View source for Afrocentricity

{{Short description|Research method that centers Africans and the African diaspora}}
{{Distinguish|Afrocentrism}}

[[File:Molefi Asante 2011.jpg|thumb|200px| [[Molefi Kete Asante]], [[United States]]]]

'''Afrocentricity''' is an academic theory and approach to scholarship that seeks to center the experiences and peoples of [[Africa]] and the [[African diaspora]] within their own historical, cultural, and sociological contexts.<ref name="Monteiro-Ferreira">{{cite journal|last1=Monteiro-Ferreira|first1=Ana|title=Afrocentricity and the Western Paradigm|url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0021934708314801|journal=Journal of Black Studies|year=2009|volume=40|issue=2|pages=333–335|doi=10.1177/0021934708314801|jstor=40282637|issn=0021-9347|oclc=461451432|s2cid=144475771}}</ref><ref name="Asante">{{cite book |last1=Asante |first1=Molefi Kete |title=An Afrocentric Manifesto: Toward an African Renaissance |date=Dec 17, 2007 |publisher=Polity |page=17 |isbn=9780745641027 |oclc=156812629 |s2cid=190415914 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MUBn1aYacqgC&q=By+way+of+distinction%2C+Afrocentricity+should+not+be+confused+with+the+variant+Afrocentrism.}}</ref><ref name="Alkebulan">{{cite journal |last1=Alkebulan |first1=Adisa A. |title=Defending The Paradigm |url=https://idoc.pub/documents/defending-the-paradigm-by-adisa-a-alkebulan-mwl1o29mgvnj#fulltext |journal=Journal of Black Studies |publisher=Sage Publications, Inc |date=Jan 2007 |volume=37 |issue=3 |pages=411, 413–417|doi=10.1177/0021934706290082 |jstor=40034783 |issn=0021-9347 |oclc=7104045481 |s2cid=143557323}}</ref><ref name="Pellerin">{{cite journal |last1=Pellerin |first1=Marquita |title=Benefits of Afrocentricity in Exploring Social Phenomena: Understanding Afrocentricity as a Social Science Methodology |url=https://jpanafrican.org/docs/vol5no4/54-Benefits.pdf |journal=The Journal of Pan African Studies|date=June 2012|volume=5|issue=4|pages=149–160|issn=0888-6601|oclc=6864551898|s2cid=18435352}}</ref> First developed as a systematized methodology by [[Molefi Kete Asante]] in 1980, he drew inspiration from a number of African and African diaspora intellectuals including [[Cheikh Anta Diop]], [[George G. M. James|George James]], [[Harold Cruse]], [[Ida B. Wells]], [[Langston Hughes]], [[Malcolm X]], [[Marcus Garvey]], and [[W. E. B. Du Bois]].<ref name="Monteiro-Ferreira" /> The Temple Circle,<ref name="Asante VIII">{{cite book |last1=Asante |first1=Molefi Kete |last2=Mazama |first2=Ama |last3=Cérol |first3=Marie-José |title=Encyclopedia of Black Studies |chapter=Temple Circle |date=2005 |publisher=SAGE |page=445 |isbn=9781452265445 |doi=10.4135/9781412952538 |oclc=61296166 |s2cid=141533226 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VL91AwAAQBAJ&dq=%22Temple+Circle%22+Afrocentricity&pg=PP1}}</ref><ref name="Karenga">{{cite journal |last1=Karenga |first1=Maulana |title=Founding the First PhD in Black Studies: A Sankofa Remembrance and Critical Assessment of Its Significance |url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0021934718797317 |journal=Journal of Black Studies |year=2018 |volume=49 |issue=6 |page=587 |publisher=SAGE Journals|doi=10.1177/0021934718797317 |jstor=26574582 |issn=0021-9347 |oclc=7840305163 |s2cid=150088166}}</ref> also known as the Temple School of Thought,<ref name="Karenga" /> Temple Circle of Afrocentricity,<ref name="Asante X">{{cite book |last1=Asante |first1=Molefi Kete |title=African American Studies |chapter=Afrocentricity and Africology: Theory and Practice in the Discipline |date=Oct 19, 2010 |publisher=Edinburgh University Press |page=48-50 |isbn=9780748686971 |oclc=703158344 |jstor=10.3366/j.ctt1g0b6m8 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KcJvAAAAQBAJ&dq=%22Temple+Circle+of+Afrocentricity%22&pg=PP1}}</ref> or Temple School of Afrocentricity,<ref name="Myers">{{cite journal |last1=Myers |first1=Joshua |title=Racial Economies of Academia: Africana Studies as Arbiter |url=https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12111-014-9291-8 |journal=Journal of African American Studies |year=2015 |volume=19 |issue=1 |page=85 |doi=10.1007/s12111-014-9291-8 |jstor=43525579 |issn=1559-1646 |oclc=5739148920 |s2cid=144208208}}</ref> was an early group of Africologists during the late 1980s and early 1990s that helped to further develop Afrocentricity, which is based on concepts of agency, centeredness, location, and orientation.<ref name="Asante VIII" />

==Definition==

Afrocentricity was coined to evoke "African-centeredness", and, as a unifying [[paradigm]], draws from the foundational scholarship of [[Africana studies]] and [[African studies]].<ref name="Alkebulan" /><ref name="Chawane" /> Those who identify as specialists in Afrocentricity, including historians, philosophers, and sociologists, call themselves "Africologists"<ref name="Asante II">{{cite book|last1=Asante|first1=Molefi Kete|title=The Palgrave Handbook of African Philosophy|chapter=The Philosophy of Afrocentricity|chapter-url=https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1057/978-1-137-59291-0_16|year=2017|pages=231, 239–240|publisher=The Palgrave Handbook of African Philosophy|doi=10.1057/978-1-137-59291-0_16|isbn=978-1-137-59290-3|oclc=1012883218|s2cid=158226446}}</ref><ref name="Conyers III">{{cite journal |last1=Conyers, Jr. |first1=James L. |title=The Evolution Of Africology: An Afrocentric Appraisal |journal=Journal of Black Studies |date=May 1, 2004 |volume=34 |issue=5 |pages=643–644, 646–648 |doi=10.1177/0021934703259257 |jstor=3180921 |issn=0021-9347 |oclc=5546050945 |s2cid=145790776 |url=https://www.artsrn.ualberta.ca/amcdouga/MEAS400/jan%2022/africology.pdf}}</ref> or "Afrocentrists."<ref name="Asante IV" /><ref name="Asante XXIII">{{cite book|last1=Asante|first1=Molefi Kete|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KcJvAAAAQBAJ&dq=%22Temple+Circle+of+Afrocentricity%22&pg=PP1|title=African American Studies |chapter=Afrocentricity and Africology: Theory and Practice in the Discipline|date=Oct 19, 2010|publisher=Edinburgh University Press|isbn=9780748686971|oclc=703158344|page=38-39|jstor=10.3366/j.ctt1g0b6m8}}</ref><ref name="Conyers III" /> Africologists seek to ground their work in the perspective and culture common to African peoples, and center African peoples and their experiences as [[Agency (sociology)|agents]] and [[Subject (philosophy)|subjects]].<ref name="Mazama">{{cite journal|last1=Mazama|first1=Mambo Ama|title=Afrocentricity And African Spirituality|url=https://onyekatefari.com/healing/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/Afrocentricity-African-Spirituality.pdf |journal=Journal of Black Studies |date=November 1, 2002 |volume=33 |issue=2 |pages=218–219|doi=10.1177/002193402237226|jstor=3180935|issn=0021-9347|oclc=363925416|s2cid=145664692}}</ref>

