Neocolonialism: Cheikh Anta Diop – Against the arrogance of the West

It is said about Cheikh Anta Diop that he gave Africans back their historical consciousness. There were and are good reasons for this assessment, although in some points his central theses offer more speculation than empirically proven knowledge. They are: Firstly, Africa is characterized by a cultural unity and secondly, the ancient Egyptian culture is of Negroid origin and thirdly Ancient Greek philosophy almost seamlessly adopted ancient Egyptian thinking. This led Diop to return to the sources, i.e. to return to ancient Egyptian culture of Negroid origin. Today this approach would probably be referred to as Afrofuturism.

Cheikh Anta Diop was born on December 29, 1923 in Thieytou, a small Senegalese village near Diourbel, to a Wolof Muslim family. He received his schooling in both Koranic schools and in Catholic schools run by the colonial power France. He continued his physics studies, which he began in Dakar, in Paris. He also studied history and ethnology at the Sorbonne in Paris, including with Marcel Griaule. In 1954, Présence Africaine published his book “Nations nègres et culture,” which is considered a classic work of “African authenticity.” Working in Paris until 1960, he was then co-founder and leader of several opposition parties in Senegal. The Rassemblément National Démocratique (RDA) became one of the strongest opposition parties in Senegal. Diop is best known as a historian, physicist and cultural theorist, and is particularly controversial as an Egyptologist because of some bold theses. Cheikh Anta Diop died on February 7, 1986 in Dakar.

Although many of his views cannot be proven, for example the congruence of Egyptian and African gods, Diop became a symbol of the striving for emancipation of science in Africa. In the context of colonial history, missionary work characterized by paternalism, as well as Hegel’s view of Africa’s lack of history, this was only too understandable. The ignorance and – worse still – degradation of any achievements of Africans has characterized historiography since ancient times. In ancient times there was still a great deal of ignorance about the cultures south of the Sahara, but there were repeated contacts with today’s Ethiopia, Egypt and Nubia. These were not without conflict, there was talk of barbarians, but at the same time they were often viewed more or less as partners, competitors or enemies on equal terms. Back then, as it often does today, “at eye level” did not mean that “the others” first had to be raised to the level of “our values” before they were allowed to sit at the table with “us” on equal terms. The Histories of Herodotus, to which Diop refers, provide impressive evidence of this.

Cheikh Anta Diop wanted to use the most precise research possible, including scientific research, to prove that it was Africans who made decisive contributions to the development of human civilization. As a scientist and politician, he wanted to make concrete suggestions to help Africans look at their history with self-confidence and shape their own future. In Africa, Diop rightly emphasized, there were highly developed civilizations similar to those north of the Mediterranean with effective administrative structures, sophisticated technologies and strong power apparatuses, for example Aksum as well as in Benin, Ghana, Zimbabwe and especially in Egypt. There would therefore be no reason to view the history of Africa solely as a history of individual isolated “tribes” and thus to completely ignore the cultural unity of the continent. Diop advocated a new Pan-Africanism. This also includes treating African languages ​​as equal to other languages. He suggested curricula whose content, even in kindergartens and primary schools, should overcome colonial perspectives and structures as well as communication exclusively in the languages ​​of the colonial powers that supposedly only meet modern requirements. As proof that African languages ​​can convey highly complex issues, Diop translated excerpts from Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity into his native language, Wolof.

What is interesting about Diop’s writings is the lack of an abstract concept of freedom. For him, freedom was concrete and included the active aspect of political liberation. This approach and his reflections and suggestions on the social structure of African societies and economic development earned him the reputation of a Marxist. As early as 1954, in the foreword to the first edition of his main work, he wrote about his methodical approach that he had not thought up any questions with desirable answers. So for him it was about analysis and not about confessions. Diop himself said: “Anyone who uses Marxism as a guide for their actions on African terrain will essentially come to the same conclusions.”

A still largely unknown area of ​​Diop’s academic work is his reflections on African philosophy. However, it is precisely here that his theoretical weaknesses become visible. What truth should be gained if philosophical statements are linked to skin color or collective ethnic characteristics? On the other hand, the change of perspective propagated by Diop against racism and Eurocentrism results in an epistemologically contradictory approach that rejects closed systems. He not only criticized corresponding theories that had been handed down and adopted from Europe, but was also quite self-critical of his own previously advocated theses. What the philosopher and former Minister of Culture of Benin Paulin Hountondji wrote generally about African philosophy applies to the appreciation and critical discussion of Cheikh Anta Diop’s scientific achievements: »We don’t need a closed system to which we all adhere and which we can present exhibitionistically to the rest of the world . No, we want restless doubt, an unbridled dialectic that now and then produces systems and ultimately recommends them to the horizon of new truths.«

Cheikh Anta Diop’s legacy warns to put a stop to the resurgence of “Western” arrogance. Not contradicting the slogans of a “values-based world order,” which should be the sole benchmark for all states and regions of the world, would amount to an impoverishment of intellectual debates about the future in a multipolar world.

In 2016, the office of the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation in Dakar hosted a conference with more than 150 participants that focused on Diop’s economic policy views. One speaker was the Senegalese Felwine Sarr, at the time professor of economics at the Université Gaston-Berger in Saint Louis, now best known as the author of the report on the restitution of African cultural assets, written together with Bénédicte Savoy. Example of collegial cooperation at eye level, as Diop had wanted.

On the 100th anniversary of Diop’s birth, representatives of the RND he founded emphasized as his legacy that all Senegalese and other African patriots and democrats should unite in the fight for true political, economic and cultural liberation of the country and the continent.

Dr. Gerd-Rüdiger Hoffmann, philosopher and African scholar; born 1952; Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung Brandenburg.