African history has reflected and shaped internal and external power relations, particularly between Western and African peoples. It has been used and misused to vindicate and challenge political processes, value systems, and power structures. The term itself is contentious, while its normative structuring around the colonial period instinctively undervalues African’s agency by determining that exogenous factors are predominant. Nevertheless, for our study of 20th century Africa, this structuring highlights the overarching experience of the continent which was both central to and justified by historical scholarship. The term ‘African history’ will be taken to mean both academic and wider literary output concerned with or positioned within the African past. Furthermore, the extent to which it has ‘empowered’ Africans will be measured by the ability of those indigenous to the continent to define their history, gain a greater appreciation of the past and how it has impacted communities. From this basis, one can appreciate that the relative empowerment of Africans through history is determined by the form of history analysed, which in turn has changed over time due to political, particularly colonial, shifts in Africa. The 20th century saw a decline in traditional, Western histography on Africa. However, the racist narratives it propagated to justify colonialism and maintain centuries-long value systems continued to be thoroughly disempowering for Africans due to its continued pervasiveness. The onset of decolonisation enabled Africans to challenge these narratives through both scholarly work and popular literature, empowering them, although to differing degrees, to write their own history and begin to deconstruct racist notions.
Traditional, Western histography of Africa which disempowered Africans by propagating and justifying racist narratives intrinsic to the colonial project, saw a declining prevalence in the 20th century. This strain of historiography, typified by George Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, saw Africa as outside of history, “still involved in the conditions of mere nature” which meant it did not meet “the threshold of the World’s History”.[1] This in part stemmed from Western historians’ exposure, in Africa, to a historical record grounded in socio-cultural structures distinct from those in the West and established primarily through oral means and social memory rather than literature. However, it also fit comfortably into and perpetuated, the established narratives of African intellectual and material primitiveness used to justify colonialism, evident in Rudyard Kipling’s characterisation of colonialism as the “white man’s burden” to civilise people he described as “half devil and half child”[2] and “lesser breeds”[3] as well as wider colonial-era media.[4] Despite publications of this sort being concentrated in the early 20th century, they remained present, if not pervasive at least until the mid to late century. As late as 1960 historian Alfred Hanna wrote that without colonialism “the tribes of the Rhodesias and Nyasaland would have remained … with no ideals higher than the pride of bloodshed … [and] an attitude of apathy, improvidence and fatalism.”[5] These notions of Africans as primitive and barbarous however outlived their academic prominence. They remained engrained into the popular psyche – the product of decades of colonial education.[6] For Africans, the ideas of those, such as Sir Hugh Trevor-Roper, who degraded African history and culture as “unrewarding gyrations of barbarous tribes in picturesque but irrelevant corners of the globe”,[7] resulted in internalised racism regarding their own culture and people.[8]The functional impact of this was deference to Western ideas and history and an embarrassment with indigenous culture, which continues to this day, evident in practices such as skin bleaching in Ghana.[9] It was psychologically destructive for African communities, robbing them of collective self-esteem and promoting high levels of anxiety.[10] For Westerners, these prejudices inevitably shaped their interactions with African people. Western approaches to aid, for example, have been historically paternalist, informed, in some cases, such as in volunteer tourism, by a sense of racial superiority,[11] serving to further psychologically degrade African communities. Moreover, these narratives were also upheld by ‘evidence’ to their veracity, such as in the violence of the independence period, the genocide of Rwandan Tutsis in 1994[12] and authoritarian leaders such as Mobutu (who were seen to embody their subjects).[13] This mixture of ‘evidence’ and education ensured the continued pervasiveness of racist narratives, that had been peddled by Western historians, in the popular psyche even as it faded from academic history with dire psychological consequences.
