the exclusion of the african contribution to the conceptual development of reality, appearance and

296 Pages·2014·1.05 MB·English

THE EXCLUSION OF THE AFRICAN CONTRIBUTION TO THE CONCEPTUAL
DEVELOPMENT OF REALITY, APPEARANCE AND KNOWLEDGE IN THE
HISTORY
OF PHILOSOPHY

BY

Andrea T. Chimuka; B. A. General,
B.A. (SPL), M.A (Zimbabwe)

Thesis Submitted in Fulfilment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of
Philosophy in the
Department of Religious Studies,
Classics and Philosophy

Supervisors: Dr. D. Kaulemu
Dr. J. D. McClymont

University of Zimbabwe

15 September 2012
TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgements……………………………………………………… i

Abstract …………………………………………………………………… iv

Introduction….……………………………………………………………. 1

Chapter One: A Watershed of Perspectives 8

1.1 Introduction ………………………………………………………..... 8

1.2 Even African Philosophical Ideas are Part of the History of Ideas …. 10

1.3 History Of Philosophy..………………………………………….......... 14

1.4 History of African Philosophy………………………………................ 25

1.5. The Sponge-Effect Of Early European Intellectuals In Africa ............ 30

1.6 European Modernity And The Cognitive Erasure Of Africans ............ 31

1.7 Africa’s Vain Intellectual Input …………………………………....... 33

1.8 A Ray Of Light On The African Horizon ………………………....... 37

1.9 Conclusion ………………………………………………………......... 39

Chapter Two: The Limping Stallion - The Troubled Historiography
Of African Philosophy 41

2.1 Introduction ……………………………………………………….. .... 41

2.2 The Nature of African Historiography ………………………….......... 41

2.3 Un-Gagging The African Mouth ……………………………….......... 47

2.3.1 The Post-Modern Critique of European Modernity …………............. 52

2.3.2 Feminist Critique of European Modernity ………………….............. 56

2.3.3 Post-Colonial Critique of Modernity ………………………................ 59
2.3.4 Sub-Altern Critique of Modernity…………………………….............. 60

2.4 Colonial Historiography of Africa ………………………… ................ 62

2.5 Conclusion ……………………………………………….................... 72

Chapter Three: The Natural Universe Is Divine 74

3.1 Introduction ………………………………………………................. 74

3.2 The Classical Civilization ………………………………… ............... 75

3.3 The Historiography of Greek Philosophy ……………….................... 76

3.4 The Intellectual Revolution in Philosophy ……………...................... 85

3.5 The Few Who Made Revolutionary Strides in Philosophy.................... 94

3.6 From Socrates To Aristotle ……………………………….................. 106

3.7 Greek Philosophy After Aristotle …………………………................ 110

3.8 Conclusion ………………………………………………................... 117

Chapter Four: God -The Ontological Reality And Author Of Knowledge 120

4.1 Introduction ………………………………………………................. 120

4.2 Africa Interfaces With Rome ......................…………………............ 121

4.3 Each Individual is Endowed With Self-Knowledge…........................... 126

4.4 Everything Flows from God And Back to Him…………………......... 134

4.5 Truth Lies Hidden Within the Soul ....................................................... 136

4.6 Nature is the Sum of Realty …………………….................................. 140

4.7 God: The Very Nature of Being …………………………................... 149

4.8 Everything is Fraught With Inconsistenies ............................................ 151

4.9 Conclusion ............................................................................................. 154
Chapter Five: Knowledge of The Nature, A Matter Of Impersonal
Scientific Investigation 156

5.1 Introduction ……………………………………………….................. 156

5.2 Historiography Of Modern Philosophy................................................. 157

5.3 Revolutions In Science ………………………………........................ 168

5.4 European Modernity and the Condemnation of Africans........................ 170

5.5 Modern Philosophy and the New World Order ..................................... 173

5.6 Kant at the Summit of Enlightenment Thought ..................................... 190

5.7 Philosophy And Science In Alliance? ................................................... 196

5.8 Conclusion .............................................................................................. 200

Chapter Six: “The Ship With Multiple Rudders And Numerous
Navigators” 203

6.1 Introduction ……………………………………………..................... 203

6.2 Crises In Newtonian Science ………………………………………… 206

6.3 The Critique Of Science …………………………………………….. 208

6.4 The Crisis Of Mathematics …………………………………………. 213

6.5 Implications of the New Science……………………………………… 214

6.6 Does Philosophy Mirror Nature? …………………………………….. 217

6.7 Conclusion …………………………………………………………… 227

Chapter Seven: Can Anything Valuable Come Out Of Africa? 230

7.1 Introduction …………………………………………......................... 230

7.2. African Presence in Intellectual Circles ............................................... 230

7.3. The African Philosophical Contribution .............................................. 232

7.3.1 A Pilgrimage to Freedom ..................................................................... 232
7.3.2 Afrocentrism Drawing from the Metaphysical Spring ......................... 236

7.3.3 African Conceptual Schema ................................................................. 240

7.3.3.1 Menkiti on the African View of Reality ................................................ 241

7.3.3.2 Ramose on the African View of Reality ............................................... 242

7.3.3.3 Brown on the African View of Reality ................................................. 244

7.4 Reflections on African Worldviews …………………………............ 247

7.5 Conclusion ........................................................................................... 247

8 Conclusion: The Future Of African World-Views ….................... 250

9. List Of Sources …………………………………………................ 255
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This work would not have been possible without the help from my teachers and
inspiration from students and friends. I would like to thank my students from the
University of Zimbabwe, Arrupe College and St Thomas University of Mozambique
for the various responses to ideas in this thesis. Over the years, the students have
provided a form of measurement for the credibility or otherwise of some of the
findings of this research. Sobantu (“Mpinji”) Sibanda and Munyaradzi Madambi, my
fellow MA students (now colleagues) have always been my sparring partners.

