Afrocentric education refers to a pedagogical approach to education designed to empower people of the
African diaspora
The African diaspora is the worldwide collection of communities descended from List of ethnic groups of Africa, people from Africa. The term most commonly refers to the descendants of the native West Africa, West and Central Africans who were ...
with educational modes in contact and in line with the cultural assumptions common in their communities. A central premise behind it is that many Africans have been subjugated by having their awareness of themselves limited and by being
indoctrinated with ideas that work against them and their cultures.
Like
educational leaders of other cultures, proponents assert that what educates one group of people does not necessarily educate and empower another group, so they assert educational priorities distinctly for the ''Africans'' in a given context.
Philosophy
Afrocentric education has, as one of its tenets, the decolonization of the African mind. The central objective in decolonizing the African mind is to overthrow the authority that alien traditions may exercise.
Education
The term "miseducation" was coined by
Carter G. Woodson to describe the process of systematically depriving
African American
African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...
s of their knowledge of self. Woodson believed that miseducation was the root of the problems of the masses of the African-American community and that if the masses of the African-American community were given the correct knowledge and education from the beginning, they would not be in the situation that they find themselves in today. Woodson argues in his book ''
The Mis-Education of the Negro'' that African Americans often valorize European culture to the detriment of their own culture.
History
This has been an active area of
Afrocentrism
Afrocentrism is a worldview that is centered on the history of people of African descent or a view that favors it over non-African civilizations. It is in some respects a response to Eurocentric attitudes about African people and their hist ...
for many decades.
19th and early 20th century
Edward Wilmot Blyden, an
American-Liberian educator and diplomat active in the
pan-Africa movement, perceived a change in perception taking place among Europeans towards Africans in his 1908 book ''African Life and Customs'', which originated as a series of articles in the
Sierra Leone
Sierra Leone, officially the Republic of Sierra Leone, is a country on the southwest coast of West Africa. It is bordered to the southeast by Liberia and by Guinea to the north. Sierra Leone's land area is . It has a tropical climate and envi ...
''Weekly News''.
In it, he proposed that Africans were beginning to be seen simply as different and not as inferior, in part because of the work of English writers such as
Mary Kingsley and
Lady Lugard, who traveled and studied in Africa. Such an enlightened view was fundamental to refute prevailing ideas among Western peoples about African cultures and Africans.
Blyden used that standpoint to show how the traditional social, industrial, and economic life of Africans untouched by "either European or Asiatic influence", was different and complete in itself, with its own organic wholeness. In a letter responding to Blyden's original series of articles,
Fante journalist and politician
J. E. Casely Hayford commented, "It is easy to see the men and women who walked the banks of the
Nile
The Nile (also known as the Nile River or River Nile) is a major north-flowing river in northeastern Africa. It flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The Nile is the longest river in Africa. It has historically been considered the List of river sy ...
" passing him on the streets of
Kumasi
Kumasi is a city and the capital of the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly and the Ashanti Region of Ghana. It is the second largest city in the country, with a population of 443,981 as of the 2021 census. Kumasi is located in a rain forest region ...
. Hayford suggested building a university to preserve African identity and instincts. In that university, the history chair would teach
The exchange of ideas between Blyden and Hayford embodied the fundamental concepts of Afrocentrism.
In the United States, during the early 20th century and the
Harlem Renaissance, many writers and historians gathered in major cities, where they began to work on documenting achievements of Africans throughout history, in United States and Western life. They began to set up institutions to support scholarly work in African-American history and literature, such as the American Negro Academy (now the Black Academy of Letters and Arts), founded in
Washington, DC
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and Federal district of the United States, federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from ...
, in 1874. Some men were self-taught; others rose through the academic system. Creative writers and artists claimed space for African-American perspectives.
Leaders included bibliophile
Arthur Schomburg, who devoted his life to collecting literature, art, slave narratives, and other artifacts of the
African diaspora
The African diaspora is the worldwide collection of communities descended from List of ethnic groups of Africa, people from Africa. The term most commonly refers to the descendants of the native West Africa, West and Central Africans who were ...
