Hountondji and Towa did not actually coin the term ethnophilosophy

Evidence

Even though Paulin Hountondji from Benin and the late Marcien Towa (1931–2014) from Cameroon redefined the term ethnophilosophy in their own way, as we shall see below, they did not initially coin the term as is usually assumed. Rather, they made their reputation as philosophers with their relentless critiques of ethnophilosophy. Hountondji, for example, is given credit for the term ethnophilosophy because he uses it in his famous article, “The Myth of Spontaneous Philosophy” (1974), to refer to works that describe collective African worldviews, cultural themes and oral-literary expressions as philosophy. Nigerian philosopher Sanya Osha (2011) notes that former Ghanaian president and philosopher Kwame Nkrumah had registered in 1943 for a PhD dissertation at the University of Pennsylvania, USA, and had proposed to work on what he termed “ethnophilosophy”. — Frans Dokman, Beyond Bantu Philosophy_…, 491

Categorization

• QUESTION: Worth chasing: if Nkrumah used ‘ethnophilosophy’ in 1943, who used it before Hountondji’s 1974 article, and in what sense?
• DEFINE: Defines ethnophilosophy as the description of collective African worldviews, cultural themes and oral-literary expressions treated as philosophy.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Frans Dokman, Beyond Bantu Philosophy_…, 491
• XREF: connects to: Hountondji coined ethno-philosophy to mark collective thought as second-hand philosophy

Broader Connections

• Hountondji coined ethno-philosophy to mark collective thought as second-hand philosophy #contradicts (0.95)