Both ethnophilosophy and sage philosophy grew from revolt against colonial denial of African rationality

Evidence

In his conception of sagacity, he sets out to reject three negative claims regarding the philosophical status of indigenous African thought: (1) the claims of ethnophilosophy that Africa is a place of philosophical unanimity, (2) that writing is a precondition for philosophy, and (3) the Eurocentric claim that Greek sages are philosophical while African sages are not (Oruka 1990, p. 1). We noticed, however, that Oruka’s project in countering the Eurocentric bias is quite similar to the main aims of ethnophilosophers like Tempels, Mbiti, and Kagame. Tempels, for example, was also influenced by his own intellectual climate. The ugly episodes of slavery, colonialism, and racialism not only shaped the world’s perception of Africa but also instigated a form of frustration and intellectual revolt from the African and Africanist intelligentsias. The colonial caricature of Africa as culturally naïve, intellectually docile, and rationally inept had a profound influence on Tempels. He called for the need to recognize the identity and rationality of so-called primitive man, their place in history, and their contributions to world civilization. Consequently, I argue that the reactions of Tempels and Oruka fall under this form of intellectual revolt against the corrosive effects colonialism, racialism, as well as the legacies of slavery and alter any notions of Western superiority in philosophy. — Frans Dokman, Beyond Bantu Philosophy_…, 581

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to earlier chapters on Tempels’ ethnophilosophy and the colonial intellectual climate that shaped it.
• DEFINE: Oruka’s sagacity is defined by its threefold rejection: unanimity claims, writing as precondition, and Greek-vs-African sage asymmetry.