. In 1911, along with
John Edward Bruce, he founded the Negro Society for Historical Research in
Yonkers, New York
Yonkers () is the List of municipalities in New York, third-most populous city in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York and the most-populous City (New York), city in Westchester County, New York, Westchester County. A centrally locate ...
. The value of Schomburg's personal collection was recognized, and it was purchased by the
New York Public Library
The New York Public Library (NYPL) is a public library system in New York City. With nearly 53 million items and 92 locations, the New York Public Library is the second-largest public library in the United States behind the Library of Congress a ...
in 1926 with the aid of a
Carnegie Corporation
The Carnegie Corporation of New York is a philanthropic fund established by Andrew Carnegie in 1911 to support education programs across the United States, and later the world.
Since its founding, the Carnegie Corporation has endowed or othe ...
grant. It became the basis of what is now called the
Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, based in
Harlem, New York
Harlem is a neighborhood in Upper Manhattan, New York City. It is bounded roughly by the Hudson River on the west; the Harlem River and 155th Street (Manhattan), 155th Street on the north; Fifth Avenue on the east; and 110th Street (Manhattan ...
. Schomburg used the money from the sale of his collection for more travel and acquisition of materials.
Hubert Henry Harrison used his intellectual gifts in street lectures and political activism, influencing early generations of Black Socialists and Black Nationalists. Dr.
Carter G. Woodson co-founded the
Association for the Study of African American Life and History (as it is now called) in 1915, as well as ''
The Journal of Negro History'', so that scholars of black history could be supported and find venues for their work.
Among their topics, editors of publications such as
NAACP
The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is an American civil rights organization formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E. B. Du&nbs ...
's ''
The Crisis'' and ''Journal of Negro History'' sought to include articles that countered the prevailing view that Sub-Saharan Africa had contributed little of value to human history that was not the result of incursions by Europeans and
Arab
Arabs (, , ; , , ) are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in West Asia and North Africa. A significant Arab diaspora is present in various parts of the world.
Arabs have been in the Fertile Crescent for thousands of years ...
s. Historians began to theorize that Ancient Egyptian civilization was the culmination of events arising from the origin of the human race in Africa. They investigated the history of Africa from that perspective.
In March 1925, Schomburg published an essay "The Negro Digs Up His Past" in an issue of the ''Survey Graphic'' devoted to Harlem's intellectual life. The article had widespread distribution and influence, as he detailed the achievements of people of African descent.
Alain Locke included the essay in his collection ''
The New Negro''.
Afrocentrists claimed ''
The Mis-Education of the Negro'' (1933) by
Carter G. Woodson, an African-American historian, as one of their foundational texts. Woodson critiqued education of African Americans as "mis-education" because he held that it denigrated the black while glorifying the white. For these early Afrocentrists, the goal was to break what they saw as a vicious cycle of the reproduction of black self-abnegation. In the words of ''The Crisis'' editor
W. E. B. Du Bois
William Edward Burghardt Du Bois ( ; February 23, 1868 – August 27, 1963) was an American sociologist, socialist, historian, and Pan-Africanist civil rights activist.
Born in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, Du Bois grew up in a relativel ...
, the world left African Americans with a "
double consciousness," and a sense of "always looking at one's self through the eyes of others, of measuring one's soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity."
[Tejumola Olaniyan]
"From Black Aesthetics to Afrocentrism"
, ''West Africa Review'', Issue 9 (2006).
