Guest Editor’s Introduction: The Time of Africana Philosophy

Africana philosophy is in the main a of present. Many will demur and with good reason. In first place, worrying about definition animating energies philosophers, philosophers have looked to past furnish answers former, future motivate its orientation latter. For Lucius Outlaw, for example, writing Stanford Encyclopedia Philosophy, “Africana third-order, metaphilosophical, umbrella-concept used bring organizing oversight various efforts philosophizing—that is, activities reflective, critical thinking articulation aesthetic expression—engaged by persons peoples African descent who were are indigenous residents continental Africa many Diasporas worldwide” (2017, paragraph).If, then, on one hand, Outlaw’s points make intelligible contours philosophy—“persons . descent”—it end mobilizing toward future. “In all cases,” he argues, “the point much [Africana] philosophizings has been confer meaningful orderings individual shared living natural social worlds while resolving recurrent, emergent, radically disruptive challenges existence so as survive, endure, flourish across successive generations.” It striking, that, though, that makes sure insist philosophizing, verb, rather than philosophy, noun. name [Africana philosophy] does not refer particular philosophical system, method, or tradition” (2017). Rather, it primarily doing. Where, invoked give shape contours, doing philosophy—practices moment, present—are revealed be constitutive marrow.In history few encounters clarify present stakes bitter debate erupted post-independence over whether there could said an philosophy. protagonists other commentators, those debates seemed overwhelmingly fights past—specifically, precolonial past. Those came identified ethnophilosophers held worldviews societies constituted coherent systems thought worthy “philosophy.” They vehemently opposed insisted universalist standpoint, led redoubtable Beninois Paulin Hountondji. These argued bent task recuperating traditional anthropology, philosophy.At glance, would seem these little tell us Indeed, overwhelming weariness among regarding pitched factionalized disputations tore through discipline immediate era. And yet view now passé, relics distractions from immature era fledgling discipline, cannot account their stakes; why precisely they rancorous, why, even today, occasion simmering tensions embittered eruptions philosophers. Ethnophilosophers, after all, intent epistemes out sheer curiosity. intervening deeply contested sociopolitical cleavages time.Alexis Kagame, renowned within field most prominent emerged mid-twentieth century. His explication ontology Bantu, Bantu languages, ought seen piece his position central court historian political theorist Kingdom Rwanda. As Claudine Vidal (1991) established, Kagame’s influential scholarship had primary goals justification constitutional monarchy. half century writings, Rwandese leaders power wake 1990s genocide seize portrayal Rwanda pastoral formation testimony Greater justifying irredentist ambitions (Pottier 2002).Where claimed past, universalists widely book, Philosophy: Myth Reality, Hountondji this explicit: “The theoretical liberation discourse presupposes liberation. We today at center tangle problems. The need struggle itself felt levels, planes. I shall simply add simple clarity well resolve needed if we succeed. stake” (1983, 46). But just ethnophilosophical antagonists—though pitching camp antipodes future—the real temporal locus Hountondji’s concentrated anxieties very forged crucible present.It though suffuses saturates ideas, relationships, registers field, idioms grounding metaphors, turn states. reasons worth exploring. A potential response may recognition present” never immediately available naïve forms apprehension. German anthropologist Johannes Fabian famously articulated, non-Western long objects study anthropology denied “coevalness”—a space time Westerners. reveals acute antinomy anthropological practice: “On hand dogmatically rests ethnographic research involving personal, prolonged interaction Other. then pronounce upon knowledge gained such discourse, which construes Other terms distance, spatial temporal” (2003, xli). He describes allochronism accounts (Western) believes themselves here (non-Western) subject (32).Fabian conceives significantly epistemological construction, but rhetorical ones. denial coevalness, out, “rests negation materiality communication language. temporality speaking implies cotemporality producer product, speaker listener, Self Other” 164). practical manifestations phenomenon everywhere disciplines. Africans Afro-diasporic people discovered, discoverers. are, draw great