The Interface Between the Written and the Oral in lfa Corpus

Abstract

While the modernists in the field of African philosophy embrace writing as a precondition for philosophy and forcefully maintain the need to cast philoso­phy in the image of science, the traditionalists insist that African philosophy is essentially a philosophical reflection on African oral traditions, morals, and re­ligious practices. This essay argues that the intransigent relationship between the modernists and the traditionalists persists because the two dominant schools have failed to recognize the need to furnish a paradigm of interaction between their projects. From the standpoint of lfa, therefore, this paper rejects the written-oral dichotomy that is central to both the modernist and the tradi­tionalist orientations, occasioned by their parochial and provincial conceptions of philosophy respectively. The paper shows how lfa as a complete philosophy puts a premium on the need to bring individual views in oral and written cul­tures together to enhance a wider human vision in matters bordering on the intellectual configuration of our human society.