I would also like to thank the late Dr. Simon (“Simomo”) Mawondo for making
thought provoking comments on some of the draft chapters. Special thanks go to my
two teachers; Dr. Jameson Kurasha, Dr. David Kaulemu and friend Bill Shaw from
San Jose State University (California, USA). Professor Shaw read the chapter drafts
and gave valuable comments. Dr Kurasha encouraged me to push forward always,
even during moments when I felt things were not moving at all! Dr. Kaulemu has
mentored me throughout the storms and droughts of scholarship. He has taught me
that a project such as this one requires one to settle for issues that preoccupy one’s
life. For me, the role of Africans or Blacks in world civilizations is my passion -
almost an obsession. Dr Kaulemu made me discover that.

He has also gone over my draft chapters, ripping through some of them, suggesting
how to improve others and sometimes providing materials from his own library. In
particular, he introduced me to the works by J.A. Rogers. It was Rogers’ project to
highlight to the world that Africans or men of colour played a significant role in
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human civilization in general. In similar spirit, it has become my passion to examine
how the philosophical insights of the peoples of African descent have fed the hearth
of civilization.

My other profound thanks go to Dr. J. D. McClymont, who took over as internal
supervisor and saw the project through its final stages. He edited the dissertation and
made valuable comments. I am very grateful.

I would like also to thank the University of Zimbabwe, for funding my travel to Cape
Town for my first contact visit in 2001. There, I met Karori Mbugua, then a DPhil
student from Kenya. Our discussions in philosophy were very fruitful. He impressed
on me that science was very instrumental to the rise of modern philosophy. In 2004 I
went to Kenya for my second contact visit, where I engaged Dr. Karori Mbugua in
philosophic discussions. This experience fostered my intellectual growth. Most
importantly, I would like to thank the Department of Religious Studies, Classics and
Philosophy for facilitating my study leave for the part of 2004 and the rest of 2005. I
wouldn’t have made it without the break. Special thanks go to all those scholars
whose ideas I have used directly or indirectly to develop my own.

My family has also made invaluable contributions to the completion of this work.
There were nights I would literally not sleep, and days when I felt like not speaking to
anybody. My family had their way of accommodating me and seeing us through these
storms. It was difficult to have a husband and father who was a student. Yet, they
were all very supportive. At times they would ask me when my studies would come to
an end. This question, whenever asked, would spur me into working hard, though at
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times it made me angry. I would soliloquise; how do they expect me to finish when
studying under these dire conditions? To my wife Ntombizodwa and the boys I say,
“Thank you very much. You have always been there for me, even during times when I
was not very friendly and most importantly, you have been the reason for my pushing
forward, against all the odds, as they slapped hard into my face”.

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ABSTRACT

Few histories of philosophy have probed the contributions of Africans or people of
African descent. A significant section of modern and contemporary intellectual
historians, unlike their classical counterparts, regards civilization to have been
transmitted only by white privileged males (Keita 1994, p. 147). This is what Cornell
West coins “malestream” history (West 1990, p.94). The problem lies squarely on
Eurocentrism, according to which the “Eurocentric west is trapped, even in its best
intentions, by its concentration on itself, its selfishness, its inability to draw a wider
picture” (Asante quoted in Akafor 1991, p. 253).

Undoubtedly, this has relegated significant other participants to the sidelines. Thus,
the contribution of non- Europeans, of women, and children to global history has
neither been fully scrutinized nor appreciated. Furthermore, the issue of race came to
be used as an index of civility, much to the detriment on Africans who occupied the
least place in the racial taxonomy. The net result, according to Keita, is that, "the
voice of civilization elaborated over millennia has been stilled" (Keita 1994, p.147).

The work is a commitment to pluralism. Pluralism is the view that there are many
possible mature human ways of thinking about the world, not just one privileged one.
Pluralism allows several intellectual perspectives to feed into some kind of global
history. In science, pluralistic methodology is the integration of the various methods
and insights into the investigation of scientific phenomena (Barnes 1998, p. 31). Also
when it comes to speaking about the knowledge of reality, numerous possibilities
abound (Jackson 1999, 12.) The pluralistic vision encapsulated here is generally
integrationist. It is the view that in the writing of history in general and history of
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philosophy in particular other voices matter. As such, the work challenges the notion
that “human reason best expresses itself within terms of Western male gender norms”
(Sherry Turkle and Seymour Papert 1990, p.141)

The work pads through these less frequently chartered frontiers of knowledge. Does it
mean that Africans are intellectually sterile to a point that they have made no
intellectual achievements – no science, no technological innovation, no discoveries,
no meaningful philosophy? While there are seemingly unending debates about
whether or not African philosophy exists (Oyeshile 2008; Taiwo 1998), the present
work focuses on how the records of African philosophy have been produced.

This thesis argues that this is not the case. A substantial amount of intellectual
resources that belong to the Africa continent either went unnoticed appropriated
without acknowledgement or simply discarded. This scenario was largely a result of
the politics of knowledge. Powerful communities, with dominant ideologies,
technologies and philosophies have ensured that the African and other voices either
remained unheard or expropriated, but with no due recognition given to the authors of
such knowledge. The net result was the existence of African philosophy under
‘erasure’. Thus, there is need to unlock this hegemonic intellectualism. A prospective
interpretation of world history does not thrive on polarization and binary opposition.
An integrative approach to human history allows for the celebration of the
achievements of Africans, Europeans and other players in the processes of history
making. This is what this thesis seeks to demonstrate from Chapter 1 through to
Chapter 7.

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