On the Quest for Epistemic Justice in Africa: Unpacking the Methodic Crisis

Abstract

The paper interrogates the methodical attempts in the quest for epistemic justice/re-centring in the Global South, focusing on Africa. The paper notes some of the intellectual dilemmas or methodic crises that African scholars encounter in their quest for epistemic justice. With the conversational method, the paper interrogates the methodic crises in the quest for epistemic justice and engages with the power dynamic of the epistemological silencing of African knowledge forms. The paper argues that the power dynamics of epistemological silencing created a system of epistemic annihilation of the colonised people. It further contends that epistemological silencing enhances the dearth and death of significant development of African indigenous knowledge forms. Consequently, epistemic annihilation necessitates the quest for epistemic freedom. The paper concludes that an epistemic re-centring process that is void of the methodic crisis is imperative for the liberation, growth, emancipation, and development of African Societies.

Keywords

• africa
• epistemic justice
• epistemological silencing
• knowledge forms
• methodic crisis