Western Education and Political Domination in Africa

A Study in Critical and Dialogical Pedagogy

Magnus O. Bassey

• Publisher: Praeger
• Year: 1999
• Print ISBN: 9780897896221
• eBook ISBN: 9780313003790
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

The contribution of Western education to the creation of an African-educated elite is well documented. What is not equally well documented is the fact that African-educated elites have used their education and the schools to perpetuate their dominance by denying the poor the knowledge necessary to protect their political and economic rights and to advance in society. On the other hand, educated elites in Africa make opportunities available to their own members through selective ordering, legitimization of certain language forms and learning processes in schools, and legitimization of elite codes and experiences to the exclusion of the histories, experiences, and worldviews of the poor. This book highlights the processes by which the poor in Africa have been disenfranchised and marginalized through schools' ascriptive mechanisms, and explains why African economic development is very slow.

Table of contents

• Contents
• Tables
• Acknowledgments
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Traditional African Education
• 3 Christian Missionary/Colonial Education in Africa
• 4 Western Education and the Rise of Educated Elites in Africa
• 5 Western Education and Political Socialization in Africa
• 6 Educated Elites and Political Domination in Africa
• 7 Schools in Africa as Sites of Cultural and Structural Inequalities, Disempowerment, Sexism, Domination and Hegemony
• 8 Education in the Service of Apartheid in South Africa, 1802–1993
• 9 Education of Most Worth for Africa in the Twenty-First Century
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index