Afrocentricity

Afrocentricity: The Theory of Social Change, the first edition of which was published in 1980, was Molefi Kete Asante's initial thrust toward a critical theoretical framework that advocates analysis of African history and culture and, more generally, world history and culture from an African perspective. Such an Afrocentric critique situates the analysis of phenomena in the cultural agency of African people. The Afrocentrist asserts that knowledge of classical and contemporary, continental and diasporic African history and culture is inextricable from and indispensable to any analysis or proper interpretation of Africa and Africans.

Though the theory of Afrocentricity has antecedents and borrows from several social and political theories, it was not until the publication of Afrocentricity that the theory received its first sophisticated and systematic treatment. This book became the signature work in the field. It signaled a new adventure in intellectual activity and lifted the work of scholars in African American Studies (also called Black Studies) to a more theoretical plane and provided a basis for an Afrocentric critique of Western culture. A second, revised and expanded edition of Afrocentricty: The Theory of Social Change was published in 2003 by African American Images of Chicago. Asante has observed that although Afrocentrists often harbor varying intellectual agendas and interests, which reflect their training in diverse academic disciplines and their radically different political persuasions, what makes them Afrocentrists is their conscious utilization of a historically and culturally grounded African approach to and analysis of knowledge and experience.

The book Afrocentricity builds on the thought and practice of many activist-intellectuals and highlights key areas for developing Afrocentric critique. Thus the [Page 73]central tasks of a serious discussion of Afrocentricity, as both a critical theory of contemporary society and a cultural consciousness-raising movement, are (1) explaining its core characteristics, concepts, and basic categories of analysis; (2) bringing to the fore the major moments and the often shrouded meaning of its discourse and debates; and (3) seriously and soberly delineating the criticisms of Afrocentricity.

Afrocentricity sought to provide a coherent conceptual framework. This framework in Asante's view takes culture to be simultaneously crucial and critical with regard to efforts aimed at the mental and physical emancipation of Africans in particular and humanity in general. Asante argues in Afrocentricity that culture is precisely what enables one to locate a theorist and his or her text, deciphering whether the language, attitude, and direction, among other aspects of the text, are anti-African and therefore anti-human. Upon locating an anti-African text, the Afrocentrist critiques the text by radically rereading it, that is, locating it in light of African historical and cultural experience.

Afrocentricity considers the historical fact that the European imperial impulse has led to Native American holocaust and almost absolute physical and cultural decimation of Native Americans; African Holocaust (maangamizi in Kiswahili), enslavement, and colonization; and the domination and colonization of various Asian peoples. Therefore, Afrocentricity argues, Africans should cease imitating Europe and its mores and offer ethical and egalitarian alternatives to the established imperial order by asking Africa questions and seeking from African history and culture answers to the major issues of the modern epoch.

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