Pan-Africanism and the Language Question: Re-reading African Cultural and Intellectual History

This paper examines the role of intellectuals in the development of Pan-Africanist linguistic nationalism. The specific aim of the paper is to analyse elite ideas about African linguistic nationalism and their role in African society from the perspective of the sociology of knowledge, a stance which understands ideas in terms of the social, cultural and civilisational milieu that produces and consumes them. The focus of the paper is dictated by the fact that little, if anything, has been written on linguistic nationalism as a factor of Pan-Africanist ideology. This is in contrast with the abundance of literature on the political and economic aspects of the movement. Political theorists on Africa have had a lot to say about the ‘language of Pan-Africanism’ but very little to say about ‘Linguistic PanAfricanism’. It is therefore argued in this paper that the structure of nationalism consists of two equally powerful components: traditional data (such as race, language, literature, tradition, and territoriality), and egalitarian ideology (such as freedom, equality and fraternity). Pan-Africanism was a type of nationalism that fused traditional culture and modern ideology to generate the great social power that it was. Thus, Pan-Africanist linguistic nationalism deserves special attention because not much has been written on this aspect of cultural nationalism, and yet cultural nationalism was part of the social struggle against colonialism and imperialism. Further, among the intellectual leaders of Africa, none have attracted less attention than the language reformers.