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Unesco and African Historiography

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 May 2014

Jan Vansina
Jan Vansina*
Affiliation:
University of Wisconsin–Madison
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Unesco's General History of Africa (henceforth GHA) is now nearing completion—seven out of the eight volumes having been published in English, at least—and the time is ripe to draw attention to its role in the historiography of African history, a role very different from that played by the Cambridge History of Africa with which it is often compared. In certain ways the Unesco project has been a unique venture, and not just in African history but, in general, because it broke with old established practice. The work was not guided by one or two editors but by a large committee. History-writing by committee seemed not only distasteful but impossible to achieve to many, both because of the practical difficulties involved and because it seemed incredible that so many editors could agree on a common text, without falling into sheer banality. Now that the volumes are out, readers can judge for themselves. Many among them actually wonder how exactly these volumes and chapters were created. Because I have been an active member of the committee since its creation in 1971 and of its bureau since 1983, I can provide a general answer to this question. But the time has also come to draw attention to the records generated by this project. Future researchers will find a huge mass of papers involving hundreds of historians of Africa that touch on practically all aspects of Africa's historiography between ca. 1965 and today.

Type
Research Article
Information
History in Africa , Volume 20 , 1993 , pp. 337 - 352
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 1993

References

Notes

1. UNESCO, eds. General History of Africa, London, Berkeley, Paris 1980 to 1992, seven volumes (volume 8 due in 1993)Google Scholar; Oliver, Roland, Fage, John D., The Cambridge History of Africa, Cambridge 1975-1986, eight volumes.Google Scholar This account is clearly affected by my own involvement in the UNESCO venture.

2. While it is too soon to write a history of the project, it is time at least to outline its activities and draw attention to the records generated by the project. My own papers concerning this total around 10,000 pages and are being deposited at the Memorial Library of the University of Wisconsin in Madison.

3. Paris, where Présence africaine was published, was then the focal point for international discussions about African cultures and the journal captures that intellectual climate well.

4. So far eight volumes have been published under the aegis of the international Council on Archives, beginning with volume 1 (Germany) in 1970. Among repositories of major interest to African historians, the guides to the Portuguese and Turkish archives are still not published, while come countries, like the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, have published their guides separately. For UNESCO's involvement see the preface by A.M. M'Bow in GHA, 11 (French edition).

5. CHA 4 (1975): xi-xii. The CHA project was well ahead. A first volume was published in 1975 as against UNESCO's first volume in 1980.

6. GHA 1, 787-88 (French edition) gives their names. Later volumes give updates. For the final list see GHA 5, 1992 (English edition). For the rules guiding the composition of the committee A. M. M'Bow, GHA 1, 1980: 11 (French edition).

7. A general description of the project, including its procedures and its ancillary projects can be found in UNESCO, Preparation of a General History of Africa, Paris 1983, 32.Google Scholar

8. The personal interest of A. M. M'Bow, Director General of UNESCO from 1974 to 1987, and a citizen of Sénégal, has clearly been significant in this relationship.

9. To my knowledge this occurred only once in the whole project.

10. Illustrations were in theory to be provided by authors and to be approved by the committee. In practice a volume was often approved when only a portion of the relevant illustrations had been accepted. Hence the role of the director became more important than had been foreseen. In contrast the cover illustrations for each volume were discussed at length and on several occasions by the committee because of their symbolic importance for the project as a whole.

11. In most cases committee members did not spend much time on this verification, although the committee rejected the version provided by the director of volume 4 and entrusted the task to the director of volume 1.

12. Beginning in 1950 UNESCO sponsored The History of Mankind, which would be comprised of many volumes. But thirteen years later only J. Hawkes, Prehistory, and Woolley, Leonard, The Beginnings of Civilization (1/1–2)Google Scholar had been published. The fate of this much-heralded project helps to explain why scepticism reigned at the agency. Moreover, two major differences between the GHA and this project are instructive in this regard. First, the volumes for this project were actually written by single people. If a project involving so few authors did not succceed, how could one hope better for one involving over 200 authors? Secondly, the spirit in which The History of Mankind was planned was that of the Journal of World History. The notion of elite ‘civilizations,’ as distinct from plebeian ‘cultures,’ was central to its endeavor. Indeed, for Woolley “the Beginnings of Civilization” still was to be found only in the Middle East! The whole venture was imbued with ethnocentricity, yet many UNESCO officials personally believed in such views, even as late as the 1970s, which explains their arrogant animosity towards the GHA project.

13. This process was perhaps accelerated by the fact that many committee members, including most members of the various bureaus, had acquired or were acquiring considerable administrative experience during their own careers, usually in managing universities or in political life.

14. Diop, Sheikh Anta, Nations nègres et culture (Paris, 1955)Google Scholar, and his later Antériorité des civilisations nègres: Mythe ou vérité historique (Paris, 1967).Google Scholar

15. GHA 3, 1988: 586-615 (English edition).

16. For instance: GHA 7, chapters 4, 6, 8, 11,13, 17, 27, 28, 29.

17. GHA 7, chapter 8.

18. A feeling for the delays involved can be gathered by comparing the various éditons of UNESCO, Preparation of a General History of Afirca. The order of volume publication from 1980 to 1992 is 1, 2, 4, 7, 3, 6, 5, and 8. As a result differences between chapters in one volume and between volumes—reflect different approaches contemporary to each other, but also the changing intellectual climate of history over a twenty-year timespan.

19. With regard to the publishers of the French edition it is instructive to note who published which volume of the costly main edition and who published which volume of the lucrative shorter paperback version.

20. Hromnik, C. A., “Recent Models for the African Iron Age and the Cattle-Related Evidence,” Diogense 119 (1982), 103–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Cf. also his Indo-Africa: Towards a New Understanding of the History of Sub-saharan Africa (Cape Town, 1981).Google Scholar For the spirit of animosity which reigned at Diogenes see note 12.

21. The Committee's reply was published as “Concerning the Article by Cyril A. Hromnik,” Diogenes 135 (1986), 131–39.Google Scholar

22. Various styles of academic culture were easily noticeable in the discussions. Most obvious was the understated and down-to-earth English-speaking style contrasted with a more discursive French rhetoric, but committee members soon learned to recognize several other styles of presentation and eloquence. But the commonality of the international academic culture, fostering a common sense of historical consciousness is even more relevant. Had not all the members of the committees shared this common approach, die project would have failed.

23. For accounts of this crisis see Wells, Clare, The UN, UNESCO, and the Politics of Knowledge (London, 1987)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and Singh, S. Nihal, The Rise and Fall of UNESCO (Ahmedabad, 1988).Google Scholar