Orality
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The ancient texts known as the Upaniṣads claim to expose the hidden connections between things, including the self and the world.
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An introduction to the “ethnophilosophy” approach inaugurated by Placide Tempels, its promises and potential pitfalls.
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A conversation with Sam Imbo on approaching oral traditions as philosophy and the Ugandan thinker and poet Okot p'Bitek.
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John Mbiti’s influential and controversial claim that traditional Africans experience time as having “a long past, a present, and virtually no future.”
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Traditional African ideas about personhood, which challenge assumptions about the relation between mind and body, self and other.
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What archeology, ethnography, and philosophical interpretation tell us about the diverse and often ambiguous roles of men and women in traditional African societies.
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Paulin Hountondji (pictured) and other African philosophers criticize ethnophilosophy and advocate a universalist approach.
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Henry Odera Oruka’s new method for exploring philosophy in Africa, based on interviews with wise individuals.
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An interview with Kai Kresse (pictured here with Ustadh Mahmoud Mau) who discusses his efforts to do "anthropology of philosophy" on the Swahili Coast.
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As the twentieth century draws to a close, the critique of ethnophilosophy gives way to approaches that continue to privilege the study of precolonial traditions, including the approach promoted by Kwasi Wiredu (pictured).
Note: we dedicate this episode to the memory of Kwame Gyekye, who passed away earlier this month.
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Co-host Chike Jeffers and Peter chat about the themes and questions raised by the podcast so far.
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John Jacob Thomas argues for self-government in the English colonies of the Caribbean but his fellow Trinidadian Frederick Alexander Durham recommends repatriation to Africa instead.
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Co-host Chike joins Peter to look back at series two and ahead to series three.
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Zora Neale Hurston’s interest in Africana folklore feeds into her great novel Their Eyes Were Watching God.
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The key events and figures in philosophy as an academic discipline, in both Africa and the diaspora, from the 1970s to the 1990s.
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What were ancient Chinese philosophical texts written on? How did writing relate to orally transmitted wisdom? How were texts read and used? And what even counted as a “text” in ancient China?
