African Historiography: Past, Present and Future

This presentation, delivered at the third congress of the Association of African Historians (Bamako, Mali, September 2001), reflects on the state of African historiography, its genesis and its evolution. The author highlights some of the major achievements of African historiography, identifies the constraints it faces, and indicates the challenges of the future, of which the greatest lies in the organizational sphere. African historians need to grow out of the national framework within which much of African historiography has been stuck and to build horizontal linkages, instead of the vertical linkages with Europe and America that have prevailed up to now. Bibliogr. [ASC Leiden abstract]