Gadflies and public intellectuals

[Sabella Abidde]

Good greetings friends and colleagues:

Please help. In your part of the continent -- East, West, Central, North, and Southern Africa -- who were some of the noted gadflies/public intellectuals during the colonial, post-colonial, and post-2000 eras? I am asking because I am about to start work on “The State of Public Intellectualism in Africa” and would like to compile a representative list. Thanks and have a pleasant week.

Cordially,

Sabella Abidde

Sab...@gmail.com

[Harrow, Kenneth]

Pius adesanmi, ali mazrui, wole soyinka, toyin falola, \

Although not african i'd include henry louis gates jr

Kwame appiah

Chimimanda adichie

Dennis brutus

Kenneth Harrow

517 803 8839

Emeritus Professor of English, Michigan State University

Harrow@msu/edu

Get Outlook for iOS

---

From: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Sabella Abidde <sab...@gmail.com>
Sent: Thursday, March 14, 2024 12:30:41 AM
To: USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Gadflies and public intellectuals

 

--
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
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialo...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/7c13901e-a462-4d68-839e-2e2e75556521n%40googlegroups.com.

[Sabella Abidde]

Hello Prof. Harrow,

Thanks for the names. I appreciate it.

Regards,

Sabella

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/BL1PR12MB5755BB21E91D0E8AFBF71669DA292%40BL1PR12MB5755.namprd12.prod.outlook.com.

--

Sabella Ogbobode Abidde, PhD
Professor, Department of History and Political Science
Alabama State University, Montgomery Alabama 36104
Office Phone: 334-604-8038

Cell Phone: 334-753-4026

Book Series Editor:

Africa-East Asia International Relations | Book series home (springer.com)

African Governance, Development, and Leadership (Lexington Books)

[Patrick Effiboley]

This is a good initiative. I would like to add

Spero Stanislas Adotévi,

Paulin Hountondji

Theophile Obenga

Dr Emery Patrick EFFIBOLEY

Maître de conférences en Histoire de l'Art

Chef, Département d'Histoire et d'Archéologie, Université d'Abomey-Calavi, Bénin

Andrew W. Mellon Postdoctoral Research Fellow, University of the Witwatersrand,Johannesburg,(2014-2016) 

www.researchgate.net/Profile/Emery_Effiboley

 

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/CAPNGb4S_N529F564OS8qwVr5cn6zNgdCKGd1g-OupyCGtfsLxg%40mail.gmail.com.

[Chidi Anthony Opara, FIIM, CDOA]

I will like to add:

(1) Tenkobo

(2) Osama 

(3) Prof Prof 

(All of Arugo Motor Park Owerri)

-CAO 

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/635719534.7545917.1710487370940%40mail.yahoo.com.

[Oluwatoyin Adepoju]

Adesanmi's story is complex, a complexity that needs to be appreciated.

He moved from years of being a critic of the political establishment to being integrated into APC politics.

The same for Wole Soyinka who has oscillated from being a critic of the political and ruling military establishments to being integrated within them, from his accepting an appointment to work in Babangida's govt, thereby helping to legitimize his democracy nullifying govt which came into power through a coup to his open conflicts with opponents in support of APC in the run up to the 2015 elections, verbally fighting with the President's wife, if I recall correctly, supporting Buhari, of whom he had been the mosy trenchant critic before then and closeness to then APC frontliner, Rotimi Amaechi, governor of Rivers State, described as throwing a lavish birthday party for him.

These public intellectuals are best appreciated in terms of the complexity and perhaps contradictions of their engagements, but how much of such fine details is a researcher likely to catch in a study covering a broad range of the continent?

Thanks

Toyin

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/BL1PR12MB5755BB21E91D0E8AFBF71669DA292%40BL1PR12MB5755.namprd12.prod.outlook.com.

[cornelius...@gmail.com]

“verbally fighting with the President's wife”? 

Who? 

Soyinka? 

Was "verbally fighting" with the President’s wife? 

Melania Trump? Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama? Lying Hillary? 

Aisha Buhari? 

God forbid!  

If he did that he would rue the day!

