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Options in African Philosophy

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 January 2009

G. S. Sogolo
G. S. Sogolo
Affiliation:
University of Ibadan
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Extract

Professor Peter Bodunrin's paper ‘The Question of African Philosophy’ (Philosophy 55 (1981) 161–179) has, as it were, become the first question for most African scholars, teachers or students, starting a course in African philosophy. In most of the discussions, the controversy over what constitutes an African philosophy tends to dominate, sometimes so much that it forms almost the entire content of the course.

Type
Articles
Information
Philosophy , Volume 65 , Issue 251 , January 1990 , pp. 39 - 52
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy 1990

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References

1 I admit that there are genuine grounds on which the identification of the core areas of philosophy should be made; it is perhaps necessary at the level of undergraduate teaching. But beyond that level one finds it difficult to see how Marxist philosphy or philosophical anthropology is less of a philosophy than say social and political philosophy, philosophical psychology or even philosophy of science.

2 Gellner, Ernest, Thought and Change, 3rd edn, (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1972), 12.Google Scholar

3 The Open Society and its Enemies, 4th edn, (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1962), 175.Google Scholar

4 Popper, K., op. cit., 173.Google Scholar

5 Footnote to Ch. 10 (p. 294) of Popper, 's Open Society and its Enemies.Google Scholar

6 Wiredu, Kwasi, Philosophy and an African Culture (Cambridge University Press, 1980) 42.Google Scholar

7 Mounce, H. O., ‘Understanding a Primitive Society’, Philosophy 48, No. 186 (10 1973), 347.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

8 Winch, Peter, ‘Understanding a Primitive Society’, American Philosophical Quarterly 1, (1964), 307–324.Google Scholar

9 Philosophy 54, No. 207 (01 1979).Google Scholar

10 Geach, P. T., op. cit., 11.Google Scholar

11 See Wiredu, 's Philosophy and an African Culture (Cambridge University Press, 1980)Google Scholar, and his ‘On an African Orientation in Philosophy’, Second Order 1, No. 2 (07 1972)Google Scholar; Bodunrin, 's ‘The Question of African Philosophy’, Philosophy 56, No. 216 (04 1981), 161–179CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Oruka, 's ‘The Fundamental Principles in the Question of African Philosophy’, Second OrderGoogle Scholar. Also Hountondji, 's African Philosophy: Myth or Reality (London: Hutchinson, 1976Google Scholar; English translation 1983).

12 This quotation is part of the summary of Wiredu's theme on the cover (paperback, 1st edn 1980) of his Philosophy and an African Culture.

13 See my ‘On an Orientation in African Philosophy’ forthcoming in the Ibadan Journal of Humanistic Studies, Faculty of Arts, University of Ibadan, Nigeria.

14 In Bodunrin, P. O. (ed.), Philosophy in Africa: Trends and Perspectives, (University of Ife Press, 1985), 43–54.Google Scholar

15 In Ibadan Journal of Humanistic Studies, University of Ibadan, No. 3 (10 1983), 113–132.Google Scholar

16 An unpublished paper.

17 Wiredu, Kwasi, Philosophy and an African Culture, op. cit., 48.Google Scholar

18 Momoh, C. S., ‘African Philosophy and Existence’, a paper presented at the conference of the Nigerian Philosophical Association, University of Lagos, 02 1982.Google Scholar

19 Published by Routledge, and Paul, Kegan (London, 1967)Google Scholar

20 I wish to express my sincere gratitude to Vernon Pratt of the School of Independent Studies, Lancaster, for his helpful criticism and suggestions about an earlier version of this paper.