In his early years, W. E. B. Du Bois, researched
West Africa
West Africa, also known as Western Africa, is the westernmost region of Africa. The United Nations geoscheme for Africa#Western Africa, United Nations defines Western Africa as the 16 countries of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, The Gambia, Gha ...
n cultures and attempted to construct a
pan-Africanist value system based on West African traditions. In the 1950s Du Bois envisioned and received funding from
Ghana
Ghana, officially the Republic of Ghana, is a country in West Africa. It is situated along the Gulf of Guinea and the Atlantic Ocean to the south, and shares borders with Côte d’Ivoire to the west, Burkina Faso to the north, and Togo to t ...
ian president
Kwame Nkrumah
Francis Kwame Nkrumah (, 21 September 1909 – 27 April 1972) was a Ghanaian politician, political theorist, and revolutionary. He served as Prime Minister of the Gold Coast (British colony), Gold Coast from 1952 until 1957, when it gained ...
to produce an ''
Encyclopedia Africana
''Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African-American Experience'' edited by Henry Louis Gates and
Anthony Appiah ( Basic Civitas Books 1999, 2nd ed. Oxford University Press, 2005, ) is a compendium of Africana studies including A ...
'' to chronicle the history and cultures of Africa. Du Bois died before being able to complete his work. Some aspects of Du Bois's approach are evident in work by
Cheikh Anta Diop
Cheikh Anta Diop (29 December 1923 – 7 February 1986) was a Senegalese historian, anthropologist, physicist, and politician who studied the human race's origins and pre-colonial African culture. Diop's work is considered foundational to the the ...
in the 1950s and 1960s.
Du Bois inspired a number of authors, including
Drusilla Dunjee Houston. After reading his work ''The Negro'' (1915), Houston embarked upon writing her ''Wonderful Ethiopians of the Ancient Cushite Empire'' (1926). The book was a compilation of evidence related to the historic origins of
Cush and Ethiopia, and assessed their influences on Greece.
1960s and 1970s
The 1960s and 1970s were times of social and political ferment. In the U.S. were born new forms of
Black Nationalism
Black nationalism is a nationalist movement which seeks representation for Black people as a distinct national identity, especially in racialized, colonial and postcolonial societies. Its earliest proponents saw it as a way to advocate for ...
,
Black Power
Black power is a list of political slogans, political slogan and a name which is given to various associated ideologies which aim to achieve self-determination for black people. It is primarily, but not exclusively, used in the United States b ...
and the
Black Arts Movements, all began to be driven, to a degree, driven to some degree by an identification with "Mother Africa." Afrocentric scholars and Black youth also challenged Eurocentric ideas in academia.
The work of
Cheikh Anta Diop
Cheikh Anta Diop (29 December 1923 – 7 February 1986) was a Senegalese historian, anthropologist, physicist, and politician who studied the human race's origins and pre-colonial African culture. Diop's work is considered foundational to the the ...
became very influential. In the following decades, histories related to Africa and the diaspora gradually incorporated a more African perspective. Since that time, Afrocentrists have increasingly seen African peoples as the makers and shapers of their own histories.
[ Henry Louis Gates and ]Kwame Anthony Appiah
Kwame Akroma-Ampim Kusi Anthony Appiah ( ; born 8 May 1954) is an English-American philosopher and writer who has written about political philosophy, ethics, the philosophy of language and mind, and African intellectual history. Appiah is Prof ...
(eds), '' Africana: The Encyclopedia of the African and African-American'' Vol. 1, p. 114, Oxford University Press. 2005. .
''You have all heard of the African Personality; of African democracy, of the African way to socialism, of negritude, and so on. They are all props we have fashioned at different times to help us get on our feet again. Once we are up we shan't need any of them any more. But for the moment it is in the nature of things that we may need to counter racism with what Jean-Paul Sartre
Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre (, ; ; 21 June 1905 – 15 April 1980) was a French philosopher, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, and literary criticism, literary critic, considered a leading figure in 20th ...
has called an anti-racist racism, to announce not just that we are as good as the next man but that we are much better.''
—Chinua Achebe, 1965
In this context, ethnocentric Afrocentrism was not intended to be essential or permanent, but was a consciously fashioned strategy of resistance to the Eurocentrism of the time.
Afrocentric scholars adopted two approaches: a deconstructive rebuttal of what they called "the whole archive of European ideological racism" and a reconstructive act of writing new self-constructed histories.
