Month: February 2020

African Philosophy –Myth and Reality  

“Philosophy not only exists within history, like a substance in a container, but is itself a second-order history borne by empirical history, a productive process (producing something as yet undefined) a progress. In this sense philosophy does not have a history; structurally, it is history itself.” – Paulin J. Hountondji.¹

After the introduction to the subject of the traditional but erroneous concept of African philosophy as ethnophilosophy, Hountondji formulates his arguments for an authentic African philosophy through three essays prepared in 1969, 1970, and 1973. Be prepared for some fascinating reading!

He starts by telling us what philosophy is not: cultural anthropology, mythology, folklorism, oral literature, poetry, stories, a collective worldview, popular notions, proverbs, or even traditional wisdom. Rather philosophy is a discipline or a science, like algebra or linguistics, based on hypotheses and theories. It derives from the confrontation between individual thoughts through free and open discussion and debate. It is an intellectual effort to know, understand, and think out doctrines.

For Hountondji, philosophy is always in a sense a metaphilosophy^2,3 developed by reflecting on its history with new thinkers feeding on the doctrines of their predecessors (and contemporaries). In the case of African philosophy, he feels it is best when directed to an African public, although it can include debates on Western philosophy.

His thoughts crystalize into three main points:⁴

1)   Philosophy is not a system, but a history.

2)   It moves forward by leaps and bounds, or revolutions.

3)   African philosophy may today (June 1973?) be going through its first mutation.

By the first point, he means that philosophy is not a finished system of absolute truth, but a historical dialectic. But that history is discontinuous, a zigzag, often shifting suddenly through revolutionary thinking. His examples of revolutions in Western philosophy include Descartes’ revolt against Scholasticism, Kant’s critique of existing dogmatism in response to Hume’s skepticism, and Marx’s materialism as revolt against Hegel’s idealism. However Hountondji adopts Louis Althusser’s theory that philosophical revolutions follow scientific revolutions, and as such philosophical discourse must be modeled on scientific discourse.

Now science depends on writing, the recording of discovery. Here we find the linchpin of authentic philosophy. Oral traditions demand preservation via repetition often leading to dogmatism; written documents do the remembering, and instead questioning and rebuttal are encouraged. Philosophy then must be based on written documents in order to enable criticism and debate. This also answers the question as to whether philosophical fragments from the oral tradition can be authentic – the answer is yes, but the process begins at the precise moment of transcription. Nonetheless above all “African philosophy is inseparable from African science.”⁵

His third point is the utterly critical one; at last we see the direction Hountondji is taking. African philosophy is emerging from its Western ethnophilosophical fog, and his generation of philosophers, being the first, will initiate and define African philosophy. They will be the Platos, Aristotles, Zenos, and Epicuruses of the first authentic African philosophy. Imagine the excitement he and his colleagues feel as, integral parts of, in his own beautiful words, “that groping, endless history, that unquiet, forever incomplete quest we call philosophy”⁶ 

Our next and final post on Hountondji will look at his analysis of two major African philosophical works.

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¹Hountondji, Paulin J., African Philosophy – Myth and Reality. Indiana University Press, Bloomington, Indiana, 1996. ISBN 0-253-33229-X, page 101.

²Ibid. Page 63.

³Metaphilosophy is the philosophy of philosophy, essentially the attempt to answer the question: “What is philosophy?”  See Honderich, Ted, The Oxford Guide to Philosophy. Oxford University Press, 2005. ISBN 978-0-19-534093-8 page 589.

⁴Hountondji, Paulin J., African Philosophy – Myth and Reality. Indiana University Press, Bloomington, Indiana, 1996. ISBN 0-253-33229-X, page 71.

⁵Ibid. Page 106.

⁶Ibid. Page 64.

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Having trouble leaving a question or comment?  E-mail me at gregoryciliberti@gmail.com

African Philosophy –Myth and Reality ¹

“…Bantu ‘philosophy’ is shown to be a myth. To destroy the myth once and for all, and to clear our conceptual ground for a genuine theoretical discourse – these are the tasks now awaiting African philosophers and scientists.” – Paulin J. Hountondji.²

In my search through the philosophy section of my local used book store I came upon this book with its intriguing title. Mr. Hountondji is (or was) Professor of Philosophy at the National University of Benin, Cotonou and former Minister of Culture and Communication and Special Advisor to the Head of State of Benin, a small former French colony and then Marxist state, now a republic in western Africa. He was a visiting professor at our local university in 2008. The edition in my possession is part of a series called  African Systems of Thought.

In the preface, Hountondji sets down his perspective. First he follows Plato in that philosophy is the study of episteme (truth) not doxa (opinion). Philosophy cannot be inferred from culture and linguistics, so-called ethnophilosophy. Rather he defines African philosophy as literary works written by Africans and self-identified as philosophy. He also resists the idea of absorbing philosophy into politics.

A bit of history is instructive here. The science of anthropology arose in the 19th century against the backdrop of European colonialism and missionary work in Africa and elsewhere. In the traditional Western view, Africans were seen as ‘primitives’ and thought to have contributed very little to human ideas and civilization. By the 1920s, there was a movement to pluralism and relativism, and an attempt to revise the Western understanding of African philosophy. The main problem was the lack of written texts;  researchers were forced to extract philosophy from African culture and linguistics. Placide Tempels, a Belgian missionary, published his very influential book, Bantu Philosophy, in 1945. In it he distills from his observations the following:

“I believe that we should most faithfully render Bantu thought in the European language by saying that the Bantu speak, act, live as if, for them, beings were forces. Force is not for them an adventitious, accidental reality. Force is even more than a necessary attribute of beings: Force is the nature of being, force is being, being is force.”³

This seems, to me, incredibly powerful, and even complementary to the philosophy of Schopenauer (will) and Nietzsche (the will to power), but Hountondji and other Africans debunk it as mere European projection, especially as a means to enhance Christianization of Africans. Nonetheless later European and African intellectuals (such as Leopold Sengher, Alexis Kagame, and even Hountondji himself) expand on Tempel’s formulation or expend a great deal of energy on its refutation. Left unresolved is the question of the place for an alternate dynamic ontology of being as force in contrast to the classical Aristotelian static ontology of being as substance.

However, at the end of the day, I deeply respect the intellectual ideal that  all people develop their own philosophy through dialectic. We pick up with Hountondji’s arguments for an authentic African philosophy next time.

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¹Hountondji, Paulin J., African Philosophy – Myth and Reality. Indiana University Press, Bloomington, Indiana, 1996. ISBN 0-253-33229-X. This book is featured on the list of Africa’s 100 Best Books of the 20th Century.

²Ibid. Page 44.

³Ibid. Page 16.

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Having trouble leaving a question or comment?  E-mail me at gregoryciliberti@gmail.com