Conceptualizations of Africa.
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Date
2025-02-28
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African Studies and Research Forum Series. Springer, Cham.
Abstract
In this chapter, I discuss the conceptualizations of Africa in the field of History, an
academic discipline which many scholars have defined as the study of past events,
people, and societies. It is the exploration of the past through the examination of
written and non-written sources, artifacts, and other forms of evidence (Carr, 1961).
The goal of history is to understand the past and to explain how and why things happened
the way they did. The concept of History has evolved, with different
approaches and perspectives. Traditional approaches to History focused on political
and military events, while more recent approaches have expanded to include social,
cultural, and economic aspects (Burke, 2008).
Historians use a variety of sources to reconstruct the past, including primary
sources such as letters, diaries, pictures, drawings, songs, chants, and official documents,
as well as secondary sources such as textbooks and scholarly articles. They
also use a range of methods, including qualitative and sometimes quantitative
approaches, to interpret the evidence and draw conclusions to narratives (Gaddis,
2004). History has important practical applications in all fields of life, such as
informing policy decisions, preserving cultural heritage, and promoting social cohesion.
It also has intrinsic value as a way to understand and appreciate the diversity
of human experience and the complexity of human societies (Bauer, 1948).
Africa has been studied by many Western historians since the 1900s with misconceptions
about Africa, such scholars are Hugh Trevor-Roper, Johann Friedrich
Blumenbach, David Hume, Hegel, E. D. Morel, and many other European scholars
and colonial powers viewed African societies as primitive and uncivilized, with a
culture and history that were inferior to their own.
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Citation
Salihu, H.A. (2024). History. In: Bangura, A.K., Ifedi, J.A. (eds) Conceptualizations of Africa. African Studies and Research Forum Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-74535-5_17