At a 1974 UNESCO symposium in Cairo titled "The Peopling of Ancient Egypt and the Decipherment of Meroitic Script",
Cheikh Anta Diop
Cheikh Anta Diop (29 December 1923 – 7 February 1986) was a Senegalese historian, anthropologist, physicist, and politician who studied the human race's origins and pre-colonial African culture. Diop's work is considered foundational to the the ...
brought together scholars of Egypt from around the world.
Key texts from this period include:
* ''The Destruction of Black Civilization'' (1971) by Chancellor Williams
* ''The African Origins of Civilization: Myth or Reality'' (1974) by Cheikh Anta Diop
* ''They Came Before Columbus: The African Presence in Ancient America'' (1976) by Ivan Van Sertima
Some Afrocentric writers focused on study of indigenous African civilizations and peoples, to emphasize African history separate from European or
Arab
Arabs (, , ; , , ) are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in West Asia and North Africa. A significant Arab diaspora is present in various parts of the world.
Arabs have been in the Fertile Crescent for thousands of years ...
influence. Primary among them was
Chancellor Williams, whose book ''The Destruction of Black Civilization: Great Issues of a Race from 4500 B.C. to 2000 A.D.'' set out to determine a "purely African body of principles, value systems (and) philosophy of life".
1980s and 1990s
In the 1980s and 1990s, Afrocentrism increasingly became seen as a tool for addressing social ills and a means of grounding community efforts toward
self-determination
Self-determination refers to a people's right to form its own political entity, and internal self-determination is the right to representative government with full suffrage.
Self-determination is a cardinal principle in modern international la ...
and political and economic empowerment.
In his (1992) article "Eurocentrism vs. Afrocentrism", US anthropologist Linus A. Hoskins wrote:
The vital necessity for African people to use the weapons of education and history to extricate themselves from this psychological dependency complex/syndrome as a necessary precondition for liberation. ..If African peoples (the global majority) were to become Afrocentric (Afrocentrized), ... that would spell the ineluctable end of European global power and dominance. This is indeed the fear of Europeans. ... Afrocentrism is a state of mind, a particular subconscious mind-set that is rooted in the ancestral heritage and communal value system.
American educator
Jawanza Kunjufu made the case that
hip hop
Hip-hop or hip hop (originally disco rap) is a popular music genre that emerged in the early 1970s from the African-American community of New York City. The style is characterized by its synthesis of a wide range of musical techniques. Hip- ...
culture, rather than being creative expression of the culture, was the root of many social ills. For some Afrocentrists, the contemporary problems of the
ghetto
A ghetto is a part of a city in which members of a minority group are concentrated, especially as a result of political, social, legal, religious, environmental or economic pressure. Ghettos are often known for being more impoverished than other ...
stemmed not from race and class inequality, but rather from a failure to inculcate Black youth with Afrocentric values.
[Algernon Austin, ''Achieving Blackness: Race, Black Nationalism, and Afrocentrism''. .]
In the West and elsewhere, the European, in the midst of other peoples, has often propounded an exclusive view of reality; the exclusivity of this view creates a fundamental human crisis. In some cases, it has created cultures arrayed against each other or even against themselves. Afrocentricity’s response certainly is not to impose its own particularity as a universal, as Eurocentricity has often done. But hearing the voice of African American culture with all of its attendant parts is one way of creating a more sane society and one model for a more humane world. –Asante, M. K. (1988)
In 1997, US cultural historian Nathan Glazer described Afrocentricity as a form of multiculturalism. He wrote that its influence ranged from sensible proposals about inclusion of more African material in school curricula to what he called senseless claims about African primacy in all major technological achievements. Glazer argued that Afrocentricity had become more important due to the failure of mainstream society to assimilate all African Americans. Anger and frustration at their continuing separation gave black Americans the impetus to reject traditions that excluded them.
[Nathan Glazer, ''We Are All Multiculturalists Now'', Harvard University Press, 1997. .]
2000s
Today, Afrocentricity takes many forms, including striving for a more multicultural and balanced approach to the study of history and sociology. Afrocentrists contend that race still exists as a
social
Social organisms, including human(s), live collectively in interacting populations. This interaction is considered social whether they are aware of it or not, and whether the exchange is voluntary or not.