[[Ama Mazama]] defined the paradigm of Afrocentricity as being composed of the "[[ontology]]/[[epistemology]], [[Religious cosmology|cosmology]], [[axiology]], and [[African aesthetic|aesthetics]] of African people" and as being "centered in African experiences", which then conveys the "African voice". According to her, Afrocentricity incorporates African [[African dance |dance]], [[Sub-Saharan African music traditions |music]], [[Traditional African religions#Practices and rituals |rituals]], [[Legends of Africa |legends]], [[African literature#Precolonial literature |literature]], and [[African literature#Oral literature |oratures]] as key features of its expository approach. Axiological features of Afrocentricity that Mazama identifies include explorations of African [[African philosophy#African ethics |ethics]], and the aesthetic aspects incorporate African [[List of African mythological figures |mythology]], [[Rhythm in Sub-Saharan Africa |rhythm]], and the [[Performing arts#African performing arts|performing arts]]. Mazama also argues that Afrocentricity can integrate aspects of African spiritualities as essential components of African [[Worldview|worldviews]]. Mazama sees spirituality and other intuitive methods of acquiring knowledge and emotional responses used in the paradigm as a counterbalance to [[rationality]], and firsthand experience of these cultural and spiritual artifacts can inform Afrocentricity.<ref name="Alkebulan" /> Mazama indicates that many of the terms and concepts used in Afrocentricity are meant to shift the conceptual status of Africans from being objects that are acted upon to subjects who are agents that act.<ref name="Mazama III">{{cite journal|last1=Mazama|first1=Ama|date=2021|title=Africology and the Question of Disciplinary Language|url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0021934721996431|journal=Journal of Black Studies|volume=52|issue=5|pages=4–5|doi=10.1177/0021934721996431|issn=0021-9347|oclc=8992523912|s2cid=234870652}}</ref>

In contrast to the [[Hegemony|hegemonic ideology]] of [[Eurocentrism]], the paradigm of Afrocentricity is argued by Africologists to be non-[[hierarchical]] and [[Cultural pluralism|pluralistic]] and not intended to supplant "'[[White people |white]] knowledge' with '[[Black people |black]] knowledge'". As a [[holistic]] multidisciplinary theory with a strong focus on the location and agency of Africans, Afrocentricity is designed not to accept the role of [[subaltern (postcolonialism)|subaltern]] prescribed to Africans by Eurocentrism. An important aspect of Afrocentricity is therefore a [[deconstruction]] and criticism of hegemony, [[racism]], and [[prejudice]].<ref name="Monteiro-Ferreira" />

Africologists, who produce Afrocentric academic works, identify their professional field as Afrocentricity – not [[Afrocentrism]]. Crucially, not all academic works that focus on African or African-American topics are necessarily Afrocentric and neither are works on [[Melanin theory|melanist theories]] nor those rooted in matters of color of the skin, biology, or [[biological determinism]]; this means that some claims to Afrocentricity are not strictly part of the paradigm, and certain critiques of supposedly Afrocentric ideas may not be critiques of Afrocentricity ''per se''.<ref name="Asante XXIII" />

==History==

Midas Chanawe outlined in his historical survey of the development of Afrocentricity how experiences of the [[trans-Atlantic slave trade]], [[Middle Passage]], and [[Anti-literacy laws in the United States |legal prohibition of literacy]], shared by [[Slavery in the United States |enslaved]] [[African-American history#Enslavement|African-Americans]], followed by the [[Double consciousness |experience of dual cultures]] (e.g., [[Africanisms]], [[American nationalism|Americanisms]]), resulted in some [[African-Americans]] re-exploring their African cultural heritage rather than choosing to be [[Americanized]]. Additionally, the African-American experience of ongoing [[Racism against African-Americans |racism]] emphasized the importance that culture and its relative nature could have on their intellectual enterprise. All of this cultivated a foundation for the development of Afrocentricity. Examples of the kinds of arguments that presaged Afrocentricity include pieces published in the ''[[Freedom's Journal]]'' (1827) that drew connections between [[Sub-Saharan Africa |Africans]] and [[ancient Egyptians]], African-American abolitionists, such as [[Frederick Douglass]] and [[David Walker (abolitionist) |David Walker]], who highlighted the accomplishments of the ancient Egyptians as Africans to undermine the [[White supremacy|white supremacist]] assertion that Africans were inferior, and the assertions of the Pan-Africanist, [[Marcus Garvey]], who argued that ancient Egypt laid the foundation for [[civilization]] in world history. These would be echoed in the contexts of [[Black Nationalism]], [[Negritude]], [[Pan-Africanism]], [[Black Power movement]], and the [[Black is Beautiful]] movement that served as harbingers for the formal development of Afrocentricity.<ref name="Chawane">{{cite journal|last1=Chawane|first1=Midas|title=The development of Afrocentricity: a historical survey|journal=Yesterday and Today|publisher=The South African Society for History Teaching|pages=81–82|date=December 2016|volume=16|issue=16|doi=10.17159/2223-0386/2016/N16A5|issn=2309-9003|oclc=8520863946|s2cid=164548774|doi-access=free}}</ref>

Molefi Kete Asante dates the first use of the term, "Afro-centric", to 1964,<ref name="Asante II" /> when the [[Institute of African Studies]] was being established in [[Ghana]] and its founder, [[Kwame Nkrumah]], said to the Editorial Board of the [[Encyclopedia Africana]]: "[T]he Africana Project must be frankly Afro-centric in its interpretation of African history, and of the social and cultural institutions of the African and people of African descent everywhere."<ref name="Biney">{{cite book |last1=Biney |first1=Ama |title=The Political and Social Thought of Kwame Nkrumah |chapter=Nkrumah's Political Writings, 1958–1966 |chapter-url=https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1057/9780230118645_8 |year=2011 |pages=122 |publisher=Springer |doi=10.1057/9780230118645_8 |isbn=978-1-349-29513-5 |oclc=6019828376 |s2cid=156979024}}</ref> Other antecedents to Afrocentricity identified by Asante include the 1948 work of [[Cheikh Anta Diop]] when he introduced the idea of an "African Renaissance",<ref name="Asante II" /><ref name="Maurice">{{cite journal|last1=Maurice|first1=Danielle|title=The living museum and the centenary of the abolition of slavery: for the recognition of African cultures|url=https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&u=https%3A%2F%2Fjournals.openedition.org%2Fcm%2F127|journal=Colonial Past and Ways of Remembering Slavery|year=2007|volume=3|issn=1718-5556|oclc=6733666736|s2cid=161385608}}</ref> J.A. Sofala's 1973 treatise ''The African Culture and Personality,'' and the three 1973 publications of ''The Afrocentric Review''.<ref name="Asante II" /> Following the example of these and other preceding African intellectuals, Asante formally proposed the concept of Afrocentricity in a 1980 publication, ''Afrocentricity: The Theory of Social Change'',<ref name="Monteiro-Ferreira" /> and further refined the concept in ''The Afrocentric Idea'' (1987).<ref name="Asante II" /> Other influential publications that helped to develop Afrocentricity include Linda James Myers' ''Understanding the Afrocentric Worldview'' (1988), Asante's ''Kemet, Afrocentricity and Knowledge'' (1992), Ama Mazama's edited compilation ''The Afrocentric Paradigm'' (2003), and Asante's ''An Afrocentric Manifesto'' (2007).<ref name="Asante II" />