thinker W. E. B. Du Bois, investigate problems problem (1903).As any close reader notice, Fabian’s cri de coeur acknowledgment alterity reiterates motif West spatially differentiated substances existing “externally” relation another. Significantly, diagnoses largely representational phenomenological terms. Other’s empirical presence turns into absence, conjuring trick worked array devices common function keep outside anthropology,” argues no wonder when moves beyond diagnosis ventures prescriptions, sees path forward refurbishment anthropology: “Ultimately, anthropology’s who, spoken only absentia” (175).One limitation approach way foregrounds epistemic answer historical-structural relation. Moreover, absence psychologistic register, states affairs enacted theaters mind. radical alternative however, available. This register historically materialist phantasmatic terrain, bound up last instance intermeshed historical dynamics capitalist value-form, white supremacist anti-Black conjunctures, hetero-patriarchal libidinal economies. Toni Morrison (2007) written, argument whose context literature carries disciplines sciences, totemic values North Atlantic world—“individualism, masculinity, engagement versus isolation; ambiguous moral problematics; thematics innocence coupled obsession figurations death hell”—are “responses dark, abiding, signing Africanist presence.”Fabian testimony, notion venture claim presence, now, apt shrink their, our, actually insistences life imagination. Even imagines coevalness issue ideal communicative encounter between Western researcher (African) Other, can barely get himself countenance spectral, upshot: “I am still nowhere near understanding implications nor do know how quandary ambition puts into: succeed making others put business representers / representatives?” 175). abide already given vehement disavowal contained question. To acknowledge radicalism words, what impossible, ipso facto, must abolished possible. That, ineluctably, abolition such. West,” always reminded, “is West. project, place” (Glissant 1989, 2). That project racial capitalism, world planetary plunder, patriarchal heteronormative domination, eugenicist ableist violence, more, litanies quotidian punctual atrocity. At stake, abolition, say, revolution.The articles special tarry material spectral upshot abolition. befitting journal dedicated interanimation rhetorical, traverse fraught terrain form content, image, language silence, text sound.Alena Rettová’s Genres Swahili Philosophy” questions nonfictional prose counts dominance idea she cut off “from cultures origin, networks circulation, local audiences.” Rettová, more promising route consist taking seriously diversity richness genres languages cultures. Rettová conducts brilliant reading proverbs, musical performances, metric free-verse poetry, novelistic prose, translations. excavating insights genres, demonstrates ineliminable mediations genre robust tradition.Bryan Mukandi’s “Pan-African Pandemonium: Identities, Histories Constellations” offers searching examination imagine pan-African subjectivity against background sociohistorical ruptures slavery, colonialism, postcolonial authoritarianism. Pushing “ontological exceptionalism” advanced disparate Senghorian Negritude Afropessimism, Mukandi instead listens dissonances forms. where find pandemonium reverberations diaspora, finds flows confluence. Ultimately, seeks diasporic sensibility “traverses aesthetic, ethical political.”The third article, “Watery Hauntings: Glossary Philosophy Different Key,” Louise du Toit Azille Coetzee, reads erasures, foreclosures, violences reinscribed philosophy’s desire “Philosophy,” tout court. Where canonical disavows material, particular, embodied, Coetzee invite philosophizing theorizing attuned discarded Black women’s creative work, argue opens glossary different key.Amir Jaima’s “To Make Scholar Black: Constructive Analysis Discursive Orientation Toward Blackness” examines texts take whiteness Blackness. Jaima discursive Blackness expands range rigor texts. Specifically, being oriented Blackness, conspicuous features, nonwhite narratee, articulates personal analyses.Finally, Omedi Ochieng’s “After Thought: Sylvia Wynter Ends Knowledge” invites inquiry Wynter’s thought. thought, charts cartography intransigently committed vision intellectual imagination ambitious staying true grain detail liminal, minoritized, particular. Ochieng wants open work labor comes theory.If present, volume necessarily refuses offer definitive, totalizing strives improvisatory, provisional, experimental. Precisely so, urgent, vital—to strive enact practice nothing less, also praxis abolitionist horizon, ecological, political, ethical, existential.