By Wachira Kigotho. Is a crisis of identity emerging among African academics in the diaspora as to whether they are an offshoot of Pan-Africanism or a breed of emigrant elites, the Afropolitans? Therese Assie-Lumumba, professor of African studies at Cornell University in the United States, says there is growing interest in the concept of Afropolitanism – a school of thought loosely embedded in elements of geography, territoriality and location. Read more...
Africa university alliance ‘will boost higher education’
By Ellie Bothwell. Director of education and society at the British Council says Western universities must prove they do not have ‘imperialist’ designs on the continent. More...
THE Africa Summit: proper credit is 'boosting African research'
But the vice-chancellor of the University of Ghana says academics must still 'push' for recognition. More...
Repair bill for South Africa student protests hits £14.5 million
By Chris Havergal. Opposition calls on government to help meet funding shortfall. More...
How South Africa’s higher education leaders missed a golden opportunity
By . There were several elephants in the room at the South African Higher Education Summit which ran just as university students were beginning a nationwide series of protests against fees. More...
University students are becoming a new kind of democratic citizen
By . If one tracks South African student activities in 2015 it becomes apparent that a new politics is bubbling below the surface of academic life. This first emerged with the #RhodesMustFall and #OpenStellenbosch protests, followed more recently by #FeesMustFall. More...
Why Africa’s professors are afraid of colonial education being dismantled
By . A series of student protests in South Africa has thrown up a number of questions. Many of these are linked to the problem of decolonising institutions. And at least one implicates the country’s professoriate by asking: how do academics transcend Western knowledge systems and ways of learning in African universities. More...
How the rise in ethnic tensions at Kenya’s universities is hurting the academy
By . There were high hopes for Kenya’s public universities after the country gained independence from Britain in 1963. Universities were meant to become instruments of national integration. Sadly, 53 years on, that dream appears well and truly dashed. Ethnic tension is a daily reality on the country’s campuses. More...
The untold story of how Africa’s flagship universities have advanced
By . Africa has the lowest university enrolment rates in the world. In the past two decades, though, virtually all the continent’s higher education systems have recorded massive growth. More...
South African ‘born free’ students see the world through the prism of race
By . Some people are astonished that this is happening nearly 22 years after the end of formal apartheid and that such clashes often involve the so-called “born frees” – young South Africans who were born after apartheid ended in 1994. But the country is undergoing a massive transformation. Race lies at the heart of this process, just as it lay at the heart of the apartheid state. More...