[[Temple University]], the institutional home of Molefi Kete Asante and site of the first PhD program in the field of Africana Studies, which at Temple is named Africology and African American Studies,<ref name="Temple University">{{cite web |title=Africology and African American Studies |url=https://liberalarts.temple.edu/academics/departments-and-programs/africology-and-african-american-studies |website=Temple University |date=20 January 2021 |publisher=Temple University College of Liberal Arts |access-date=2021-07-03}}</ref> is widely regarded as the leading institution for scholarship in Afrocentricity. In addition to Molefi Kete Asante, Afrocentricity developed among the "Temple Circle" (e.g., Abu Abarry, [[Kariamu Welsh Asante]], [[Terry Kershaw]], Tsehloane Keto, Ama Mazama, [[Theophile Obenga]]).<ref name="Chawane" /> As a result of the scholarly development of Afrocentricity, several [[scholarly journals]] and [[professional associations]] have developed throughout the [[United States of America]] and [[Africa]].<ref name="Chawane" /> As a global intellectual enterprise, Afrocentricity is studied, taught, and exemplified at institutions and locations, such as Quilombismo (which was initiated by [[Abdias Nascimento]]) in [[Brazil]], the [[Universitario del Pacifico]] in [[Buenaventura, Valle del Cauca|Buenaventura]], [[Colombia]], the programs of Africamaat in [[Paris]], [[France]], the Centre for African Renaissance at the [[University of South Africa]] in [[South Africa]], a training program operated by Stanley Mkhize at the [[University of Witwatersrand]] in [[South Africa]], and the Molefi Kete Asante Institute in [[Philadelphia]], [[Pennsylvania]], [[United States]].<ref name="Tillotson">{{cite journal |last1=Tillotson |first1=Michael T. |title=Retrospective Analysis: The Movement Against African Centered Thought |journal=Journal of Pan African Studies |date=March 2011 |volume=4 |issue=3 |page=170 |url=https://www.jpanafrican.org/docs/vol4no3/4.3Retrospective.pdf |issn=0888-6601 |oclc=4774962979 |s2cid=141299507}}</ref> Africological conferences also developed, some which operate by invitation, and some which occur on a yearly basis,<ref name="Asante IX">{{cite book |last1=Asante |first1=Molefi Kete |title=Dispatches from the Ebony Tower: Intellectuals Confront the African American Experience |chapter=Afrocentricity, Race, and Reason |date=Mar 1, 2001 |publisher=Columbia University Press |page=199 |isbn=9780231507943 |oclc=243615903 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=bsayWnizUD0C&q=Temple+Circle}}</ref> such as the Cheikh Anta Diop Conference.<ref name="Asante IX" /><ref name="Mazama II">{{cite journal |last1=Mazama |first1=Ama |title=The Afrocentric Paradigm: Contours and Definitions |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2668022 |journal=Journal of Black Studies |year=2001 |volume=31 |issue=4 |pages=403 |publisher=Sage Publications, Inc|doi=10.1177/002193470103100401 |jstor=2668022 |issn=0021-9347 |oclc=425284157 |s2cid=143377231}}</ref> The theory of Afrocentricity also had subsequent impact on other academic fields and theories, such as anthropology, education, jazz theory, linguistics, organizational theory, and physical education.<ref name="Gayles">{{cite journal |last1=Gayles |first1=Jonathan |title=Anthropology, Afrocentricity, And African American Studies: Toward A Sincere Discipline |url=https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1548-7466.2008.00022.x |journal=Transforming Anthropology |year=2008 |volume=16 |issue=2 |pages=147–159 |publisher=American Anthropology Association|doi=10.1111/j.1548-7466.2008.00022.x |issn=1051-0559 |oclc=5157215557 |s2cid=144396400}}</ref>

[[File:Obenga 2.JPG|thumb|200px| [[Theophile Obenga]], [[Republic of Congo]]]]

==Differences between Afrocentricity and Afrocentrism==

Afrocentricity and Afrocentrism are not synonymous, but, instead, are distinct from one another, and should not be mistaken for one another. [[Molefi Kete Asante#Afrocentricity|Molefi Kete Asante]] explains:

<blockquote>By way of distinction, Afrocentricity should not be confused with the variant Afrocentrism. The term “Afrocentrism” was first used by the opponents of Afrocentricity who in their zeal saw it as an obverse of Eurocentrism. The adjective “Afrocentric” in the academic literature always referred to “Afrocentricity.” However, the use of “Afrocentrism” reflected a negation of the idea of Afrocentricity as a positive and progressive paradigm. The aim was to assign religious signification to the idea of African centeredness. However, it has come to refer to a broad cultural movement of the late twentieth century that has a set of philosophical, political, and artistic ideas which provides the basis for the musical, [[Folk costume#Africa|sartorial]], and aesthetic dimensions of the African personality. On the other hand, Afrocentricity, as I have previously defined it, is a theory of [[Agency (philosophy)|agency]], that is, the idea that African people must be viewed and view themselves as agents rather than spectators to historical revolution and change. To this end Afrocentricity seeks to examine every aspect of the subject place of Africans in [[History of Africa |historical]], literary, [[Architecture of Africa|architectural]], ethical, [[African philosophy#Pre-modern|philosophical]], [[Economic history of Africa|economic]], and political life.<ref name="Asante" /></blockquote>

