Restoring African studies to its linguistic identity: reflections on Ethiopian studies

Abstract

One of the defining characteristics of African studies at the moment, regrettably, is the fact that the bulk of knowledge produced in and about Africa is written in foreign languages. This, according to Ngugi wa Thiong’o, is the “Europhonic legacies of colonialism.” Any serious attempt to decolonise knowledge production in Africa cannot disregard the language question. The use of local African languages in higher education and academic publications contributes a great deal to a project of complete decolonisation. Against the backdrop of such debates and concerns, the present study examines the issue of language and academic publication in Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia. Although Ethiopia escaped direct forms of colonialism, the postcolonial situation in the use of foreign languages for higher education and academic publication is quite similar to the rest of Africa. The appraisal of a decade of academic publication in one college and five decades of publication in a research institute reveals that English is the dominant language of academic publications in the university, while the use of local languages like Amharic, Afan Oromo, Tigrigna and Somali are limited or non-existent. The paper, following Ngugi, argues that languages are archives of “social memory” and “remembrance,” and these languages are the most suitable vehicles to get direct access to the various communities and ethnic groups across Africa. Hence, the study calls for intellectuals in African universities and Africanists to use local languages in academic publications and thereby, contribute to the complete decolonisation of knowledge production on the continent.