African studies

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Africa

African studies is the study of Africa, especially the continent's cultures and societies (as opposed to its geology, geography, zoology, etc.). The field includes the study of Africa's history (Pre-colonial, colonial, post-colonial), demography (ethnic groups), culture, politics, economy, languages, and religion (Islam, Christianity, traditional religions). A specialist in African studies is often referred to as an "Africanist". A key focus of the discipline is to interrogate epistemological approaches, theories and methods in traditional disciplines using a critical lens that inserts African-centred ways of knowing and references.

For Africanists, also known as communitarians, problems within Africa are thought to be caused because the real flesh-and-blood communities that comprise Africa are marginalized from public life as so many "tribes". Therefore, the solution is understood to be the need to defend culture and put Africa's age-old communities at the center of African politics. It is also argued that there is a need to "deexoticize" Africa and banalise it, rather than understand Africa as exceptionalized and exoticized.[1]

Notable deceased Africanists

University-based centers

National and transnational centers

Associations

Projects

Degree programs

United States of America Howard University, PhD

Canada

  • Carleton University, Institute of African Studies - Combined Honours Undergraduate Degrees and Collaborative Masters in African Studies

Egypt

Ethiopia

Ghana

Nigeria

Switzerland

United Kingdom

Further reading

  • Gershenhorn, Jerry, “‘Not an Academic Affair’: African American Scholars and the Development of African Studies Programs in the United States, 1942–1960,” Journal of African American History, 94 (Winter 2009), 44–68.

See also

External links

Library Guides for African Studies

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  • African Studies Library, Centre of African Studies, University of Cambridge UK
  • Studying Africa. A guide to the sources. Nordic Africa Institute, Uppsala. 3rd ed., 2014

References

  1. Mamdani, M. (1996), Chapter 1 from Mamdani, M., Citizen and Subject: contemporary Africa and the legacy of late colonialism.
  2. Tribute in ACAS Review 89, incl. bibliography (2015)

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