Etymology
The word "social" derives fro ...
and political construct. They argue that for centuries in academia, Eurocentric ideas about history were dominant: ideas such as blacks having no civilizations, no
written language
A written language is the representation of a language by means of writing. This involves the use of visual symbols, known as graphemes, to represent linguistic units such as phonemes, syllables, morphemes, or words. However, written language is ...
s, no cultures, and no histories of any note before coming into contact with Europeans. Further, according to the views of some Afrocentrists, European history has commonly received more attention within the academic community than the history of sub-Saharan African cultures or those of the many Pacific Island peoples. Afrocentrists contend it is important to divorce the historical record from past racism.
Molefi Kete Asante
Molefi Kete Asante ( ; born Arthur Lee Smith Jr.; August 14, 1942) is an American philosopher who is a leading figure in the fields of African-American studies, African studies, and communication studies. He is currently a professor in the Dep ...
's book ''Afrocentricity'' (1988) argues that African-Americans should look to African cultures "''as a critical corrective to a displaced agency among Africans''." Some Afrocentrists believe that the burden of Afrocentricity is to define and develop African agency in the midst of the
cultural wars debate. By doing so, Afrocentricity can support all forms of multiculturalism.
Afrocentrists argue that Afrocentricity is important for people of all ethnicities who want to understand African history and the
African diaspora
The African diaspora is the worldwide collection of communities descended from List of ethnic groups of Africa, people from Africa. The term most commonly refers to the descendants of the native West Africa, West and Central Africans who were ...
. For example, the Afrocentric method can be used to research African indigenous culture. Queeneth Mkabela writes in 2005 that the Afrocentric perspective provides new insights for understanding African indigenous culture, in a multicultural context. According to Mkabela and others, the Afrocentric method is a necessary part of complete scholarship and without it, the picture is incomplete, less accurate, and less objective.
Studies of African and African-diaspora cultures have shifted understanding and created a more positive acceptance of influence by African religious, linguistic and other traditions, both among scholars and the general public. For example, religious movements such as
Vodou are now less likely to be characterized as "mere superstition", but understood in terms of links to African traditions.
In recent years
Africana Studies
Black studies or Africana studies (with nationally specific terms, such as African American studies and Black Canadian studies), is an interdisciplinary academic field that primarily focuses on the study of the history, culture, and politics of ...
or Africology departments at many major universities have grown out of the Afrocentric "Black Studies" departments formed in the 1970s. Rather than focusing on black topics in the African diaspora (often exclusively African American topics), these reformed departments aim to expand the field to encompass all of the African diaspora. They also seek to better align themselves with other University departments and find continuity and compromise between the radical Afrocentricity of the past decades and the
multicultural
Multiculturalism is the coexistence of multiple cultures. The word is used in sociology, in political philosophy, and colloquially. In sociology and everyday usage, it is usually a synonym for ''ethnic'' or cultural pluralism in which various e ...
scholarship found in many fields today.
[Delores P. Aldridge, Carlene Young. ''Out of the Revolution: The Development of Africana Studies'', Lexington Books, 2000. .]
List of schools
Public schools
*
African-Centered College Preparatory Academy (Kansas City, Missouri)
*
Columbus Africentric Early College (Columbus, Ohio)
Public charter schools
*
Betty Shabazz International Charter School (Chicago, Illinois)
*
Imhotep Institute Charter High School (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
See also
*
Pedagogy
Pedagogy (), most commonly understood as the approach to teaching, is the theory and practice of learning, and how this process influences, and is influenced by, the social, political, and psychological development of learners. Pedagogy, taken ...
*
Philosophy of education
The philosophy of education is the branch of applied philosophy that investigates the nature of education as well as its aims and problems. It also examines the concepts and presuppositions of education theories. It is an interdisciplinary fiel ...