You mean the hoary Nobel Laureate unleashed - I mean deployed some verbal cannons on Patience Jonathan, the wife of Dr. Goodluck Jonathan ( I almost wrote the wife of Dr. Feelgood), and she survived? As you well know if it comes to a verbal battle, even her husband Goodluck, with the best of luck would be no match for Wole Soyinka. Ditto the former military man Sani Abacha

Wole Soyinka ridiculed Big Grammar’s Patience Jonathan and you call that a fight, when she was no match at all  - like Israel vs Gaza…

Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju:

Commandment number 13: Thou shalt not exaggerate or distort or denigrate or unjustly criticise a benign servant of Olodumare. Such a one is inviolate, sacrosanct. Do you understand?

So you don’t think that Soyinka’s world tour campaign against Abacha is more deserving of being highlighted than First Lady Patience Jonathan's big grammar?

On the day that Abacha - as we say in Nigerian English  - on the day that Abacha "quenched", Soyinka was in Jerusalem  - and from there he flew to meet his brother in Paris…talked to the BBC, a little later….

Adepoju, you ought to know that when the Prophet is angry, God is angry

 

Have respect for your elders and please try your uttermost to be careful about how you accost such a one, verbally or otherwise, lest you be dispatched unceremoniously, the way that Prince Hamlet dispatched Polonius :

“ Thou wretched, rash, intruding fool, farewell!

I took thee for thy better. Take thy fortune.

Thou find'st to be too busy is some danger. “ 

“East, West, Central, North, and Southern Africa -- who were some of the noted gadflies/public intellectuals during the colonial, post-colonial, and post-2000 eras?”

The list is long 

In Sierra Leone, there are quite a few (about twenty that I can think of ) and these three come to mind, immediately 

Bai Bureh

I.T.A.Wallace-Johnson

 Herbert Bankole-Bright

[Oluwatoyin Adepoju]

Soyinka is a political acrobat.

Unreliable.

Toyin

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/ff5c60af-09e6-48d1-9ee6-9c4535ef3657n%40googlegroups.com.

[Sabella Abidde]

Dear Dr. Effiboley,

Good greetings and thanks for the list. I appreciate it.

Best,

Sabella

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/CAGBtzfM8UVTW-Wr1xO0iMQQ9ODfZ0ag%3DAcKEUUBq-Hcojbj7iQ%40mail.gmail.com.

[Sabella Abidde]

Good greetings and thanks for the list, Dr. Cornelius Hamelberg. I appreciate it.

Regards,

Sabella

[cornelius...@gmail.com]

At times, a man has to be politically savvy, diplomatic, shrewd, and astute, to survive in any jungle where jungle politics is being practised. Better a “political acrobat'' (versatile, dynamic, flexible) than a political chameleon, a political harlot (prostitute) or a fair-weather friend 

At times, a man has to make the best out of a bad situation; sometimes a man has to choose the lesser of two d-evils 

By the way, Wole Soyinka and Professor Eldred Durosimi Jones were the best of friends. It was Professor Jones who spearheaded the campaign to release Wole Soyinka from detention, after - brave man - real activism & commitment  - he was charged with holding up a radio station at gunpoint.

I remember signing the petition in Hans Zell’s bookshop at Mount Aureol, back then the best bookshop in Freetown, Sierra Leone.

But when it comes to f-cking for revolutionary causes

Niggers say 'F-ck revolution!'

What was Oluawtoyin doin’ in that cataclysmic era during which Wole Soyinka delivered the Reith Lectures entitled Climate of Fear - on the BBC?

The Ramblers Dance Band - The West African Highlife Scene ( 50-something years ago 

[cornelius...@gmail.com]

You're welcome Sir 

Yessir. I'm glad to be of service. Many more names to come, fast forward, such as e.g. Lansana Gberie

Bring me the file  - Yes Sir ( Fela: Monkey Banana 

You may call me doctor (like Dr Goodluck Jonathan or Aretha’s Dr Feelgood

You may call me ”Professor Longhair” or King Sunny Ade…no matter what you say

Indeed, just as the bard said:

“You may call me Terry, you may call me Timmy

You may call me Bobby, you may call me Zimmy

You may call me RJ, you may call me Ray

You may call me anything, no matter what you say

You're still gonna have to serve somebody

[cornelius...@gmail.com]

But in the Nigerian public and intellectual sphere, what about the prolific OjogbonToyin Falola ( most obviously numero uno) and in alphabetical order, people like 

Ayo Olukotun

Auwal Musa Rafsanjani

Jibrin Ibrahim

The late Mailafia Obadiah (although I think that his very last article went over the top 

Salihu Mohammed Lukman

On Friday 15 March 2024 at 16:32:26 UTC+1 Sabella Abidde wrote: