Module Structure

ENDOGENOUS KNOWLEDGE_PAULIN HOUNTONDJI

Endogenous knowledge, Paulin Hountondji, What is the difference between endogenous and indigenous knowledge?

Critique of ethno philosophy, Why ‘endogenous’ and not ‘traditional’? Extraversion, academic dependency.

Description of the Module

Items Description of the Module

Subject Name Sociology

Paper Name Contemporary Social Theory

Module Name/Title Endogenous Knowledge_ Paulin Hountondji

Module Id

Pre Requisites None

Objectives

Key words Endogenous knowledge, Hountondji, Extraversion, Academic dependency.

Role Name Affiliation

National Coordinator

Subject Coordinator Prof Sujata Patel Department of Sociology, University of Hyderabad

Paper Coordinator Dr Dev N Pathak South Asian University, New Delhi

Content Writer ANU K ANTONY Research Scholar, Department of

Sociology, University of Hyderabad

Content Reviewer

Language Editor

Technical Conversion

ENDOGENOUS KNOWLEDGE

INTRODUCTION

Endogenous Knowledge is a concept developed in the interactive sessions of a seminar

organized by Paulin Hountondji at Universite Nationale du Benin, Cotonou, in 19871. There is a

larger context in which the term ‘endogenous knowledge’ was evolved out of the discussions in

this seminar. An elaboration of this context is required before explaining what Endogenous

Knowledge means. One has to historically approach the problem of Africa’s underdevelopment

to understand it properly, according to Paulin Hountondji. The present underdevelopment of

Africa is a result of colonial domination and exploitation in the past. The colonial exploitation

continues in many ways even after the independence from direct colonial rule. This

exploitation, according to Houtondji, is not just restricted to the economic realms, but it also

extend to the sphere of knowledge production. The knowledge production in Africa, according

to Hountondji is highly dependent to the academia of North. (Hountondji, 1995: 2) This

dependency of African academia to the North opens to a set of serious discussions and leads us

to the concept of Endogenous Knowledge. Hence, it is first important to discuss the context and

other concepts which help us to understand the meaning and relevance of ‘Endogenous

Knowledge’. Though Hountondji substantiates his arguments with the example of African

academia’s dependency to the North, the concept of endogenous knowledge holds relevance in

the context of other post colonial nations as well.

1 The papers presented in this seminar is published as a book titled “Endogenous Knowledge: Research Trails”,

edited by Houtondji. The concept of Endogenous Knowledge is elaborated in the introductory chapter of this book.

Paulin Houtondji (1942 – Present)

.

(Image accessible at http://www.bdlive.co.za/world/africa/2012/10/02/paulin-j.-hountondji )

Paulin Houtondji is a contemporary Beninese Philosopher and the director of the African Centre

for Advanced studies, Porto Novo. He is also the Professor of Philosophy at Universite du Benin,

Cotonou. Houtondji was also an active politician, a critic of Benin’s military dictatorship and a

prominent personality who was involved in the process of Benin’s democratic return.

Hountondji’s works are important to understand the academic dependency of Africa to the

North. Hountondji believed that the underdevelopment of Africa needs to be understood

through a historical approach and not through an evolutionist approach. Evolutionist approach

understands this underdevelopment as inevitable whereas historical approach enlightens us to

the aspect of colonial exploitation of Africa in the past. (Ochieng, 2010: 26) He argued that the

knowledge production in Africa is still externally oriented to cater the needs of Northern

universities. Hountondji understands this through the concepts of extraversion and

endogenous knowledge. (Hountondji, 2010: 11) Though Hountondji substantiates his

arguments with the present situation of African economy and academia, his academic

contributions are relevant in the context of all post-colonial nations.

What is the context leading to the discussion on endogenous knowledge?

As mentioned earlier, Hountondji notes that, the knowledge production in Africa is dependent

on the Northern academia. Africa’s dependency and underdevelopment has to be understood

historically, as a result of the colonial domination and exploitation. Even decades after the end

of settled colonialism, the domination from the so-called mother country continues to have its

control over 1) the economy, and 2) the knowledge production of Africa. Hountondji observes

that there is a global parallelism in the field of economic activity and intellectual activity of

Africa. The linkage of African economy to the world market creates a situation where the nation

has to orient its economy to the demands of the North. Similarly, as a result of the same

domination, the African academia is externally oriented to cater the intellectual needs of North.

(Hountondji, 1995: 2)

How can this academic dependence be better understood?

Hountondji observes that the quality of the research in Africa can be better assessed if one

takes in to account the overall collective achievement of scholars, instead of the individual

gains of researchers. Considering the general trend of research, it can be observed that the

facilities available for research are highly underdeveloped. It can be observed that the research

happening in Africa attends to the needs of Northern intellectuals than their own research

needs. In other words the research is externally oriented. This happens in two ways: 1) In the

same way the colonies acted as sources of raw materials for the industries of mother country,

the research in the third world is merely performing the job of providing information or data as

intellectual raw materials to the universities and laboratories of North. 2) The theories

produced in the North are imported to Africa. African academia, according to Hountonji, also

serves as loyal consumers for the theories produced in the North. (Hountondji, 1990, 1995,

2009)

The raw materials and information collected by African intellectuals are used by intellectuals of

North to enhance their paradigms and sharpen their theoretical perspectives. These theories

never attempt to understand what is actually happening in those locations from where their

raw materials come. That is, the data collected in the so called third world is send to the North

where these data is processed to formulate newer theories. The Northern academia is

insensible to the actual social realities of the periphery from where the raw material is

collected. At the same time, Periphery, marked with the absence of theoretical work, becomes

the consumers of the imported theories from North. So here, what is missing in the process of

knowledge production in Africa is the production of theoretical work. Hountondji argues that

the actual theoretical work is not happening in the third world; instead it serves as a source of

raw materials to the North and market for their imported theories. (Hountondji, 1995; 2009)

Hountondji’s critique on ethno philosophy

While moving ahead with Hountondji’s critique on the present process of knowledge

production in Africa, it is important to understand his critique on ethno philosophy. Ethnology

and Ethno sciences, exposes the knowledge in the peripheral landscape for the curiosity of the

researchers of North. Hountondji notes that the disciplines which study the history, philosophy

or sciences of Africa are taking Africa as an objective genitive, rather than looking at the

complicated realities. In other words research centers of North which study African history or

African sociology (for instance) do it from a Eurocentric perspective, by taking Africa as an

objective genitive. That is, it will be a sociological or historical discourse on Africa and a

sociological or historical tradition developed by Africans won’t be of any relevance here.

Hountondji argues that this is not sociology or history of Africa, but, ethno-sociology or ethno-

history which takes birth from a Eurocentric perspective. Hountondji explains this with the

example of ethno philosophy done by Placide Tempels to understand the Bantu philosophy of

Africa. The writers like Tempels who ‘discovered’ the presence of philosophy in Africa wrote

that Africans are not aware about their philosophy. According to Tempels the Africans were not

conscious about their own philosophy. He argued that the philosophy present in the African

systems of thought is not self consciously developed by the Africans. Instead, the thinkers from

outside Africa has discovered it and further developed it in a systematic way. This was what

Tempels wrote when he came across the richness of philosophy in African systems of thought.

(Hountondji, 2009: 3-7)

Houtondji observes that this view point of Tempels was a result of the belief that only the North

is capable of self consciously producing a philosophical tradition and the South is incapable of

such an intellectual work. This is a pure Eurocentric logic, the logic which was a characteristic

feature of most thinkers who attempted to understand Africa from outside. The Africa which

they explained through their disciplines was not an Africa which was familiar to the Africans

who lived there. The ethnology including ethno philosophy understood and attempted to study

the African traditions of knowledge in a way which fulfilled the exotic curiosity of North and

thus added to their collection of knowledge from cultures across the world. Hountondji

criticized that this practice is not a peculiar feature of thinkers from outside, but even African

thinkers who attempted to understand their culture, fell in to this trap of Eurocentric

perspective and did research in this way. The paradigms and theoretical perspectives from

North are so powerfully hegemonic that the African intellectual fails to recognize this

hegemony most of the time. (ibid, 2009: 5)

Hountondji understands ‘philosophy as a set of texts’. This challenges the notion of self-

unconscious existence of diverse knowledge in the African systems of thought. Searching

philosophy in the oral culture of the so called exotic primitive lands is the result of a prejudiced

assumption that African people are incapable of engaging in intellectual activities such as doing

philosophy. The north searches for unconscious existence knowledge in third world. For

hountondji, African philosophy is simply the philosophy done by Africans. African philosophy is

rich and unique with its particular world views, which will be different but no less important,

compared to the philosophy of the North. (ibid, 2009: 7)

What is ‘Extraversion’?

Hountondji asks certain crucial questions such as, “where does all the equipment used for

research in periphery come from?”, “how are research topics selected?”, “where and how are

the data produced, dispatched stored, capitalized?”, “how do they get translated in to practical

applications?”, “on what social needs and practical requirements are they based directly or

indirectly?”, “who are the intended beneficiaries of the research?”, “what complex ties link our

research establishments to industry in particular and the business world in general?’, “how

does it fit in to the society producing it?”, “and to what extend is this society able to take

charge of its findings, while discussing the hegemony of North in the knowledge production

process of Africa.” (Hountondji, 1997) These questions are crucial in understanding the

externally oriented nature of research in Africa.

There is a huge quantitative as well as Qualitative difference between the research done in

Africa and the research done in the countries of North. This difference starts from the selection

of topics for the research to the academic trips compulsorily conducted by the academicians of

the South to the North. The activity of knowledge production in the South functions in the same

way in which the economic activity of the third world functions. The southern academia is a

territory under the continuing domination of North to collect raw materials, both economic and

intellectual. It also acts as a market for the finished goods and theories. In this way, Hountondji

argues that the knowledge production in Africa is ‘extraverted’, which means that this

knowledge production is ‘outward/externally oriented’. It is outward oriented in the sense that

its research strategies are decided by the North in direct as well as indirect ways. This outward

focus of research reproduces and reinforces the hegemony of the North over South.

(Hountondji, 1997)

According to Hountondji, Africa is marked by the absence of theoretical work. This is because of

the absence of proper laboratories and libraries in Africa. Theoretical works and the

development of concepts are done in the advanced laboratories of North. Just as Africa

provided raw materials, they also consumed the theoretical products from North. Research

done in the Africa applied alien theories to understand things which are part of their culture.

This submission to the exotic curiosity and fantasy of the hegemonic North has to be

understood keeping in mind the aspect of underdevelopment and dependence, as mentioned

earlier. This is what Hountondji meant when he developed the term Extraversion. The purpose

of the very existence of the knowledge production in African universities becomes serving the

needs of the North. In other words, the intellectual work in the Periphery is externally oriented.

This phenomenon is what Hountondji called ‘extraversion’.

What are the indices of extraversion?

Houndtonji is expanding the concept further by listing out certain selected indices of this

extraversion. These indices alerts us to the multiple and complicated dimensions in which the

knowledge production of South is extraverted. Given below are some of the indices which

Hountondji listed out to explain the aspects of extraversion.

1. Firstly, the sophisticated apparatus required for the research is not produced in

countries like Africa. Hountondji states that they have never manufactured a

microscope or any other lab apparatus. It is always imported from countries of North

where it is manufactured. This increases the difficulty of doing advanced research here

and also, automatically sets the standards in northern scale.

2. Secondly, the spaces where the research work is physically stored and systematically

preserved, such as journals, archives and publishing houses are majorly concentrated in

the North. It is burden of the intellectuals of the Southern intellectuals to publish in the

journals of North or publish through the publishing houses of the North. Even if there

are journals published in the South, Hountondji observes that the most number of

readerships of the journals from South comes from North. In this way even writing in

the journals of South is not inverting the existing extraverted tendencies.

3. Thirdly, the fact that the works of intellectuals from South is better known and read by

the intellectuals from the North, the research work from the periphery tends to orient

their work according to the North’s needs and expectations. This aspect of theoretical

extraversion further restricts the possibility of the research work from South.

4. Fourthly, the situation traps the researchers from South in a way that it ends up doing

research which is limited to the local scenes. They study the particular realities of their

culture, but they do it in a way which gives data to the North about the primitive

underdeveloped societies. Because of this they fail to produce independent research

work and theories which can form strong universal theories. Hountondji notes that they

thus become intellectually ingrown and thus miss to involve in the ‘independent

creation of theoretical models, the making of comprehensive conceptual designs which

later facilitate the accurate understanding of particular details as such”. (Hountondji,

1997)

5. Fifthly, the reasons for the extraverted research can be immediate and practical

concerns of economic gain. This includes research in the area of agricultural cultivation

of cash crops which can be imported or send to import substitution factories in the

periphery. The agronomic research in Africa, as Hountondji observes was focused on the

ways to improve the production of cash crops such as coffee, cocoa, cotton and oil

palm. This research is not done expecting the readership of the intellectual community

in North, but it is merely aimed at the practical concerns of import of cash crops to the

North. This brings in economic gain for the periphery in a certain way and results in

negligence of the production of the staple food crops of the majority population living

there. This signifies the general economic extraversion for existential reasons.

6. Sixthly, Hountondji observes that the academic trips conducted by the southern

intellectuals to North should be understood as a part of the same existential problem.

This is just another expression of the existential crisis of an intellectual living in a

country with an extraverted economy. As a result of this, for the much esteemed

progress of their careers some of them settle in northern countries. The rest

compulsorily conducts North ward trips and shuttle between the periphery and the

centre to ensure their career graph in the extraverted intellectual space in which they

have to survive. Those who are not even capable of this, no matter how excellent they

are in their respective fields of research, according to Hountondji, “survive as best they

can on periphery waging Sisyphean battles against cynicism and despair while keeping a

sharp eye out for openings through which they too might wriggle in to northward brain

drain.” (1997)

7. Seventhly, Elaborating on the situation of brain drain, Hountondji is explaining that such

academic trips have become a structural necessity. He adds that this observation is not

intended to underestimate the huge amount of gains the research in periphery has as a

result of those trips. But the real problem is when this happens in the logic of

extraversion. The inward scientific activity is almost absent and the research is almost

completely outward oriented. It is in this situation Hountondji finds these trips as

problematic.

8. The above point will be clearer when we come to what Hountoundji has listed as the

Eighth point in the introduction of his book titled “Endogenous Knowledge”. The

academic trips from periphery to the North have become a structural necessity, as

mentioned above, for the survival of intellectuals from South. The intellectuals from

North also conduct such trips to the periphery. These trips are not a part of their

survival. Instead these are trips conducted to the exotic locations which can give them

materials for further research back home. They don’t visit the Periphery to collect newer

paradigms and theoretical frame works or to know different world views, but just to

collect facts and information which can enrich their paradigms and theories. The

southern intellectuals instead conduct the trips in search of new paradigms and theories

to understand the peculiarities of their own culture. This is the difference between the

south to north academic trips and north to south academic trips. This difference is the

story of a continuing exploitation of the periphery by the centre. The academic trips are

not intended for a mutual sharing and hence problematic. There is another type of

academic trip which is a North to North trip. This has the intension of mutual sharing

without exploitation and hence helps in improving the quality of the knowledge

production of both sides, in a balanced way.