In addition to Molefi Kete Asante, many other academics have explained that Afrocentricity and Afrocentrism are distinct from one another, and that critics have often conflated the two when criticizing Afrocentricity.{{refn|<ref name="Moloi">{{cite web |last1=Moloi |first1=Lehasa |title=Towards An Afrocentric Development Paradigm In Africa |url=https://uir.unisa.ac.za/bitstream/handle/10500/28258/thesis_moloi_l.pdf?sequence=1 |publisher=University of South Africa |pages=52–53 |date=May 2020}}</ref><ref name="Sesanti">{{cite journal |last1=Sesanti |first1=Simphiwe |title=The concept of 'respect' in African culture in the context of journalism practice: An Afrocentric intervention |journal=South African Journal for Communication Theory and Research |date=2010 |volume=36 |issue=3 |page=345 |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02500167.2010.518792 |doi=10.1080/02500167.2010.518792 |issn=0250-0167 |oclc=5378049283 |s2cid=143395459}}</ref><ref name="Kumah-Abiwu">{{cite journal |last1=Kumah-Abiwu |first1=Felix |title=Beyond Intellectual Construct to Policy Ideas: The Case of the Afrocentric Paradigm |journal=Africology: The Journal of Pan African Studies |date=March 2016 |volume=9 |issue=1 |page=170 |url=https://www.jpanafrican.org/docs/vol9no1/9.1-11-Felix.pdf |issn=0888-6601 |oclc=6024551485 |s2cid=44233168}}</ref><ref name="Monteiro Ferreira III">{{cite journal |last1=Monteiro Ferreira |first1=Ana |title=Review: [Untitled] |journal=Journal of Black Studies |publisher=Sage Publications |date=July 2010 |volume=40 |issue=6 |page=1276 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/25704087 |jstor=25704087}}</ref><ref name="Coquery-Vidrovitch">{{cite journal |last1=Coquery-Vidrovitch |first1=Catherine |title=African Historiography in Africa |journal=Revue Tiers Monde |date=2013 |volume=216 |issue=4 |page=111 |doi=10.3917/rtm.216.0111 |url=https://www.cairn-int.info/journal-revue-tiers-monde-2013-4-page-111.htm |issn=1293-8882 |oclc=7961511219 |s2cid=146173419|doi-access=free }}</ref><ref name="Gwaravanda">{{cite web |last1=Gwaravanda |first1=Ephraim Taurai |title=A Critical Analysis of the Contribution of Selected Shona Proverbs To Applied Philosophy |url=https://core.ac.uk/reader/43178380 |publisher=University of South Africa |pages=36–37 |date=January 2016 |oclc=1006644805 |s2cid=148463272}}</ref><ref name="Rasekoala">{{cite web |last1=Rasekoala |first1=Elizabeth |display-authors=etal |title=Comprehensive Report: A Research Framework on Gender and Socio-Cultural Inclusion in Global Change Research |url=https://repository.hsrc.ac.za/bitstream/handle/20.500.11910/1813/8790.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y |publisher=Africa Institute of South Africa |page=8 |date=May 2015 |s2cid=150948814}}</ref><ref name="Masaka">{{cite web |last1=Masaka |first1=Dennis |title=The Impact of Western Colonial Education On Zimbabwe's Traditional And Postcolonial Educational System(s) |url=https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/43178366.pdf |publisher=University of South Africa |page=56 |date=January 2016 |oclc=1019701687 |s2cid=147852193}}</ref><ref name="Stewart II">{{cite journal |last1=Stewart |first1=James B. |title=Black/Africana Studies, Then And Now: Reconstructing A Century Of Intellectual Inquiry And Political Engagement, 1915–2015 |journal=The Journal of African American History |date=2015 |volume=100 |issue=1 |page=107 |url=https://sites.psu.edu/stewartjonesprogram/files/2020/01/Stewart-AfricanAmericanHistory_2015.pdf |doi=10.5323/JAFRIAMERHIST.100.1.0087 |jstor=10.5323/jafriamerhist.100.1.0087 |issn=1548-1867 |oclc=5914865094 |s2cid=148321689}}</ref><ref name="Akua">{{cite web |last1=Akua |first1=Chike |title=The Life of a Policy: An Afrocentric Case Study Policy Analysis of Florida Statute 1003.42(h) |url=https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1181&context=eps_diss |publisher=Georgia State University |pages=vi-vii |date=2017 |s2cid=157994824}}</ref><ref name="Noman">{{cite web |last1=Noman |first1=Abu |title=Africological Reconceptualization of the Epistemological Crises In Postcolonial Studies |url=https://scholarshare.temple.edu/bitstream/handle/20.500.12613/3342/TETDEDXNoman-temple-0225E-13213.pdf?sequence=1 |publisher=Temple University |pages=43–44 |date=May 2018 |oclc=1280138580}}</ref><ref name="Asante XXII">{{cite book |last1=Asante |first1=Molefi Kete |title=Routledge Handbook of Pan-Africanism |date=Apr 30, 2020 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-0-367-03066-7 |doi=10.4324/9780429020193-10 |oclc=1154016805 |s2cid=240702391 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=oKHgDwAAQBAJ&dq=Afrocentricity+is+a+philosophical+paradigm+used+to+generate+theories+and+methods+of+analysis+and+correctives+to+the+social%2C+economic%2C+and+cultural+conditions+of+African+people.+Rather+Afrocentricity+argued+that+Africans%2C+regardless+to+opposition+and+despite+the+spatial+distribution+of+Africans%2C+had+to+embrace+the+idea+that+as+African+people+there+was+nothing+wrong+with+them+as+Africans.+Afrocentricity%E2%80%99s+innovation+in+approaching+knowledge+related+to+African+people+is+the+assertion+that+Africans+must+be+the+center+of+their+own+narratives.+This+was+a+simple+philosophical+pivot%2C+but+its+impact+has+colored+all+studies+of+African+people+since+the+publication+of+Molefi+Kete+Asante%E2%80%99s+original+studies+on+Afrocentricity.+A+key+premise+of+Afrocentricity+is+that+African+agency+is+the+central+instrument+in+a+cultural+reorientation+in+the+African+world.+Few+critics+of+Afrocentricity+even+quote+from+Afrocentrists%3B+they+are+second-hand+commentators+for+the+most+part.&pg=PT174 |chapter=Afrocentricity|pages=147–158}}</ref><ref name="Bangura" /><ref name="Bangura II" /><ref name="Kunda" /><ref name="Abdullah">{{cite book |last1=Abdullah |first1=Dhakir |title=The Inter-ethnic Dimensions of Afrocentricity: A Metatheoretical Framework for Intercultural Agency and Psychological Fortification |url=https://www.proquest.com/openview/7bd1064b28e62d166411a31fcc5fb366/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=18750&diss=y |page=2 |date=July 2020 |isbn=9798662477865 |oclc=1319082211}}</ref><ref name="Appiagyei">{{cite web |last1=Appiagyei |first1=Akua |title=The Manifestation of the African-Centered Educational Philosophy in the Pedagogical Practices of an Elementary Education Science Teacher |url=https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1050&context=ece_diss |publisher=Georgia State University |page=57 |date=2019 |s2cid=181521655}}</ref><ref name="Monteiro-Ferreira II" /><ref name="Bankole" /><ref name="Ramose" /><ref name="Stewart" /><ref name="Yehudah" /><ref name="M'Baye" /><ref name="Gayles II" /><ref name="Zulu" /><ref name="Balakrishnan" /><ref name="Amo‑Agyemang" />}} Further, Asante indicates that by conflating Afrocentricity with Afrocentricism, critics of Afrocentrism have mischaracterized Afrocentricity as being a "'religious' movement based on an [[essentialist]] paradigm."<ref name="Asante IV">{{cite book |last1=Asante |first1=Molefi Kete |title=Afrocentricity: Critical Intercultural Communication Theories, Issues, and Concepts |url=https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/9781118783665.ieicc0195 |journal=The International Encyclopedia of Intercultural Communication |date=13 December 2017 |pages=1–11 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons, Inc.|doi=10.1002/9781118783665.ieicc0195 |isbn=9781118783665 |oclc=1019678798}}</ref> Other academics have also been critical of the criticism of Afrocentricity that seek to define it as a religious movement.<ref name="Monteiro-Ferreira II">{{cite journal |last1=Monteiro-Ferreira |first1=Ana |title=Afrocentricity and the Western Paradigm |journal=Journal of Black Studies |date=March 26, 2008 |volume=40 |issue=2 |page=333 |url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0021934708314801 |doi=10.1177/0021934708314801|jstor=40282637|issn=0021-9347|oclc=461451432|s2cid=144475771}}</ref><ref name="Asante XXIII" /> Historian and medical anthropologist [[Katherine Bankole-Medina]] notes that rather than seeking to understand the theory of Afrocentricity or engage in constructive discourse with the scholars of the theory, many critical academics seek to critique and discredit the theory as well as engage in intellectual militarism.<ref name="Bankole">{{cite journal |last1=Bankole |first1=Katherine Kemi |title=The Attack On Afrocentricity |journal=The Gaither Reporter |date=Nov 30, 1994 |volume=2 |issue=2 |page=8 |url=https://www.proquest.com/openview/9eb6ba87de7d9bd23643c17f46b828bb/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=26402}}</ref> Consequently, between Afrocentrism and Afrocentricity, many critical academics tend to overlook their key suffix distinction (i.e., -ism and -icity).<ref name="Bankole" /> Philosopher [[Mogobe Ramose|Ramose]] indicated that, in contrast to Afrocentricity, Afrocentrism has been characterized as a notion that negates the notion of Afrocentricity being a “positive and progressive paradigm.”<ref name="Ramose">{{cite book |last1=Ramose |first1=Mogobe B. |title=Ubuntu: Curating the Archive |chapter=Ubuntu: Affirming a Right and Seeking Remedies in South Africa |date=2014 |publisher=University of KwaZulu-Natal Press |isbn=978-1-86914-265-0 |oclc=881707322 |s2cid=146369742 |page=124 |chapter-url=https://www.academia.edu/40401757}}</ref>

