Shabiha Khan
Marcel Brousseau
Writing 2
05-05-14
The Study of Africa
As L.Lennie Irvin mentioned “look for the things that interest you” in “What is “Academic” Writing?” I realized when I do something I am interested on it makes my works easier and more funny. For example Africa, first things comes into to mind when we talk about Africa is, poverty, unstable governments, war, and violence; some people even believe that Africa is a country. The reason behind this is because due to biased conclusions coming from different theories, methods and Africanist (who studies about Africa), the media enforces misperceptions about Africa. As Azevedo mentioned in “Africana Studies and the State of the Art” Africana Studies, when it comes to Africa, the “media focuses on exotic negative news such as drought, and famine, civil war, and widespread poverty” (1). In reality, Africa has a layered history behind it that is waiting to be unfolded. African Studies is a field that derives from the combinations of disciplines—information accumulated over time based on one particular research. Africanists such as anthropologists, and historians are major contributors of study of the continent of Africa. As L.Lennie Irvin mentioned “make a point and support it” in “What is “Academic” Writing?” in this essay I will support my point with evidence from the sources I found.
Anthropology, the study of culture, attempted to observe what they called “primitive tribes” (Azevedo 11) in an objective matter. It is clear from their language in their descriptions of the cultures that their methods were not objective and their bias was both ethno- and Eurocentric. “The first ethnographers who worked during the 1920s through the 1940s did their research in collaborat...
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...ropologist and historians both focus on African and African people all came up with different conclusions. African scholar Thandika Mkandawire (who is paraphrased in Azevedo) is known for his criticisms on the present state of African studies. One of his most important criticisms is that the focus on dubious theoretical frameworks leads to a tendency to bend reality to fit these frameworks. This is certainly a pressing concern. Rather than simply doing away with the frameworks from the past the best solution is to accept the necessity of composite frameworks that do not overemphasize a single way of understanding Africa’s history. If scholars on Africa are truly to come to a better understanding of Africa they must first understand that Africa is a continent not a theory and that theories exist only as tools to help us rather than guide us along a well-trodden path.
Mazrui, Ali A. "The Re-Invention of Africa: Edward Said, V. Y. Mudimbe, and Beyond." Research in African Literatures 36, no. 3 (Autumn 2005): 68-82.
The formation of the Africana Studies Project includes Knowledge, Power, and Humanity. This insurrectionary intellectual formation examines the worlds of meaning, thought, and expression of Africans, reconstructing new meanings and possibilities for humanity. Development of African American Studies has increased awareness of the contribution of African Americans to the civilizations of the world, using its many themes and concepts, while also displaying many issues. One main issue of this, is the lack of Africana knowledge. For African American discipline to advance, its focal point must be the production and utilization of knowledge, to develop solutions to various issues in our society.
Joseph-Marie Degerando was a revolutionary, French philosopher who transcribed one of the original guidelines for the study of anthropology in the year 1800 titled, I: Societe des Observateurs de l’Homme in French, and translated into English as, The Observations of Savage Peoples. According to the author of the introduction and translator of his work into English, F. C. T. Moore, Degerando’s guidelines were a “capital work of anthropology” (Moore, U of CA Press. p. 2). Whether Degerando provided the most accurate guidelines for the study of humans is argued; however, his work was certainly influential as it served as a foundation for the science of anthropology. In fact, Moore declares there are consistent similarities between the anthropological recommendations of Degerando and those practiced by modern day anthropologists (Moore, U of CA Press. p. 4-5).
Bryant H. McGill once said “Education should prepare our minds to use its own powers of reason and conception rather than filling it with the accumulated misconceptions of the past” (McGill ). There are misconceptions all around us; people look at certain things in a particular manner but what each person sees comes from their background. I have recently come to the realization that there are many misconceptions held about the African continent; my current class has helped me see these misconceptions and understand why they are incorrect and how I formed them. With the help of our Western society, I developed beliefs that Africa was a continent full of poverty, civil unrest, and in desperate need of help. Much of the media coverage in Africa showed droughts, famine, the need for clean drinking water; everything that was exposed to the American population about Africa through these channels carried a negative connotation. I was never taught or informed about the complex culture and fascinating traditions that make up such a diverse continent. The ancient kingdoms of West Africa were complex, developed civilizations that had rich culture, traditions, values, norms and skills that exceeded those of societies of the rest of the world such as European ones. In this paper, I will first further explain some of the common misconceptions that I had about African in general and about their ancient kingdoms.