9. As a ninth and last point in listing out the indices, he drags our attention to the politics

of language. He alerts to the situation where it has become a necessity of the Southern

intellectuals to work and express in western languages. This situation gains strength

with an underlying assumption that only the western language is capable of scientific

expression. The situation makes it impossible for an intellectual from south not to learn

the Western language. When one say that this indicates a process of exploitation, it

doesn’t mean that an intellectual to fall to the trap of some kind of linguistic

romanticism. But the situation is evidently problematic when there is no attempt made

to learn any language from periphery by the centre in any case even when it is

unavoidable for a proper research attempting to understand their culture. On the

contrary an intellectual from the periphery is compelled to learn and express in western

language. The situation is intense when the intellectual from the South don’t feel the

necessity of exploring his own language resources. (Hountondji, 1997)

These are some of the indices which help the reader understand the dimensions of a larger

complicated problematic. These indices are important because first of all, knowledge about

an extraverted situation is required for the recovery of the third world knowledge

production. Since the motivations of doing a research comes from the North in various forms, it

is important to locate the exploitation lining this motivation to develop an independent

modality of doing research. The present task of the Southern intellectuals, as Hountondji

observes is that “within the specific field of knowledge, amounts to taking an informed enough

view of current practices in order to work out other possible modalities of producing

knowledge, other possible forms of technological and scientific production relationships, first

between the South and the North, but also in the South itself and inside each and every

country.” (ibid, 1997)

Endogenous knowledge

As discussed above the intellectual extraversion of Africa is a parallel process of its economic

extraversion. The intellectual extraversion can be understood as a characteristic feature of the

extraverted economies. The beginning of all these exploitation can be historically traced back to

the period of settler colonialism. Colonial ways of thinking, modern science, mind sets and

perspectives of modernity conquered the landscapes and culture of the so called primitive

colonies. When they did this, they were not occupying the lands which were vacant. They

removed something, the so called primitive/pagan beliefs and culture (and even human beings

sometimes) which appeared illogical, irrational and unnecessary to the modern conqueror. In

such a situation the question that what happened to this ‘something’ which existed there

actively and powerfully, becomes the question of a consciousness about the necessity of

revival. African traditions of knowledge are rich and diverse. They have been pushed off to the

margins by the hegemony of modern knowledge systems. The African traditions of knowledge

have still survived and this survival is strong enough to the extent that even the modern African

scientists approach the local rainmakers to know the auspicious time for conducting

ceremonies or family functions such as marriage, house warming etc. The African traditions of

knowledge have survived in the margins and have never disappeared. It existed as a last hope

when the modern medicine failed and in explaining facts which modern rationality couldn’t

explain. Certain questions become important here such as what is the current status of these

traditions of knowledge and how and why they have survived. (Hountondji, 1997)

As mentioned earlier, the term endogenous knowledge is developed in the introductory

discussions of a seminar organized by Hountondji. A vibrant discussion occurred in the

introductory session of this seminar about the status of the term ‘traditional’ to represent the

knowledge systems of Africa. Here he attempts to coin a new terminology instead of

‘traditional’ since a group of scholars thought that ‘traditional’ is not the right term which can

be used for a set of ideas which they intended to communicate. (1997)

The so called ‘traditional’ knowledge was always understood as a system of knowledge which

has nothing to exchange with the ‘true processes’ of knowledge production. Traditional gives

the meaning of something immutable and fixed, which is unable to undergo new changes. As a

result it sometimes ended up vanishing out of people’s collective memory. It was seen as

something which existed simply in juxtaposition and incapable of any worthy exchange with the

mighty systems of present. When the word ‘traditional’ is used, even inside quotation marks, it

invokes the idea of ‘traditional’ as opposed to ‘modern’. Even though these traditions are not

completely vanished out of the collective memory of Africans, they remained as systems of

mere exotic curiosity for the North. But, as mentioned above, these counter systems backfired,

whenever the modern knowledge failed, as Hountondji notes. This has led to the development

of attempts towards valorization of these systems of knowledge. The North has understood and