This is not to say that this Western history was completely hegemonic in the early century when it was predominant. Many Africans saw the need for writing their own history, appreciating, as John Dube did in 1919, that “if there were Native Historians we would surely be reading a different story”.[14] Some Africans therefore, although a limited number due to the poor education afforded to them and the censoring of scholarly output by colonial authorities,[15] did write their history. Petros Lamula, was one such example, publishing UZulukaMalandela in 1924 – a history of the Zulus. However, Lamula’s example both represents attempts to empower Africans in the early century through history and explains their failure to do so. Lamula’s book attacked the white colonisers, criticised its missionaries[16] and exposed the biases of Western historians.[17]However, it was prevented from being used in education by the collusion of Education Department officials, missionaries and black moderates within the Teachers’ Union[18] while its’ sale was banned by the Norwegian Mission Society (of which Lamula was a part).[19] When books by African authors weren’t banned for their subversive potential, it could be guaranteed that the books were regarded as in line with the colonial narratives such as in the case of Appollo Kagwa’s The Kings of Buganda.[20] While this is an example of Africans writing their own history, rather than empowering Africans, it served to empower only Kagwa as he legitimised his power by giving it historical roots. Ordinary Africans remained just as disempowered. In fact, by centralising the importance of chiefs, he helped skew the historical record and further legitimise the colonial chief-tribe centric view of society and the proceeding colonial structure. Therefore, in the early century, Western historiographical narratives could remain, virtually unchallenged in the academic sphere, resulting in the further permeation of racist myths into African society.
Nevertheless, these narratives began to be challenged towards the mid-century when the independence movements of the 1940s-60s both liberated and provided impetus for African historical scholarship. This history told from the African perspective, provided an opportunity to deconstruct the Western history of the continent, and give a more authentic account of the past. Crucial in this development were the universities of the newly independent states. No longer the appendages to Western universities, the historians within these institutions pioneered Africanist history. They refuted the Western notions that Africa was “enveloped in the dark mantle of night”[21] pre-European intervention, with no real history, and that the colonial period was a golden age for Africa.[22] Particularly notable was the Ibadan School of History, led by Kenneth Dike. Dike’s Trade and Politics in the Niger Delta 1830-1885 undermined Hegel’s conception of an Africa without contribution to global history, “cut off from … the rest of the world”,[23] asserting Africa’s contribution in part by drawing a direct causal relationship between capital derived from African slave labour and Britain’s industrial revolution.[24] He was also pivotal in the development of scholarly use of oral history,[25] being the first historian to get oral material accepted as part of academic work.[26] This simultaneous challenge to Western historical narratives and methodology asserted African historians' claim to their history and allowed them to gain a better grasp of it, free of racist Western notions.
However, this history was not as empowering as one might assume. Africanist historians adopted Western historiographical traditions and narratives much more than they challenged them, helping to maintain the high level of esteem held for Western history which simultaneously relegated non-Western methods and scholarship. They adopted the Whiggish view of history as a story of progress that conformed to Western notions of civilisation and organisation. This teleological narrative is evident in the reinterpretation of the Mfecane as a movement towards political centralisation. Shula Marks praised “Shaka’s achievement in wielding a multi-tribal nation” which helped “previously disorganised people” create “new peoples, even new nations”.[27] Thus paradoxically, while Africanist history gave Africans a newly prominent role in telling their history, how they utilised this right both undermined the prestige of African scholarship and the complexities of African history. Africanist history also remained elite-centred, focussed on kings and chiefs, keeping the ordinary African from any greater appreciation of their history.[28] It was also heavily politicised, being highly nationalist, intent on instilling a sense of pride and unity among Africans rather than setting the historical record straight.[29] Nationalist leaders could thus utilise historical narratives, for political gain as Zambian Nationalist Harry Mwaanga Nkumbula did, appealing to history to demonstrate the inadequacy of tribal principles of affiliation, and thus demonstrate the need for national unity.[30] While this appeal to history was empowering to nationalists and its leaders, [31] the very nature of the ideology dictated that it would be disempowering to those outside the national sphere, while the inhomogeneity of support for nationalism meant that, for some, such appeals directly undermined their own beliefs. Indeed, such was the appreciation of history as a political tool by nationalist leaders that once they came to power they viewed scholarly history with great suspicion, resulting in funding cuts[32] that restricted the ability of Africans to contribute to their history. Thus, African historical output remained minimal, with only a 1.4% share in world publications in 1990.[33]This, along with the vast disparities in prestige (upheld by both Western and African historians) between African and Western historical study ensured that African contributions to scholarly debate remained limited – the practice of denoting African history remained, although not exclusively, in the hands of Western Historians. Furthermore, even this limited role was restricted to a small, highly educated, proportion of society with little bearing on the ordinary African, who remained outside this challenge to Western historical hegemony.
