The African Diaspora and Higher Education in Africa

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Toyin Falola

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Nov 10, 2019, 6:03:51 PM11/10/19
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I write from Addis-Ababa where I am for a major conference on the African Diaspora and higher education in Africa. If you have great ideas, I will be sure to pass them around and make them part of our discussion.

TF

Michael Afolayan

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Nov 11, 2019, 2:06:37 AM11/11/19
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Here is an idea (not sure if it falls in the paradigm of being "great", and not sure if it is not too late for this conference): but kindly let folks know, if they don't already, that the Diaspora influence in higher education in Africa has been so minimal (almost negligible). Nigeria is my region of focus here since I don't possess adequate knowledge of what entails with Diaspora folks in other African countries. As highly trained and endowed as Africans in the Diaspora are, and as influential in higher education, especially in the Americas, as they are (for instance, hardly is there any major - or even minor, degree awarding institution in the United States where Nigerians are not present as high-level faculty or administrators), one would expect a correspondent high-level presence of cooperation between the African Diaspora and the home base. Why are there no such actively coordinated joint efforts (not just scanty individuals) in higher education of Diasporeans in various African countries?

Michael O. Afolayan
===

On Monday, November 11, 2019, 12:03:53 AM GMT+1, Toyin Falola <toyin...@austin.utexas.edu> wrote:


I write from Addis-Ababa where I am for a major conference on the African Diaspora and higher education in Africa. If you have great ideas, I will be sure to pass them around and make them part of our discussion.

TF

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Moses Ebe Ochonu

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Nov 11, 2019, 10:55:42 AM11/11/19
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Oga Falola,

Tell the AU to endow a special fund to support what I call model continental journals, which would be edited rigorously and advised by mixed panels of both Diaspora and Africa-based scholars. There should be five or six journals--one each for the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, the arts, technology and engineering, and medicine. This should be a ten-year experiment, after which, should it prove successful, editorial control should be turned over completely to Africa-based scholars and the model should be replicated in regions--West, Central, North, South, and East Africa--by the subregional bodies. Also, if the model is successful, individual nations with a critical pool of diaspora scholars can domesticate it and establish their own model national journals. Finally, the philosophical thrust of these journals should be an explicit accent on the production of useable, instrumental, and Africa-centered knowledge--that is, knowledge that illuminates the African condition and/or ameliorates it. In other words, such journals should combine rigor and relevance.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/1507829677.1523019.1573443626657%40mail.yahoo.com.

Julius Eto

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Nov 11, 2019, 1:21:27 PM11/11/19
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Dear Prof Falola,

Thanks for the effort but let's leave out Arabs and Arabised North Africa(ns) from any Diaspora and Africa-based journal and research. They are racist supremacists who have always looked down on black people since the Trans-Saharan slave trade.

Arabs and their Afro-Asiatic cousins only identify with black Africa for political, economic, diplomatic and other gains while fomenting religious crises everywhere as the internecine violence and wars in Mali, Chad, Niger and even Nigeria, show.


tunde jaiyeoba

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Nov 11, 2019, 1:22:16 PM11/11/19
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Dear "Ojogbon Agba" (Great Professor) TF, thanks for the opportunity.

One thing is clear, there is something inherently wrong with the management and administration of education in Africa and the African society that makes people that started a level of education (primary, secondary, first degree, Masters or PhD) from Africa departing Africa and becoming leaders in their fields in the developed world. I think a brainstorming session is needed on this fact.

The Nigerian situation is peculiar. One the one hand there is so called 'autonomy' of tertiary institutions, on the other hand there are centralisation tendencies as represented by the National Universities Commission (NUC). The government places embargo on employment and sends accreditors to be checking staff to student ratio or does not provide materials and equipment and is now checking how many laboratories you have. Another example is having minimum standards that are outdated because they were compiled by Professors that are no longer in touch with contemporary trends. These minimum standards are meant to be followed almost verbatim -hook, line and sinker- even if an institution desires to add more. Often the only possible way to add more recent things is to add another year to the course of study since the minimum requirements will have covered almost the maximum units and years of study.

 How do you deal with a system that finds it difficult for institutions to respond to the demand of students for particular courses and dual /multiple degrees because of over centralisation of administrative and management framework of NUC, Federal Ministry of Education, TERTFUND and the likes. At the root of 'autonomy' is who funds education , what is the position of the government on fees, what frameworks are in place for funding education especially of brilliant but poor students and those who are hungry for education but no means. Also, many people might not believe this, there is inadequate tertiary education opportunities. 

The other issue especially in the case of Nigeria is that government agencies and related institutions  work independently as if they have no relations at all. You have a National Population Commission that perhaps is unaware of research in Statistics and Demographic Studies departments except when the later need data for analysis. Just one example that  came into my mind. Nigeria Building and Road Research Institute that cannot compile problems for engineering departments to work on and will not attend /sponsor conferences organised by say a Civil/Highway engineering department. The town-gown collaboration is very weak in terms of Public-Private--Educational sector framework. Communiques are compiled after every major conference or workshop and they have no effect whatsoever on policies and action either in the public or private sector. I think this is one of the roots of our under development.

I know many other similar issues will be raised here and at the conference. I hope this contribution is on time for Prof TF.



