Indigenous (African) knowledge systems, science and technology

Kurzfassung/Abstract

The motivation for a focus on indigenous (African) knowledge, science and technology is fairly easy to explain, especially when one considers the denigration, suppression and exploitation of traditional knowledge systems during and even after colonialism. The reclamation project that underlies this renewed focus is not only epistemological but also concerned with legislation and social justice. Like “indigenous” or “African knowledge”, the emphasis on “indigenous science and technology” is a recent phenomenon. There are several ventures that underlie this idea: publicisation of the victimisation and exploitation of the areas of practice and research constituting “ethnoscience”, acknowledgement of their autonomy, and their inclusion in educational curricula. A question that remains largely unaddressed is whether the ideas of indigenous knowledge, science and technology make any sense. A central problem appears to be the lack of clarity about the meaning or understanding of ‘knowledge’. Defenders of this idea commonly distinguish between ‘skills’ and ‘knowledge’--which suggests, in the absence of any definition, that at least part of the understanding concerns theoretical (as contrasted with practical) knowledge. Insofar as ‘knowledge’ in this sense includes reference to ‘truth’ (a notion that also characterises Yoruba thinking), this invites the perception of the latter also being ‘indigenous’. Bluntly asserting, on more than one occasion, that “truth is opinion”, Kwasi Wiredu has claimed that reference to “infallible” truth is not only a bar to dialogue but that “such a claim to knowledge is also a bar to education”. As a challenge to advocates of indigenous knowledge (IK), a problem that would need to be addressed is that of relativism (about both knowledge and truth) and of the implications of taking epistemological relativism seriously. A further question concerns the basis, if there is one, for distinguishing between knowledge and superstition within indigenous African worldviews and belief systems. Similarly, for anything to be called ‘science’, it surely involves reference to laws or regularities, observation, description, explanation, prediction and testable hypothesis. Practices, skills and beliefs (or opinions), and the ascription or attribution of scientific knowledge may vary according to personal, social or cultural context; but do scientific knowledge and truth vary in similar ways?