This attempted rebalancing of the narrative of ‘dark’ Africa was more impactful outside the academic sphere, through popular literature which did away with the need for Africans to meet the high academic threshold of scholarly history and allowed them to tell their own story, regardless of background. Nowhere is this more evident than in Drum magazine, founded in 1951 whose opening address was given by “Mr Masangu”, described as both a “sturly old African peasant” and “the most important person … [an] ordinary African”.[34]
This address reflects Drum’s egalitarian approach, publishing stories from across the socio-economic spectrum.[35] The emphasis on commonality continued in its emphasis on a shared colonial past, with stories drawn from across the continent. This combination of readability, egalitarian approach to inclusion and geographical range enabled it to be a truly pan-African newspaper, able to instil a sense of shared identity. Members of the African diaspora also contributed to this end in publications such as Presence Africaine, formed in Paris as a cultural review in 1947, becoming a mouthpiece of the Négritude movement.[36]However, such publications, just like the output from Africanist historians, were often out of the reach of ordinary Africans, remaining the virtual preserve of the highly educated. Drum remained exemplary in its role, empowering Africans to tell their own stories and providing them with a greater appreciation for their past, through highlighting their shared colonial experience. This also helped foster Pan-Africanism and anti-colonialism among the masses, helping them begin to dismantle racist notions from the ground up.
Therefore, the relative empowerment of Africans through African history shifted over the 20th century. By the turn of the century, if not mid-century, African history was no longer entirely disempowering. Africanist historians, despite their limited resources and societal reach, challenged the racist narratives of Western history instilling, if nothing else, pride in some due to both the very act of challenging the previously entirely hegemonic force in history and beginning the deconstruction of some of the most pervasive myths. Popular literature, the most empowering mode for African history, aided this challenge, demonstrating and fostering a unity set against the racist narratives of the colonial powers. Nevertheless, one should not overstate the extent of this shift. While African history empowered Africans in the 20th century to a degree not seen in the colonial era, it had only begun to deconstruct these narratives. The racist ideologies that underpinned, and were perpetuated by, Western historiography continued to disempower Africans. The psychological impacts of racism and how it informs societal expectations and interactions continue to be evident today. Moreover, there were many disparities in the relative empowerment of Africans dependent on socio-economic background, ideological conviction, and education level.
Anton Higgins is currently in his first year of a BA in History at Durham University (University College).
Notes: [1] Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, The Philosophy of History (2000) p. 117. [2] Rudyard Kipling, The White Man’s Burden (1899) https://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poem/poems_burden.htm (last accessed 22ndFebruary) [3] Rudyard Kipling, Recessional (1897) https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46780/recessional (last accessed 22nd February) [4] See, for example: ‘La France Va Pouvoir Porter Libremnet Au Maroc La Civilisation’, Le Petit Journal, 19th November 1911 https://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k7169830?rk=1008588;4 (last accessed 23rd February) and Victor Gillam, “‘The White Man’s Burden’ (Apologies to Rudyard Kipling)”, Judge magazine, Vol. 36, Issue. 