Other academics have indicated that since Afrocentricity has been made increasingly well-known inside and outside of academia, it has resulted in non-academics developing their own forms of analysis that are not so precise or accurate and these subsequently developed forms of analysis have been incorporated into various forms of media (e.g., music, film).<ref name="Stewart">{{cite book |last1=Stewart |first1=James B. |title=Africana Studies: A Disciplinary Quest for Both Theory and Method |date=1997 |publisher=McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers |pages=108–109 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=aLuIHSaIeN4C&dq=%22Afrocentricity%22+%22Afrocentrism%22+-Asante&pg=PA108 |chapter=Reaching for Higher Ground: Toward an Understanding of Black/Africana Studies |isbn=0-7864-0278-4 |oclc=35558992 |s2cid=107507209}}</ref> This form of popular culture, or Afrocentrism, has also subsequently been mistaken for the systematic methodology of Afrocentricity.<ref name="Stewart" /> As a result of the popular misconceptions of what Afrocentricity is not, Stewart indicates that this has had a negative impact in terms of public perception.<ref name="Stewart" /> Some academics have stated that, while Afrocentrism is popular culture, Afrocentricity is an academic theory and that Afrocentricity has been depicted by mass media and critics as Afrocentrism in order to attempt to mischaracterize and/or invalidate Afrocentricity.<ref name="Yehudah">{{cite journal |last1=Yehudah |first1=Miciah Z. |title=Distinguishing Afrocentric Inquiry From Pop Culture Afrocentrism |journal=Journal of Black Studies |date=June 30, 2015 |volume=46 |issue=6 |pages=552, 560 |url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0021934715593054 |doi=10.1177/0021934715593054 |jstor=24572898 |issn=0021-9347 |oclc=5868722093 |s2cid=146611141}}</ref><ref name="Kumah-Abiwu" /> [[Maulana Karenga|Karenga]] indicated that distinctions exist between the public understanding of [[Afrocentrism]] that has been conveyed through mass media, which is held by some proponents and held by some critics of Afrocentrism, and the academic conceptualization of Afrocentricity held by Africologists.<ref name="Alkebulan" /> Karenga indicates that Afrocentricity is an intellectual [[Methodology#Paradigm|paradigm]] or [[Philosophical methodology|methodology]], whereas, Afrocentrism, by merit of the term’s suffix (i.e., [[-ism]]), is an [[ideological]] and [[political]] disposition.<ref name="Alkebulan" /> Additionally, Karenga indicates that, in Afrocentricity, [[Etiquette in Africa|African behaviors]] and [[African culture]] are subject to examination through the centered lens of African ideals.<ref name="Alkebulan" /> [[Babacar M'Baye|M'Baye]] indicates that, unlike Afrocentrism, the intellectual theory of Afrocentricity adds value to the field of Black studies.<ref name="M'Baye">{{cite book |last1=M'Baye |first1=Babacar |author-link=Babacar M'Baye |title=American Multicultural Studies: Diversity of Race, Ethnicity, Gender and Sexuality |date=Jul 13, 2012 |publisher=SAGE Publications |pages=9–10 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=HE12AwAAQBAJ&dq=%22Afrocentricity%22+%22Afrocentrism%22+-Asante&pg=PT27 |chapter=What Is Black in the Melting Pot?: A Critique of Afrocentrist and Postmodernist Discourses on Blackness |isbn=978-1-4129-9802-4 |oclc=780481540 |s2cid=204705387}}</ref>

Some academics have stated that some of the more radical views of Afrocentricism have been unfairly attributed to Kete Asante.<ref name="Gayles II">{{cite journal |last1=Gayles |first1=Jonathan |title=Anthropology, Afrocentricity, And African American Studies: Toward A Sincere Discipline |journal=Transforming Anthropology |date=11 November 2008 |volume=16 |issue=2 |page=151 |url=https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1548-7466.2008.00022.x |doi=10.1111/j.1548-7466.2008.00022.x |issn=1051-0559 |oclc=5157215557 |s2cid=144396400}}</ref>

