The Politics of History in Contemporary Africa

This book mediates a dialectics between power and subjectivity versus history and politics. The invention of Africa is not merely a residue of Africa's encounter with Europe but a project in continuity in contemporary history of Africa, where history has become a location of struggle and meaning, a location of power and domination. This book mediates a dialectics between power and subjectivity versus history and politics. The invention of Africa is not merely a residue of Africa's encounter with Europe but a project in continuity in contemporary history of Africa, where history has become a location of struggle and meaning, a location of power and domination. Eze contends that postcolonial African studies that thrive by way of unanimity, analogy, or homogenenity are merely advancing a "defeatist" historicism. It attempts to gain essence by inverting the terms of colonial discourse and is decisively implicated in the very logic of coloniality. This method of historiography not only stifles the overall socio-political imagination of contemporary Africa but offers a dogmatic blueprint for politics of domination. Eze argues that a chance for an African Renaissance is dependent on review mechanisms of African historiography "This book mediates a dialectics between power and subjectivity versus history and politics. The invention of Africa is not merely a residue of Africa's encounter with Europe but a project in continuity in contemporary history of Africa, where history has become a location of struggle and meaning, a location of power and domination. Eze contends that postcolonial African studies that thrive by way of unanimity, analogy, or homogenenity are merely advancing a "defeatist" historicism. It attempts to gain essence by inverting the terms of colonial discourse and is decisively implicated in the very logic of coloniality. This method of historiography not only stifles the overall socio-political imagination of contemporary Africa but offers a dogmatic blueprint for politics of domination. Eze argues that a chance for an African Renaissance is dependent on review mechanisms of African historiography."--Publisher's website

This book mediates dialectics between power and subjectivity versus history and politics. The invention of Africa is not merely a residue of Africa's encounter with Europe but a project in continuity in the contemporary history of Africa, where history has become a location of struggle and meaning, a location of power and domination. Eze contends that postcolonial African studies that thrive by way of unanimity, analogy, or homogenenity are merely advancing a defeatist historicism. It attempts to gain essence by inverting the terms of colonial discourse and is decisively implicated in the very logic of coloniality. This method of historiography not only stifles the overall sociopolitical imagination of contemporary Africa but offers a dogmatic blueprint for politics of domination. Eze argues that a chance for an African Renaissance is dependent on review mechanisms of African historiography.

Cover......Page 1 Contents......Page 8 Preface......Page 10 Acknowledgments......Page 14 1 Introduction......Page 16 2 The "Invention" of Africa: Contested Terrains......Page 32 3 Post-colonial Displacements......Page 76 4 Africanism: A History of Histories......Page 104 5 Beyond a History by Analogy......Page 150 6 Cult of Personalities and Politics of Domination......Page 172 7 Toward an African Renaissance......Page 196 Notes......Page 212 Bibliography......Page 222 Index......Page 230