911, 1st April 1899 https://archive.org/details/sim_judge_1899-04-01_36_911/page/n11/mode/2up (last accessed 23rd February) [5] A. J. Hannah, The Story of the Rhodesias and Nyasaland (London, 1960), p. 40 cited in Caroline Neale, Writing “Independent” History: African Historiography 1960-1980 (1985), pp. 8-9. [6] Philip. D. Curtin, “Recent Trends in African Historiography and their Contribution to History in General” in UNESCO General History of Africa, I: Methodology and African Prehistory (1981), p. 54. [7] Hugh Trevor-Roper, The Rise of Christian Europe cited in Ivor Wilks, ‘African Historiographical Traditions, Old and New’ in J. D. Fage (ed.), Africa Discovers Her Past (Oxford, 1970), p. 7. [8] Shawn O. Utsey, Jasmine A. Abrams, Annabella Opare-Henaku, Mark A. Bolden, and Otis Williams III, ‘Assessing the Psychological Consequences of Internalised Colonialism on the Psychological Well-Being of Young Adults in Ghana’, Journal of Black Psychology, Vol. 41, No. 2 (2015), p. 198. [9] K. Fokuo, ‘The lighter side of marriage: Skin bleaching in post-colonial Ghana’, African and Asian Studies, Vol. 8, pp. 125-146 cited in Utsey, Abrams, Opare-Henaku, Bolden, and Williams III, ‘Psychological Consequences of Internalised Colonialism’, p. 200. [10]Utsey, Abrams, Opare-Henaku, Bolden, and Williams III, ‘Psychological Consequences of Internalised Colonialism’, p. 199. [11] Ranjan Bandyopadhyay, ‘Volunteer tourism and “The White Man’s Burden”: globalisation of suffering, white saviour complex, religion and modernity’, Journal of Sustainable Tourism, Vol. 27, No. 3 (2019), p. 340. [12] Jean-François Bayart and Stephen Ellis, ‘Africa in the world: A history of extraversion’, African Affairs, Vol. 99, No. 395 (2000), p. 217. [13] Richard Reid, 'Images of an African ruler: Kabaka Mutesa of Buganda, ca.1857-1884', History in Africa, Vol. 26 (1999), p. 270. [14] Ilanga lase Natal, 21st March 1919 cited in Paul La Hausse De Lalouvière, ‘The War of the Books: Petros Lamula and the Cultural History of African Nationalism in Twentieth-Century Natal’, in Derek R. Peterson and Giacomo Macola (eds.), Recasting the Past: History Writing and Political Work in Modern Africa (Ohio, 2009), p. 52. [15] Frederick Cooper, Africa since 1940: The Past of the Present (Cambridge, 2002), p. 5. [16] La Hausse De Lalouvière, ‘The War of the Books’, p.57. [17] Ibid., p. 55. [18] Ibid., p. 58. [19] Ilanga lase Natal, 29th October 1926, and National Archives Repository Pretoria, NTS 1458, 174/214, Reasons for Secession and Difference, 6th September 1932 cited in La Hausse De Lalouvière, ‘The War of the Books’, p.57. [20] Apollo Kaggwa, The Kings of Buganda (Bassekabaka ba Buganda) (1971) [21] Hegel, The Philosophy of History, p. 109. [22] Ebere Nwaubani,“Kenneth Onwuka Dike, Trade and Politics, and the Restoration of the African in History” History in Africa, Vol. 27 (January 2000), p. 243. [23] Hegel, The Philosophy of History, p. 174. [24] Nwaubani, ‘the Restoration of the African in History’, p. 232. [25] W. E. B. Du Bois, The World and Africa: An Inquiry into the Part Which Africa Has Played in World History (1947), p. xxvii. [26] J. F. Ade Ajayi, “Towards a More Enduring Sense of History” in J. F. Ade Ajayi, History and the Nation and Other Addresses (Ibadan, 1990), p. 41 cited in Nwaubani, ‘the Restoration of the African in History’, p. 246. [27] S. Marks, “The Rise of the Zulu Kingdom” in R. Oliver (ed.), The Middle Age of African History (Oxford, 1967), pp. 90-91, cited in Neale, African Historiography’, p. 15. [28] C. C. Wrigley, “Historicism in Africa: Slavery and State Formation”, African Affairs, Vol. 70, No. 279 (1971), p. 123 cited in Neale, ‘African Historiography’, p. 16. [29] T. O. Ranger, “Towards a Usable African Past”, in C. Fyfe (ed.), African Studies Since 1945 (London, 1976), p. 23 cited in Neale, ‘African Historiography’, p. 18. [30] Harry Mwaanga Nkumbula, ‘Life and Customs of the Baila’ cited in Giacomo Macola, “Imagining the Nation: Harry Mwaanga Nkumbula between Politics and History”, in Peterson and Macola (eds.), Recasting the Past, p. 101. [31] Curtin, ‘Recent Trends in African Historiography’, p. 56. [32] Nwaubani, ‘the Restoration of the African in History’, p. 232. [33] Jeremiah O. Arowosegbe, ‘African scholars, African studies and knowledge production on Africa’, Africa, Vol. 86, No. 2 (2016), p. 327. [34] Drum, March 1951 cited in Tom Odhiambo, ‘Inventing Africa in the twentieth century: Cultural imagination, politics and transnationalism in Drum magazine’, African Studies 65, 2 (2006), p. 164. [35] Odhiambo, ‘Drum magazine’, p.167. [36] Ibid., pp. 161-2.
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