Problems of Knowledge and Knowledge Production in Africa

Abstract

Indigenous and foreign researchers have long produced knowledge on African realities. Nevertheless, the outcome has shown perceptual imbalances. This is because the knowledge gatekeepers, or individuals and organisations such as researchers and companies who associate with knowledge production and sharing, might have usually produced misconceptions on African realties due to various reasons, including inadequate data procession, politics and deliberate acts of juxtaposing the African realities. With globalisation now operating, the question how knowledge is being produced in Africa and what role gatekeepers play in this respect becomes harder to answer. Africa pursues low-level knowledge production activities, focusing on traditional sources of knowledge and a limited scale of individual interaction, as opposed to the high-level mainstream academia of the industrialised world, which is based on official interaction, aided by adequate infrastructures encompassing numerous educational institutions, facilities, skilled human power, technological capacity and financial resources. The African indigenous knowledge system (AIKS) is inadequate in all these areas. As compared to the technologically advanced Western knowledge system (WKS), the African case projects a substantial discrepancy. Basically, knowledge production in Africa is subordinate to foreign influence. Despite being independent in theory, the process in practice remains intact under the political pressure of globalisation with governments jumping on board. Even though one can observe that some Africa-related foreign media run commercials, the process of knowledge production in Africa has not led to raise public awareness, ensure job security, or sustainability in all senses of the term. The notion that knowledge is tantamount to power falls short when applied to Africa. There is a vivid cause of intellectual poverty across Africa, the fixing of which is an urgent matter. That would provide the key to solving a range of misfortunes from poverty to violence that have inflicted the continent as we know it today.

Keywords