Africa and the Politics of Knowledge
MIT's course examines why Africa persists as both a geographical entity and a knowledge category despite its internal diversity. Readings drawn from anthropology and history trace how ideas of Africa took shape alongside European imperialism, colonial-era biological science, decolonization movements, and African state-building. The syllabus organizes material around five themes: space and place, race, representation, self-determination, and time. Students work through primary and secondary readings addressing how outsiders and Africans themselves have constructed the continent as an object of study and a political subject, and how those constructions shaped policy, science, and nation-building. The course includes a full reading list and assignments from MIT's OpenCourseWare archive, useful for anyone studying African history, postcolonial theory, or the history of ideas about race and place.