also the basis upon which scholars like Gavin Kitching can be prevented from giving up on African studies. Falaiye contends, in conclusion, that African studies needs African philosophy more than African philosophy needs it.