Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-7cvxr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-22T15:32:39.752Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Scholarship Production in Cameroon: Interrogating a Recession

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 May 2014

Nantang B. Jua  and
Francis B. Nyamnjoh
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract:

Cameroonians saw a positive correlation between the enactment of the Liberty Laws in the early 1990s, the increase in the number of tertiary institutions, and the contribution of its universities to worldwide intellectual endeavors. Nevertheless, as the history of the University of Buea shows, the university space, instead of becoming free, became instead a space of domination. Universities discourage critical scholarship and collaboration, harass politically suspect instructors, and put barriers in the way of professional advancement. For most faculty members, energy in the university space has become focused on survival, with many individuals more concerned with promoting their upward mobility than with the production of knowledge. One particularly unfortunate result is the continued marginalization or silencing of the African voice on the global stage.

Résumé:

Résumé:

Les Camerounais ont remarqué une corrélation positive entre la promulgation des lois sur la liberté ou Liberty Laws au début des années 1990, l'accroissement du nombre d'institutions du secteur tertiaire, et la contribution de ses universités à l'entreprise intellectuelle dans le monde entier. Néanmoins, comme le montre l'histoire de l'université de Buea, l'espace universitaire, loin de se libérer, devint plutôt un espace de domination. Les universités y découragent les études et les collaborations d'ordre critique, harcèlent les enseignants politiquement suspects, et mettent des barrières sur le chemin de l'avancement professionnel. Pour la plupart des professeurs d'université, l'énergie de l'espace universitaire s'est maintenant concentrée sur la survie, un grand nombre de personnes étant plus préoccupé de la promotion de leur ascension sociale que de la production du savoir. Un résultat particulièrement malheureux de ce phénomène est la marginalisation continue ou la réduction au silence des voix africaines sur l'échelle globale.

Type
Research Article
Information
African Studies Review , Volume 45 , Issue 2: African Universities in Crisis and the Promotion of a Democratic Culture , September 2002 , pp. 49 - 71
Copyright
Copyright © African Studies Association 2002

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Appadurai, A. 1999. “Globalization and the Research Imagination.” International Social Science Journal 160 (06).Google Scholar
Aronowitz, S., and Giroux, Henry A.. 1993. Education Still under Siege. Westport, Conn.: Bergin & Garvey.Google Scholar
Bates, H. B., Mudimbe, V. Y., and O'Barr, Jean. 1993. Africa and the Disciplines. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Bayart, J. F., Ellis, Stephen, and Hibou, Beatrice. 1999. The Criminalization of the State in Africa. The International African Institute. Oxford: James Currey.Google Scholar
Besong, Bate. 1990. Beasts of No Nation. Limbe: Nooremac Press.Google Scholar
Bourdieu, P. 1984. Distinction. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Butler, K. D. 2000. “From Black History to Diasporan History: Brazilian Abolition in Afro-Atlantic Context.” African Studies Review (43) 1.Google Scholar
Calloni, M. 1998. “Neopopulism and Corruption: Toward a New Critique of the Elite.” Constellations (5) 1.Google Scholar
Connolly, W. 1991. Identity/Difference. Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press.Google Scholar
Eboussi Boulaga, F. 1997. La Démocratic de transit au Cameroun. Paris: L'Harmattan.Google Scholar
Feuer, L. 1969. The Conflict of Generations: The Character and Significance of Student Movements. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Foucault, Michel. 1984. The Foucault Reader, edited by Rainbow, Paul. New York: Pantheon Books.Google Scholar
Havel, V. 1992. Open Letters. New York: Vintage.Google Scholar
Hutchful, E. 1998. “Conversation with Eboe Hutchful.” CODESRIA Bulletin 3–4.Google Scholar
Kom, A. 1993. “Intellectuels Africains et Enjeux de la Démocratie: Misère, Répression et Exil.” Politique Africaine 51 (10): 61–68.Google Scholar
Kom, A. 1996. Education et Democratie en Afrique. Le Temps des Illusions. Paris: L'Harmattan.Google Scholar
Mazrui, A. 1990. “Forward to the Past: African Intellectuals in the 1990's.” African Commentary (06).Google Scholar
Meyer, J-B, Kaplan, David, and Charum, Jorge. 2001. “Scientific Nomadism and the New Geopolitics of Knowledge.” International Social Science Journal 168 (06).Google Scholar
Mkandawire, T. 1997. “The Social Sciences in Africa: Breaking Local Barriers and Negotiating International Presence.” The Bashorun M. K. O. Abiola Lecture, presented to the 1996 annual meeting of the African Studies Association. African Studies Review 40 (2).Google Scholar
Mongo, Beti. 1993. La France contre l'Afrique: Retour au Cameroun. Paris: La Decouverte.Google Scholar
Ndjana, M. 2000. “Marriage and Cultural Integration: Essay on the Political Function of Matrimonial Institutions.” Paper presented at the Fifth Edition of the National Festival of Arts and Culture (FENAC), 12 21.Google Scholar
Nieftagodien, N. 1999. “Globalization and the Social Sciences in Africa.” CODESRIA Bulletin 1–2.Google Scholar
Nietszche, F. 1954. “On Truth and Lie in an Extra-Moral Sense.” In The Portable Nietszche, edited and translated by Kaufman, Walter. New York: Viking Press.Google Scholar
Nyamnjoh, F. B. 1993. “Controle de l'information au Cameroun: Implication pour les recherches en Communication.” Afrika Spectrum 28 (1): 93–115.Google Scholar
Nyamnjoh, F. B. 1996. Mass Media and Democratisation in Cameroon. Yaounde: Friedrich-Ebert Foundation.Google Scholar
Nyamnjoh, F. B. 1999. “Cameroon: A Country United by Ethnic Ambition and Difference.” African Affairs 98 (390): 101–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Prah, K. 1998. “African Scholars and Africanist Scholarship.” CODESRIA Bulletin 3–4.Google Scholar
Robson, M., ed. 1977. Essays on Politics and Society. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.Google Scholar
Russell, J. N. 2001. “Scientific Communication at the Beginning of the Twenty-FirstCentury.” International Social Science Journal 168 (06).Google Scholar
Sall, E. 2001. “Academic Freedom and the African Community of Scholars: The Challenges.” News from the Nordic Africa Institute (1).Google Scholar
Sawyerr, A. 1998. “Does Africa Really Need Her Univeristies?” CODESRIA Bulletin 3–4.Google Scholar
Schmidt-Soltau, K. 1999. Cameroon: Living on the Edge of a Volcano. Douala: Tencam Press.Google Scholar
Task Force on Higher Education and Society (TFHES). 2000. Higher Education in Developing Countries: Peril and Promise. Washington D.C.: The World Bank.Google Scholar
Touraine, A. 1995. Critique of Modernity. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Wacquant, Loic J. D. 1993. “From the Ruling Class to Field of Power: An Interview with Pierre Bourdieu on ‘La noblesse d'Etat.’” Theory, Society and Culture 10.Google Scholar
Yesufu, T. M., ed. 1973. Creating the African University: Emerging Issues of the 1970s. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar