Philosophy Atlas Locate in atlas →

School · 1703 CE–present

African and Africana philosophy

African and Africana philosophy is philosophical work on African and diasporic histories, colonial power, racialization, and liberation.

Shared questions

  • How should concepts formed under colonial domination be revised, refused, or repurposed?

Internal disagreements

  • Whether Africana philosophy is defined chiefly by geography, racialized experience, political struggle, or a plurality of intellectual lineages.

Key texts

  • The Souls of Black Folk · 1903 — Du Bois's essays gave the tradition its vocabulary of double consciousness and the colour line.
  • African Philosophy: Myth and Reality · 1976 — Hountondji's critique of ethnophilosophy set the methodological argument the field has since worked through.