studied these systems to add information about their knowledge on the exotic world of the

primitive. There is a difference in this way of understanding because it attempts only to

translate what is there in the primitive world to broaden the theories of the North. Not only has

the thinkers from the North, but also the intellectuals from the South studied their own

traditions of knowledge with the Westerner’s gaze. Hountondji notes,

“the new approach calls for the working out of new methodologies in the various subject areas designed to help examine and evaluate and in total in various proportions to discard or to validate ‘traditional knowledge’, thus integrating it critically and utterly carefully in to the trend of current, living research work. The critical validation of the traditional element with a view to facilitating its active reappropriation, is likely to cause within the existing body of knowledge , shifts and shake-ups of which we at the moment have no way of predicting either the scope or impact. The main thing, however, is to create bridges, to re-create the unity of knowledge or in simpler, deeper terms, the unity of the human being.”(1997)

A new approach is what needs to be worked out which can understand, validate or discard

these counter systems of knowledge to integrate it to the mainstream ways of doing research.

This will be a new pathway towards doing a research which is not outward oriented, but

independent, sensible to the particularities and holding the potential to form flexible universals.

The intellectuals from the South at this point, have to engage with two processes

simultaneously: 1) to assimilate the innovations of Modern knowledge with a critical

assessment and 2) to re-integrate the African traditions of knowledge in to the mainstream

debates. (1997)

Considering the limitations of the term ‘traditional’ to represent the innate knowledge

traditions of Africans, Hountondji introduces a new term ‘endogenous’. The term tradition

places itself against the concept ‘modern’ and drags the discussion in to the limitations of a

binary category. ‘Endogenous’ represents the knowledge which is a part of the internal cultural

background of the Africa. It is the knowledge which originated in one particular culture and

inherited through generations. It has a unique identity on behalf of that particular culture as

against the dominant modern knowledge of North. The introduction of the term leads to some

other questions about the origins of this knowledge. “What today appears endogenous may

have been imported at a distant time in the past, prior to its later assimilation and its perfect

integration in the society to the extent of obliterating its foreign origins.”(hountondji, 1997) The

question of origin of a particular knowledge is an important point because in any culture it is

difficult to decide what originated in that culture. What is practiced as a custom may have

complicated histories of origin if one attempts to trace that out. Centuries must have played

crucial roles in the numerous ways through which a culture has evolved out. Silent transactions

must have occurred as a result of the mutual sharing and interaction between different cultures

over centuries. It is difficult decide what belongs to and what do not belong to one particular

culture. Endogenous include all those knowledge which the people of a particular identifies as

theirs. Hountondji argues that this is exactly what makes the term ‘endogenous’ significant and

this significance guides us to the crucial difference between the terms ‘indigenous’ and

‘endogenous’. Endogenous include all those knowledge which the people of a particular

identifies as theirs. Hountondji argues that this is exactly what makes the term ‘endogenous’

significant and this significance guides us to the crucial difference between the terms

‘indigenous’ and ‘endogenous’.

What is the difference between Indigenous Knowledge and Endogenous Knowledge?

Endogenous knowledge is something which doesn’t intend to deny the cultural transactions

occurred over centuries between various cultures. But at the same time it intends to question

the structural imbalance in the power relations between North and South. Modern science has

become an integral part of all the former colonies. But the term ‘endogenous’ recognizes the

domination and hegemony in this exchange of knowledge between North and South. It denotes

not the static but dynamic state of cultures and its knowledge systems.“One will therefore

describe endogenous, in a given cultural set-up, such knowledge as is experienced by society as

an integral part of its heritage, in contrast to exogenous knowledge, which is perceived, at this

stage at least, as an element of another value system.” (Hountondji, 1997)

So one cannot use the term ‘endogenous’ to represent complete interiority and it has larger

dimensions. This definition which Houtondji and his fellow researchers gave to the term

