| dc.description.abstract | This contribution brings together in one source, Bethwell A. Ogot, the
man and his works. It attempts to identify his creative and scholarly
works so that they may serve as a guide to the wide range and depth of
his intellectual output during an illustrious academic career. It is a tribute
to one of the pioneer professional African historians whose ideas and
contributions continue to stimulate intellectual exchanges among both
African and non-African scholars and researchers.
Ogot and the pioneering generation of scholars that emerged in the
1950s and 1960s reasserted Africa's past as part of universal history. This
past had to be studied on its own merit and the methods of study were
similar to those of the histories of other societies. It is a generation that
exploded colonial myths and distortions about Africa, by producing
works that withstood rigorous historical scrutiny and thereby achieved a
great measure of recognition for African history.
We salute such pioneer African historians and thinkers as 1. F. Ade
Ajayi, A. Adu Boahen, Cheikh Anta Diop, Joseph Ki-Zerbo, and Bethwell
A. Ogot. They assembled, accumulated, and analyzed historical data,
thus setting models which many have since profited from. The solid intellectual
foundations they laid were no small contribution to Africa's independence.
They continue to serve in Africa's quest for cultural
independence through autonomous thinking and historical philosophy, in
the wider realm of human history and the frontiers of knowledge. | en |