Some academics have indicated that Afrocentricity is distinct from Afrocentrism, and that Afrocentrism is frequently confused with ethnonationalism, often simplified to black pride or romanticized black history, often misconstrued by [[Progressivism|progressive]]/[[Social liberalism|liberal]] academics as being a black version of white nationalism, or mischaracterized as being a black version of Eurocentrism.<ref name="M'Baye" /> They further state, that Afrocentrism has been fallaciously characterized as being a notion based on [[black supremacy]] and as being the black equivalent of hegemonic Eurocentrism.<ref name="Abdullah" /> Rasekoala states that, while Afrocentrism has been characterized as an ideology focused on cultural traits (e.g., customs, habits, traditions, values, value systems) of Africans, Afrocentricity is a methodology that focuses on the positionality, agency, and experiences of Africans.<ref name="Rasekoala" />

Proponents of Afrocentricity state that it is a theoretic concept of agency.<ref name="Moloi" /> They further state that the detractors of Afrocentricity intentionally mislabel Afrocentricity as Afrocentrism in order to steer people of African descent, who are not yet aware of what composes Afrocentricity, away from it.<ref name="Moloi" /> This has been characterized as an “ongoing ideological warfare to ensure the continuation of the subjugation of African people as objects of analysis, thus discouraging them from being agents in their own history.”<ref name="Moloi" /> Additionally, it has been further indicated that those who charge scholars of Afrocentricity of producing political propaganda, do so as well, while portraying it as scholarship, in order to deny the agency of Africans and to avoid critique.<ref name="Moloi" /> Hilliard and Alkebulan indicate that, rather than the academic work of scholars of Afrocentricity being used to define Afrocentricity, mass media has shaped the public understanding of Afrocentricity using the work of journalists and the work of academics, who are not professionals in the field of Afrocentricity – such as [[Mary Lefkowitz]] and her work, ''Not Out of Africa'', which also confuses Afrocentrism with Afrocentricity – as authoritative sources for criticisms of Afrocentricity.<ref name="Moloi" /> Cultural critic and [[postcolonial studies]] professor [[Edward Said]] has also been criticized of confusing Afrocentricity with Afrocentricism.<ref name="Noman" />

In 1991, the [[New York Times]],<ref name="Bangura">{{cite journal |last1=Bangura |first1=Abdul Karim |title=Teaching Afrocentricity Through E-Clustering |journal=Africology: The Journal of Pan African Studies |date=November 2017 |volume=10 |issue=10 |url=https://www.jpanafrican.org/docs/vol10no10/10.10-10-Bangura.pdf |page=122 |oclc=7840267045 |s2cid=70053117}}</ref><ref name="Bangura II">{{cite book |last1=Bangura |first1=Abdul Karim |title=Africa and Globalization |chapter=Hrārā/S-tut/Qeṭ: Re-conceptualizing Pan-African Studies in the Era of Globalization Using a Mixture of Ancient Egyptian, Diopian, Mazruiana, Mbitian, and Asanteian Approaches |date=2020 |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan, Cham |page=313 |chapter-url=https://dokumen.pub/africa-and-globalization-novel-multidisciplinary-perspectives-9783030553500.html |doi=10.1007/978-3-030-55351-7_15 |isbn=978-3-030-55350-0 |s2cid=226405885}}</ref><ref name="Kunda">{{cite book |last1=Kunda |first1=Ali |title=African Isms: Africa and the Globalized World |date=2021 |publisher=Peter Lang Publishing |isbn=978-1-4331-8382-9 |oclc=1240733540 |page=40 |chapter-url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/350749398 |chapter=Afrocentrism: A Mazruiana Perspective}}</ref> or [[Newsweek]],<ref name="Zulu">{{cite journal |last1=Zulu |first1=Itibari M. |title=Exploring the African Centered Paradigm: Discourse and Innovation in African World Community Studies |journal=Africology: The Journal of Pan African Studies |date=March 2018 |volume=11 |issue=4 |pages=115–116 |oclc=44580337 |url=https://www.jpanafrican.org/docs/vol11no4/11.4-18-Zulu-EACP.pdf |s2cid=165025970}}</ref> created the term Afrocentrism in opposition to Afrocentricity and critics of Afrocentricity advanced this effort.<ref name="Bangura" /><ref name="Zulu" /> Zulu indicates that Afrocentrism was an imposed term, which was part of a deceptive grand narrative, intended to derail and curtail the momentum of the paradigm of Afrocentricity being adopted and used.<ref name="Zulu" />

Asante indicates that Afrocentrism post-dates Afrocentricity as a concept.<ref name="Moloi" /> Other scholars indicate that what has come to be known as Afrocentrism has existed among black communities for centuries as a grassroots political understanding and narrative tradition about the [[history of Africa]] and Africans, which lies in contrast to and is distinct from the theory of Afrocentricity and Africology movement that developed in the 1980s.<ref name="Balakrishnan">{{cite journal |last1=Balakrishnan |first1=Sarah |title=Afrocentrism Revisited: Africa in the Philosophy of Black Nationalism |journal=Souls: A Critical Journal of Black Politics, Culture, and Society |date=February 8, 2021 |volume=22 |issue=1 |pages=71–72 |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10999949.2019.1711566 |doi=10.1080/10999949.2019.1711566 |issn=1099-9949 |oclc=8907443619 |s2cid=231848410}}</ref> Additionally, use of the term Afrocentric preexisted the birth of Kete Asante and it later became incorporated into the Afrocentric methodology and paradigm created by Asante.<ref name="Asante XXII" /> As Kete Asante further notes, while African-centeredness may suggest a limitation in geography, Afrocentricity can be performed anywhere in the world as a form of academic study.<ref name="Asante XXII" />

While there are different designations (e.g., Africanity, Gloriana Afrocentricity, Proletarian Afrocentricity) for Afrocentricity, Amo‑Agyemang indicates that Afrocentricity should not be mistaken for Afrocentrism and does not seek to replace Eurocentrism.<ref name="Amo‑Agyemang">{{cite journal |last1=Amo‑Agyemang |first1=Charles |title=Unmasking resilience as governmentality: towards an Afrocentric epistemology |journal=International Politics |date=17 February 2021 |volume=58 |issue=5 |page=688 |url=http://ugspace.ug.edu.gh/bitstream/handle/123456789/37011/Unmasking-resilience-as-governmentality-towards-an-Afrocentric-epistemologyInternational-Politics.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y |doi=10.1057/S41311-021-00282-8 |issn=1384-5748 |oclc=9270818002 |s2cid=233930251}}</ref> As Afrocentricity centers African identity, and privileges the concepts, traditions, and history of Africans, Amo‑Agyemang indicates that Afrocentricity clarifies, deconstructs, and undermines hegemonic epistemologies; also, that it serves as a liberatory method that "negates/repudiates exploitations, oppression, repression, domination and marginality of indigenous cultural knowledge" and seeks the "democratisation of knowledge, de‑hegemonisation of knowledge, de‑westernisation of knowledge, and de‑Europeanisation of knowledge".<ref name="Amo‑Agyemang" />