*
Afrocentrism
Afrocentrism is a worldview that is centered on the history of people of African descent or a view that favors it over non-African civilizations. It is in some respects a response to Eurocentric attitudes about African people and their hist ...
*
Africana studies
Black studies or Africana studies (with nationally specific terms, such as African American studies and Black Canadian studies), is an interdisciplinary academic field that primarily focuses on the study of the history, culture, and politics of ...
*
Black nationalism
Black nationalism is a nationalist movement which seeks representation for Black people as a distinct national identity, especially in racialized, colonial and postcolonial societies. Its earliest proponents saw it as a way to advocate for ...
*
Black separatism
*
Afrikan Centered Education Collegium Campus
References
Notes
Resources
* Woodson, Dr. Carter G. (1933). ''The Mis-Education of the Negro''. Booksellers & Associates.
* Chinweizu (1987). ''Decolonizing the African Mind''. Sundoor Press.
* Pollard Diane S., et al.(2000). ''African-Centered Schooling in Theory and Practice''. Bergin & Garvey.
Further reading
*
Molefi Kete Asante
Molefi Kete Asante ( ; born Arthur Lee Smith Jr.; August 14, 1942) is an American philosopher who is a leading figure in the fields of African-American studies, African studies, and communication studies. He is currently a professor in the Dep ...
(1980). ''Afrocentricity: The theory of social change''. Amulefi Pub. Co.
* Kondo, Zak. ''Black Students Guide to Positive Education''.
* Goggins II, Lathardus
"African Centered Rites of Passage and Education".* Gill, Walter. ''Issues in African American Education''.
* Cartwright, Madeline. ''For the Children''.
* Dove, Nah. ''The Afrocentric School
Blueprint'.
*
Zaslavsky, Claudia. ''Africa Counts''.
* Hilliard III, Asa G. ''SBA: The Reawakening of the African Mind''.
* Hilliard III, Asa G. ''Maroons Within Us''.
* Hilliard III, Asa G., et al. ''Young, Gifted and Black''.
* Hilliard III, Asa G., Payton-Stewart, Lucretia, Williams, Larry Obadele. ''Infusion of African and African American Content in the School Curriculum''.
* Palmer, Anyim. ''The Failure of Public Education in the Black Community''.
* Foluke, Gyasi A. ''The Crisis and Challenge of Black Mis-Education in America''.
* DuBois, W. E. B., and Herbert Aptheker. ''The Education of Black People''.
* Lomotey, Kofi. ''Going to School: the African American Experience''.
* Akoto, Kwame Agyei. ''Nationbuilding: Theory and practice in Afrikan-centered education''.
* Shujaa, Mwalimu J. ''Too Much Schooling, Too Little Education''.
* Lometey, Kofi. ''Sailing Against the Wind: African Americans and Women in U.S. Education''.
* Richard Majors. ''Educating Our Black Children: New Directions and Radical Approaches''.
* Hale, Janice E. ''Unbank the Fire: Visions for the Education of African American Children''.
* Watkins, William H. ''The White Architects of Black Education: Ideology and Power in America, 1865–1954''
* Denbo, Sheryl (2002). ''Improving Schools for African American Students: A Reader for Educational Leaders''.
* Ani, Marimba. ''Yurugu: An African-Centered Critique of European Cultural Thought and Behavior''.
* Murrell Jr., Peter C. ''African-Centered Pedagogy: Developing Schools of Achievement for African American Children''.
* Ford, Donna Y. ''Reversing Underachievement Among Gifted Black Students''.
* Ratteray, Joan D. ''Center Shift: An African-Centered Approach for the Multi-Cultural Curriculum''.
* Tatum, Beverly Daniel. ''Why Are All The Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria''.
* Gentry, Atron A. ''Learning to Survive: Black Youth Look for Education and Hope''.
* Kafele, Baruti K. ''A Black Parent’s Handbook to Educating Your Children (Outside of the Classroom)''
* Shockley, Kmt G. ''The Miseducation of Black Children''.
External links
* ''
Journal of Negro Education''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Afrocentric Education
Afrocentrism
Philosophy of education