A decolonial critique of discourses of western colonialism in South African, Namibian and Zimbabwean school history textbooks.

Abstract

European influence in Africa has portrayed the continent through the perspective of Europeans while the African perspective has been neglected. The undeniable continuation of the hegemonic epistemic turmoil due to western colonialism in the Africa, is a perpetual challenge. One of the key sources of knowledge in the educational setting is History textbooks. Taking into account the multifaceted and complex angles through which historiographies of western colonialism are presented in these textbooks, the purpose of this study was to explore the prevailing colonial discourses in South African, Namibian and Zimbabwean school History textbooks through a decolonial critique. The theories of decoloniality and postcoloniality informed the theoretical underpinning of this study, resulting in a lens that acknowledged the remnants of western colonial influence in the existing post-colonial structures of Africa, but also challenged these oppressive Eurocentric hegemonies. Decoloniality and postcoloniality, both advocate that the generations of epistemic violence should be disrupted, thus making space for increased African agency. Summarily, using Fairclough’s (1995) version of CDA methodology, the analysis of the sample school History textbooks revealed five key discourses. These included the discourses of forces of western colonialism, conflict-fomentation, economic exploitation, environmental degradation, and anti-colonialism. In keeping with the idea that knowledge production, undeniably, continues to be influenced by the structures of western colonialism, it was not unexpected that the content in the sample school History textbooks varied, especially in terms of the prevailing historiographies. The understanding from this study was that school History textbooks are not completely decolonial. Rather, the sample textbooks illustrated discourses of western colonialism in Africa from a place of hybridity, which the theory of postcoloniality defines as a fusion of African identity and cultural influence from western countries. Given the political history of each of the sample countries, their political ideologies were reflected in the school History textbooks through the historiographies presented. Considering the incongruity of historiographies in the sample school History textbooks, I have developed the ‘Decolonial model of African epistemology’ - a framework that could ideally be used as an educational tool to promote African indigenous knowledge, especially in school History textbooks by deconstructing existing historiographies,