...o parallel in any part of human history. And in order to truly understand how this effects Africa and its many lost generations, one must know the past, and how it came to be so one can truly know how it affects the present, and how to prevent future monstrosities like this.
... argues that even though our mission is to understand the culture we our studying one cannot make final assumptions about a culture. One has to reflex on the fact that a culture is always changing and that our preparation of our discipline is not often the method one uses in fieldwork.
In summary, Davidson successful traces Africa’s earliest origins and demonstrates that this is a civilization far from having no arts, technology, sophistication and unique culture. Culture and civilization as we know it today can be traced back to Africa, and modern science has verified the early perceptions of Europeans to be wrong. He provides more than adequate evidence of Africa having a history complete with vast and rich civilization, including archaeological finds and specialized interviews with distinguished scholars and philosophers. Despite the fact that society possesses a more positive attitude towards African civilization today in terms of recognition, equality, and acceptance than in the past, negative stereotypes are still acknowledged and modern day racism unfortunately exists. I believe that the existence of Davidson’s work and videos such as Different but Equal are crucial to challenging these stereotypes and discrimination in order to create a more accurate image of Africa and its history. Overall, Davidson proves that the continent of Africa is home to a history that is just as meaningful, comprehensive, and progressive as that of any other civilization in the
Anthropologists conduct fieldwork by studying people, their behaviours, and their culture. This is done in the field by actively striving to interpret and understand the world from the perspective of those studied (Powdermaker, 1968, Keesing 1981). Anthropological participant-observation includes a “deep immersion into the life of a people” (Keesing, 1981 p.16) with an aim to produce an ethnography that accurately details the experience in a holistic and valuable style (Powdermaker, 1968, Keesing 1981). Generally, full participation in a culture is thought to reduce the interference the researcher has on the behaviour of the informants (Seymour- Smith, 1986). Participant-observation is still widely used by anthropologists as it offers deeply insightful real world accounts which are difficult to achieve using other methods (Seymour-Smith, 1986, Li,
Since its inception, the academic discipline of anthropology has gone through constant paradigm shifts. In the nineteenth century, anthropology began as a nomothetic study based upon the development of cultures and societies through the process of evolution. Later on, several anthropologists particularly Franz Boas shifted the nomothetic approach of American anthropology into an idiographic approach, which focuses on assessing the development of cultures individually as their own separate entity. (Moore 2012:161) In the twentieth century, however, anthropology ushered in another paradigm shift. Several American anthropologists during this time, valued empirical data rather than applying the idiographic or the “Boasian” approach into their
... Cambridge Encyclopedia of Africa. Ed. Roland Oliver. 1. New York: Trewin Copplestone Books Limited, 1984. Print.
Bohannan, Paul, and Philip Curtin. Africa & Africans . Long Grove: Waveland Press, Inc. , 1995.
Boas, F. (1930). Anthropology. In, Seligman, E. R. A. ed., Encyclopaedia of Social Sciences. Macmillan: New York.
There is no doubt that European colonialism has left a grave impact on Africa. Many of Africa’s current and recent issues can trace their roots back to the poor decisions made during the European colonial era. Some good has resulted however, like modern medicine, education, and infrastructure. Africa’s history and culture have also been transformed. It will take many years for the scars left by colonization to fade, but some things may never truly disappear. The fate of the continent may be unclear, but its past provides us with information on why the present is the way it is.
...econd African Writers Conference, Stockholm, 1986. Ed. Kirsten Holst Petersen. Upsala: Scandinavian Institute of African Studies, 1998. 173-202.
Throughout history, Africa has been a vulnerable player in the eyes of the rest of the world. From the slave trade to various civil right injustices that have taken place over in every century, from what we have studied in this class, we have been able to see the lasting impact on the continent as a ramification of certain events occurring. Using various sources from the text, which serve as evidence, and help prove how the western world exercised its power in order to capitalize on the African continent and exploit the African people and land.