==Criticisms and responses to criticisms==

Major critics of Afrocentricity have been Tunde Adeleke (e.g., ''The Case Against Afrocentrism'', 2009), Clarence Walker (e.g., ''Why We Can't Go Home Again'', 2001), Stephen Howe (e.g., ''Afrocentrism: Mythical Pasts and Imagined Homes'', 1998), and [[Mary Lefkowitz]] (e.g., ''Not Out of Africa'', 1997).<ref name="Asante II" /> These major critical works were characterized in Asante (2017) as being a "misunderstanding of Afrocentricity or an attempt to relaunch the Eurocentric domination in knowledge, criticism, and literature."<ref name="Asante II" />

Esonwanne (1992) critiqued Asante's ''Kemet, Afrocentricity and Knowledge'' (1990) and characterized its discourse as "implausible", its [[argumentation]] as "disorganized", its analysis as "crude and garbled", its perceived lack of seriousness in study as harmful to the "serious study of [[African-American culture|African American]] and African cultures", as being part of a "whole project of Afrocentrism", and as being "off-handedly racist".<ref name="Esonwanne">{{cite journal |last1=Esonwanne |first1=Uzo |title=Review: [Untitled] |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/3819965|journal=Research in African Literatures|publisher=Indiana University Press|year=1992 |volume=23 |issue=1 |page=206|jstor=3819965}}</ref> Esonwanne (1992) indicates that the redeeming quality and "intellectual value" of Asante's earlier work is its "[[Value (ethics)#Positive and negative value |negative value]]" and that it is a prime example of what researchers in African studies and African-American studies "would do well to avoid".<ref name="Esonwanne" /> Esonwanne (1992) further characterizes Asante’s Afrocentricity as being a "[[Post–civil rights era in African-American history |post-Civil Rights]] [[individualist]] version of the pan-Africanist doctrine" that merits not giving into "temptation to dismiss the notion of Afrocentricity completely in abeyance".<ref name="Esonwanne" />

Asante (1993) critiqued Esonwanne (1992) and the critical review that was given to his earlier work.<ref name="Asante V">{{cite book |last1=Asante |first1=Molefi Kete |title=Malcolm X as Cultural Hero And Other Afrocentric Essays |date=1993 |publisher=Africa World Press |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_87tAAAAMAAJ&q=Esonwanne|pages=60–62|isbn=9780865434011|oclc=28891809|s2cid=160357150}}</ref> Asante indicated that scholars who considered using Esonwanne (1992) as a means to comprehend his earlier work would have a limited comprehension of his earlier work.<ref name="Asante V" /> Esonwanne's characterization of Asante's work as "off-handedly racist" was characterized by Asante as "gratuitous mudslinging" that lacked specificity about what was being characterized as "off-handedly racist".<ref name="Asante V" /> Additionally, Asante indicated that, due to the lack of specific example cited from his earlier work to support the characterization of it as "off-handedly racist", it was "not only a serious breach of professionalism but a grotesque and dishonest intellectual ploy".<ref name="Asante V" />

Esonwanne (1992) indicated that grouping Cheikh Anta Diop, Maulana Karenga, and Wade Nobles together was a "strange mix" due to each of the scholars having different methodological approaches to African studies and African-American studies.<ref name="Asante V" /> Based on this characterization of Asante's earlier work as a "strange mix", Asante (1993) viewed this as indication of Esonwanne (1992) showing a lack of comprehension and familiarity with his earlier work, with the works of Diop, Karenga, and Wade, as well as the theory of Afrocentricity.<ref name="Asante V" /> Asante (1993) went on to clarify that Cheikh Anta Diop, Maulana Karenga, and Wade Nobles, despite differences in professional backgrounds or academic interests, were all scholars in the theory of Afrocentricity.<ref name="Asante V" />

Asante (1993) went on to clarify that, similar to the use of the term "European", the use of the composite term "African" is not used it in reference to an abstraction, but is used in reference to ethnic identity and cultural heritage; as such, there are modal uses of terms such as "African civilization" and "African culture", which do not deny the significance of the discrete identities and heritages of more specific African groupings (e.g., [[African-American]], [[Hausa people|Hausa]], [[Afro-Jamaicans|Jamaican]], [[Kikuyu people|Kikuyu]], [[Kongo people|Kongo]], [[Yoruba people|Yoruba]]).<ref name="Asante V" /> Asante (1993) indicates that usage of such terms, in reference to [[Ma'at]], was addressed in a chapter of his earlier work, but that the shortcomings of the critiques presented in Esonwanne (1992) show that Esonwanne may not have read as far as that chapter.<ref name="Asante V" />

[[Patricia Hill Collins|Hill-Collins]] (2006) characterized Afrocentrism as essentially being a civil religion (e.g., common beliefs and values; common tenets that distinguish believers from non-believers; views on the unknowns of life, on suffering, and on death; common places of gathering and rituals that establish one as a member of an institutionalized belief system).<ref name="Hill-Collins">{{cite book |last1=Hill-Collins |first1=Patricia |title=From Black Power to Hip Hop: Racism, Nationalism, and Feminism |chapter=Black Nationalism and African American Ethnicity |date=Jan 19, 2006 |publisher=Temple University Press |pages=85–92 |isbn=9781592137909 |issn=1062-4783 |oclc=5207839980 |s2cid=140854826 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9rIqkIqCeAAC&dq=Afrocentricity&pg=PR5}}</ref> Some aspects that she defined and related to Asante's Afrocentricity was a fundamental love for [[black people]] and [[black pride|blackness]] (e.g., [[negritude]]) and common black values (e.g., Karenga’s established values and principles of [[Kwanzaa]]); another aspect was black centeredness as a form of grace or relief from white [[racism]]; another aspect was the "[[original sin]]" of the [[Trans-Atlantic slave trade]] as the major reasoning for the suffering and death of black people, Africa as the [[promised land]], and a form of [[salvation]] through self-redefinition and self-reclamation as an African people as well as rejection of what is perceived as being of white people and white culture (which are viewed as bearing evil qualities in relation to black people).<ref name="Hill-Collins" /> Another aspect of the characterization of Afrocentrism as a civil religion involves the [[homophobic]] and [[sexist]] exclusion of [[African-American LGBT community|black GLBTQ]] individuals, [[black women]], [[Multiracial people|biracial and multiracial]] individuals, and [[Black elite#United States|wealthy black]] individuals.<ref name="Hill-Collins" />