‘endogenous’, clearly differentiates it from the much used term ‘indigenous.’ Indigenous

defines something with the tag of the so called culture to which it belongs. Indigenous is what

the North thinks as belonging to a particular culture in the South. ‘Indigenous’ is a term which is

evolved inside the Eurocentric perspectives. It is an extraverted phenomenon because it

unravels the cultural specificities for the curiosity of northern intellectuals studying the

primitive world with their exotic fantasies. The so-called Indigenous knowledge is not studied

by the North because of its mighty potential and the Northern intellectuals in no way intend to

integrate it in to a universal system of knowledge. It has no significance outside that particular

culture according to the northern intellectual. But, Endogenous is a term which holds its

significance outside the cultural specificities also. It originates from consciousness of the

unequal global power relations in the process of knowledge production. Hountondji clearly

distinguishes between the terms ‘indigenous’ and ‘endogenous’ and the process of exploitation

through which the endogenous got perceived as indigenous.

“The term (indigenous) always has a derogatory connotation. It refers to a specific historic experience, precisely one of integration of autochtonous cultures in to a world-wide ‘market’ in which these perforce are pushed down to inferior positions. The ‘endogenous’ becomes ‘indigenous’ in and through such a world widening process. What is proper thereby becomes improper, and sameness turns out as difference. Viewed from outside and perceived as an object, as a thing, the autochtonous person sees himself or herself endowed with a new function, that of a primitive, a privileged witness of humanity’s imaginary beginnings. Worse still, if that person doesn’t take care, he or she can very quickly interiorize the new values and looking at him or herself henceforth with other people’s eyes, perceive him or herself as an indigenous being.” (2009)

Locating Hountondji

Omedi Ochieng attempts to locate Hountondji and his contributions in the history of African

intellectual tradition, in his paper titled “The African Intellectual: Hountondji and after”.

Ochieng argues that Hountondji can be marked as a ‘liberal’ modernist who “advocated for

universal enlightenment thought”. Hountondji developed his intellectual works from Stalin’s

regime in Benin. This was a regime which was not even willing to explore the dimensions of

Marx’s own texts. According to Ochieng, it is significant that Hountondji produced intellectually

stimulating works from this regime which imposed ideological correctness on the works of its

intellectuals. (Ochieng, 2010: 25)

In his paper, Ochieng is attempting to examine Hountondji’s contributions critically. Hountondji

practiced philosophy not in the abstract sense of the discipline. He always attempted to work

from the interface between philosophy and politics.

After the independence of Africa, it had to participate in the global capitalism to export its raw

materials. At the same time, the wars and recession caused the economic decline of Africa

which created a peculiar economic situation. The ethno philosophy debates of the 1970s should

be understood in the backdrop of this economic decline of Africa after its independence. There

were other ‘theoretical confusions’ and ‘ideological divergences’ also, which led to the

emergence of ethno philosophy. In this context, the neoliberal and utilitarian ideologies

dominated University spaces. Hountondji observes these situations to develop his thoughts

which got reflected in his works.

Contextualizing Hountondji’s intellectual contributions, Ochieng criticizes Hountondji. Ochieng

argues that in his elaboration of the concept of Extraversion Hountondji took for granted the

category called ‘West’. Even when he points out the modern hegemony of Metropole over the

knowledge traditions of Africa, he fails to realize that ‘West’ is a modern construction to create

the rest as ‘East’, the others. According to Ochieng, this realization would have complicated

Hountondji’s attempts to demystify Africanness.

However, Hountondji’s works provided newer dimensions for the research works in Africa.

Ochieng, attempting to locate Hountondji in the overall African intellectual discourse writes,

“Hountondji’s intellectual power and brilliance are without compare. And yet thanks to his uncritical belief in several fetishes of the modern intellectual- rigor, objectivity, compartmentalization, specialization- Hountondji loses an opportunity to re-examine how the documents of civilization he has rightly championed are nonetheless also documents of barbarism.” (ibid, 2010: 26)