Babatunde JAIYEOBA
















E. Babatunde JAIYEOBA PhD
Professor of Architecture
Head, Department of Architecture
Faculty of Environmental Design and Management
Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria









Gloria Emeagwali

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Nov 11, 2019, 1:22:39 PM11/11/19
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Remind them that awareness of Africa’s ancient technology in terms of metallurgy, architecture, ceramics, navigation and so on, is of fundamental  importance in stimulating in the current generation their potentialities 
and capabilities - with pedagogical 
implications. Africa should be at the center of the ongoing revolution in genomics, molecular biology and physics, that is making it possible to understand  our ancient history.The decolonization of Knowledge across periods, from antiquity to the present, is crucial in avoiding the perpetuation of false information and self hate.

Gloria Emeagwali 

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OLAYINKA AGBETUYI

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Nov 11, 2019, 1:22:49 PM11/11/19
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One reason may be that local African scholars may resent the American scholarly Condition foisted in them where it is not necessary thereby stifling local initiatives.

It is useful that the diaspora is not limited to America nor the West alone.

OAA



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-------- Original message --------
From: 'Michael Afolayan' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Date: 11/11/2019 07:15 (GMT+00:00)
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - The African Diaspora and HigherEducation  in Africa

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Here is an idea (not sure if it falls in the paradigm of being "great", and not sure if it is not too late for this conference): but kindly let folks know, if they don't already, that the Diaspora influence in higher education in Africa has been so minimal (almost negligible). Nigeria is my region of focus here since I don't possess adequate knowledge of what entails with Diaspora folks in other African countries. As highly trained and endowed as Africans in the Diaspora are, and as influential in higher education, especially in the Americas, as they are (for instance, hardly is there any major - or even minor, degree awarding institution in the United States where Nigerians are not present as high-level faculty or administrators), one would expect a correspondent high-level presence of cooperation between the African Diaspora and the home base. Why are there no such actively coordinated joint efforts (not just scanty individuals) in higher education of Diasporeans in various African countries?

Michael O. Afolayan
===

On Monday, November 11, 2019, 12:03:53 AM GMT+1, Toyin Falola <toyin...@austin.utexas.edu> wrote:


I write from Addis-Ababa where I am for a major conference on the African Diaspora and higher education in Africa. If you have great ideas, I will be sure to pass them around and make them part of our discussion.

TF

--
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfric...@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDial...@googlegroups.com
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Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
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Abidogun, Jamaine M

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Nov 13, 2019, 1:29:32 AM11/13/19
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This last comment regarding “Arabs and Arabised North Africa(ns)” should be disregarded as an overgeneralized, bigoted statement.  It is a win/movement forward to recognize the North and Northeast; as we seek to deconstruct earlier foreign divisions of the continent that originally created racial hierarchies to their advantages. To recognize and lessen the impact of such historical constructions and address them is much need.

 

Franz Fanon is listening somewhere among the ancestors.

 

-Jamaine Abidogun

 

From: 'Julius Eto' via USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Monday, November 11, 2019 12:02 PM
To: USAAfricaDialogue <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - The African Diaspora and Higher Education in Africa

 

Dear Prof Falola,

Emeagwali, Gloria (History)

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Nov 15, 2019, 10:46:06 AM11/15/19
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The great irony is that the  Afro-Asiatic Language Family to which  Eto makes reference,
emanates from  south of Khartoum and the  confluence of the Blue Nile and
the White Nilethat flows from the Rwanda-Burundi-Uganda region.

Ehret (2019) considers Omotic to be the starting point of the Afro-Asiatic  language
family. See his Harvard lecture "The Africanity of ancient Egypt."

Omotic speakers are at the intersection  of South Sudan,
Northern Kenya and Southwest Ethiopia.


Professor Gloria Emeagwali
History Department, Central Connecticut State University
www.africahistory.net
Gloria Emeagwali's Documentaries
2014 Distinguished Research Excellence Award in African Studies
 University of Texas at Austin
2019   Distinguished Africanist Award                   
New York African Studies Association
 


From: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Abidogun, Jamaine M <Jamaine...@MissouriState.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, November 12, 2019 11:08 PM
To: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: RE: USA Africa Dialogue Series - The African Diaspora and Higher Education in Africa
 

Please be cautious: **External Email**

Emeagwali, Gloria (History)

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Nov 16, 2019, 4:27:15 PM11/16/19
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Awosika Itunu

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Nov 17, 2019, 7:54:58 AM11/17/19
to 'Adeshina Afolayan' via USA Africa Dialogue Series
Here is my thinking......... It would be good if research partnerships are formed with faculty and staff of benefiting African institutions in such a way that they too can visit institutions in the diasporas for research Collaborative  activities and faculty exchange in order to cross fertilize research and cultural ideas and use the outcomes to enrich curriculums and cultural emancipation.........

Thank you.

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/DM6PR01MB3737E48B3DD33207B08114E5DE700%40DM6PR01MB3737.prod.exchangelabs.com.

Gloria Emeagwali

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Nov 17, 2019, 1:03:55 PM11/17/19
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Great points. Reciprocity is key. 

Even where there is no system in place, the first ones to venture out 
may lead the way to the eventual regularization of reciprocal 
exchanges.

GE



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