Asante (2007) characterized Hill-Collins (2006) as following a similar approach as Stephen Howe and Mary Lefkowitz of not providing a clear definition for the concept of Afrocentricity that they are attempting to critique and then, subsequently, negatively and incorrectly characterizing Afrocentricity as Afrocentrism (i.e., a black form of Eurocentrism).<ref name="Asante III">{{cite book |last1=Asante |first1=Molefi Kete |title=An Afrocentric Manifesto: Toward an African Renaissance |date=Dec 17, 2007 |publisher=Polity |pages=18–23 |isbn=9780745641027 |oclc=156812629 |s2cid=190415914 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MUBn1aYacqgC&dq=Hill-Collins&pg=PA1}}</ref> Asante indicates that Afrocentricity is not an enclosed system of thought or religious belief; rather, he indicated that it is an unenclosed, critical [[dialectic]] that allows for open-ended dialogue and debate on the fundamental assumptions that the theory of Afrocentricity is based on.<ref name="Asante III" /> Asante further critiqued and characterized Hill-Collins (2006) as being "not only poor scholarship", but a "form of [[Self-hatred#African-Americans|self-hatred]]" that is typically "engaged in by vulgar careerists whose plan is to distance themselves from African agency".<ref name="Asante III" /> Asante highlighted Hill-Collins' intellectual work on the centeredness of women of the [[African diaspora]] to contrast with her characterized lack of understanding of the intellectual work on the centeredness of African people that Afrocentricity focuses on.<ref name="Asante III" /> As a follow-up to Hill-Collins' ''Black Power to Hip Hop: Racism, Nationalism, and Feminism?'', she authored ''Ethnicity, Culture, and Black Nationalist Politics'', which Asante characterizes as having vaguely defined notions of black nationalism, Afrocentrism/Afrocentricity, civil religion, and African-American ethnic identity.<ref name="Asante III" /> Asante characterized her critiques of Afrocentricity as being supportive of a manufactured intellectual agenda and predicated on the reactionary politics surrounding modern American history.<ref name="Asante III" />

Asante (2007) highlights that Hill-Collins' perspective on black nationalism, rather than being distinct from usual approaches, derives from the same origin as these approaches (e.g., black feminist nationalism, cultural nationalism, religious nationalism, revolutionary nationalism).<ref name="Asante III" /> Within the context of racialized American national identity, Asante characterizes Hill-Collins' notion of civil religion as the reverence for American civil government and its political principles; along with this notion is the characterized view of [[West Indian Americans#Caribbean immigration to the United States|immigrating]] [[Afro-Caribbeans]] choosing how to not become "black" Americans (who later join with African-Americans and partake in the [[UNIA]] movement), [[European Americans#History|immigrating Europeans]] choosing how to become "white" Americans, the European-American [[White privilege|social power]] of whiteness to erase their racial identity and become any other identity (e.g., Native American, of Irish descent, of Italian descent) except an identity of African descent, the European-American social power to operate as individuals rather than as a monolithic racial identity (e.g., Black American), and a tradition of racism operating in the modern context of [[Color blindness (racial classification)|color-blindness]], [[Desegregation in the United States|desegregation]], and the [[Illusion of inclusion#African-Americans|illusion]] of equality.<ref name="Asante III" />

Following her characterized view of black nationalism, Asante (2007) indicates that Hill-Collins conflates [[black nationalism]] (e.g., [[Louis Farrakhan]] and the [[Nation of Islam]]) with Afrocentricity (e.g., [[Molefi Kete Asante]] and [[Afrocentricity (book)|Afrocentricity]]).<ref name="Asante III" /> Asante indicates that black nationalism, as a political ideology, is distinct from Afrocentricity, which is a philosophical paradigm, and that both serve distinct purposes and operate in distinct spheres.<ref name="Asante III" /> Rather than being a reformulation of black cultural nationalism and being a civil religion, Asante indicates that Black studies derived and developed from black nationalism and that the development of Afrocentricity post-dates the development of Black studies.<ref name="Asante III" /> Asante indicates that the correct understanding that Hill-Collins has is that "Afrocentricity is a social theory in the sense that it explains the dislocation, disorientation, and mental enslavement of African people as being a function of white racial hegemony."<ref name="Asante III" /> In relation to this view, Asante indicates that mutilating one’s own people is one of the greatest forms of dislocation and that revering the instruction of a "slave master" to intellectually attacking one's own people is a form of dislocated behavior.<ref name="Asante III" />

The centerpiece of Hill-Collins’ approach, as Asante (2007) characterized it, is that "Afrocentricity took the framework of American civil religion and stripped it of its American symbols and substituted a black value system."<ref name="Asante III" /> Asante indicates that the earliest Africologists (e.g., [[Nah Dove]], Tsehloane Keto, Ama Mazama, [[Kariamu Welsh]], [[Terry Kershaw]]) of the "Temple Circle" or contemporaneous scholars (e.g., [[Maulana Karenga]], [[Wade Nobles]], [[Asa Hilliard]], [[Clenora Hudson-Weems]], Linda Myers) had no conscious intention of creating a civil religion as Hill-Collins claims.<ref name="Asante III" />

==List of Africologists==

===Temple Circle===

* [[Abu Abarry]]<ref name="Chawane" />
* [[Kariamu Welsh Asante]]<ref name="Asante VI" /><ref name="Chawane" /><ref name="Asante VII" /><ref name="Karenga" /><ref name="Asante VIII" />
* [[Molefi Kete Asante]]<ref name="Asante X" />
* [[Aisha Blackshire-Belay]]<ref name="Karenga" /><ref name="Asante VIII" />
* [[Nah Dove]]<ref name="Asante VI">{{cite book |last1=Asante |first1=Molefi Kete |title=An Afrocentric Manifesto: Toward an African Renaissance |date=Dec 17, 2007 |publisher=Polity |page=23 |isbn=9780745641027 |oclc=156812629 |s2cid=190415914 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MUBn1aYacqgC&q=Temple+Circle}}</ref><ref name="Asante VII">{{cite journal |last1=Asante |first1=Molefi Kete |title=The Discipline of Africology at the Crossroads: Toward An Eshuean Response to Intellectual Dilemma |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00064246.2005.11413310?journalCode=rtbs20 |journal=The Black Scholar |year=2005 |volume=35 |issue=2 |pages=37–49 |doi=10.1080/00064246.2005.11413310 |jstor=41069859 |issn=0006-4246 |oclc=5390728668 |s2cid=146873735}}</ref><ref name="Karenga" /><ref name="Asante VIII" />
* [[Charles Fuller]]<ref name="Karenga" /><ref name="Asante VIII" />
* [[Terry Kershaw]]<ref name="Asante VI" /><ref name="Chawane" />
* [[C. Tsehloane Keto]]<ref name="Asante VI" /><ref name="Chawane" /><ref name="Asante VII" /><ref name="Karenga" /><ref name="Asante VIII" />
* [[Ama Mazama]]<ref name="Asante VI" /><ref name="Chawane" /><ref name="Karenga" /><ref name="Asante VIII" /><ref name="Asante X" />
* [[Theophile Obenga]]<ref name="Chawane" /><ref name="Karenga" /><ref name="Asante VIII" />
* [[James Ravell]]<ref name="Karenga" /><ref name="Asante VIII" />
* [[Thelma Ravell]]<ref name="Karenga" /><ref name="Asante VIII" />

==References==

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{{African American topics}}
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{{DEFAULTSORT:African-American Studies}}
[[Category:African diaspora]]
[[Category:African studies]]
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[[Category:Postmodernism]]