African Renaissance

African Renaissance is the name of an intellectual movement with the purpose of expanding and promoting the ideas of Cheikh Anta Diop. The movement was founded in the early 1990s in Paris by professor Theophile Obenga and nuclear physicist Cheikh M'Backe Diop, the son of Cheikh Anta Diop. In 1948, Cheikh Anta Diop had called for an African Renaissance based on the values and constructs of African reality. The African Renaissance movement is thus related to the Afrocentricity movement in its determination to define African ideas and ideals from an African perspective. Furthermore, like Afrocentricity, the African Renaissance movement views ancient Kemet as the starting place for all discussions of culture and language in the African world.

Under the direction and tutelage of Theophile Obenga, the African Renaissance group in Paris organized themselves into a school devoted to teaching and publishing Afrocentric scholarship. Cheikh M'Backe Diop used his scientific background to advance the work of the group. The combination of the efforts and talents of African linguist, historian, and philosopher Theophile Obenga and nuclear physicist Cheikh M'Backe Diop contributed to African Renaissance becoming a major instrument in the dissemination of Afrocentric ideas in the Francophone world.

In the beginning, a core group of 8 to 12 intellectuals, professionals in such fields as education, science, communication, and computer science, started meeting twice a month in Paris at the Sorbonne with the idea of creating the foundation for a renaissance in African thinking. Over time, they attracted hundreds of students to their seminars and published many books in support of the African Renaissance movement. Among the activities of the African Renaissance group is the publication of the journal ANKH, the leading journal in the study of Kemet in the African world. ANKH has defended the positions outlined by Cheikh Anta Diop in his earlier works on the African origin of civilization and advanced a pan-African study of the connectedness of African languages to the Nile Valley civilizations.

African Renaissance promoter Salomon Mezepo, an architect and the publisher of Menaibuc Editions, emerged as a leading personality in the promotion of the work of the African Renaissance movement. Menaibuc published the writings and scholarship of the major African Renaissance scholars, such as Theophile Obenga, Jean Philippe Omotunde, Ama Mazama, Nzue Paulin Carlos Mozer, Gregoire Biyogo, and others. A principal scholar and teacher in the African Renaissance school is Jean Philippe Omotunde, who embarked on a campaign to reeducate the French public about the African origin of civilization. Like Obenga, his major teacher, Omotunde gathered many facts of African history and culture and presented them in powerful analytical and critical works.

African Renaissance is linked with the Afrocentricity intellectual movement, the Temple Circle, and other groups and scholars interested in classical civilizations, African advancement, and the general rise of humanity. Each year members of the African Renaissance join in the academic conference held in Philadelphia that is dedicated to Cheikh Anta Diop.