All generations experience a sense of the extraordinary, but we, as Africans, who entered the 20th century ahead of the rest of the world through the contrasting doors of freedom and astonishment, now confront the profound intensification of inequalities and the ongoing emergence of the unprecedented, alongside hope and the enduring presence of longstanding issues. We are challenged to envision and shape the futures we aspire to for Africa and the world. The pathways that hold promise are those that prioritize courage, freedom, and truth, as these fundamental values form the cornerstone of new social agreements.
All generations experience a sense of the extraordinary, but we, as Africans, who entered the 20th century ahead of the rest of the world through the contrasting doors of freedom and astonishment, now confront the profound intensification of inequalities and the ongoing emergence of the unprecedented, alongside hope and the enduring presence of longstanding issues. We are challenged to envision and shape the futures we aspire to for Africa and the world. The pathways that hold promise are those that prioritize courage, freedom, and truth, as these fundamental values form the cornerstone of new social agreements. Humanity has rarely had such potential to transform the material existence of men and women in the context of the technological and digital revolution, yet we have never been so close to all the limits. The sustained attention required to comprehend these possibilities and challenges, and the temporalities involved in grasping the futures of the continent, understanding and concretely translating the aspirations of the masses and individuals on the continent and in the diaspora, decoding the realities they invent – these are some of the crucial focal points that have driven the establishment of the Global Africa journal.
This transdisciplinary and transnational project, situated at the intersections between Africa and its encounters with the world, is the result of many years of critical reflection and knowledge transformation initiatives aimed at rejuvenating Africa and African knowledge. Its genesis is the product of numerous fortuitous encounters, contradictory debates on the role and place of research and knowledge in addressing African and global challenges, on the critical reflexivity that strengthens the epistemological, theoretical, methodological, and ethical foundations of African/Africanist research, and on the conditions for truly free thinking on the continent and in the world. The founders of Global Africa have recognized the importance of addressing the geographic, linguistic, disciplinary, and ideological divisions that have hindered Africa's ability to break free from harmful relationships with the world and, paradoxically, with itself. They have embraced the principles of collaborative scholarship, embracing incompleteness and interdependence, as fundamental pillars for generating scientific knowledge. In line with this vision, Global Africa is committed to openness:
-Openness to contributors from diverse backgrounds, encompassing various disciplines and intellectual perspectives, with a particular focus on supporting young researchers.
-Openness to prioritizing themes relevant to the continent, reimagining existing paradigms.
-Openness to integrating arts and indigenous knowledge.
-Openness to engaging knowledge users, including civil society actors, activists, policymakers, the private sector, and citizens.
-Lastly, openness to utilizing African languages as languages of research and work. The journal actively publishes in French, English, Arabic, and Swahili, with future aspirations to include other African languages, aiming to eliminate intellectual exclusion.
Global Africa firmly believes that these openness initiatives will be even more legitimate when they are based on knowledge produced and validated through the highest academic standards. In order to strengthen the ecosystem of scientific knowledge publishing in Africa, Global Africa sets a major requirement for published texts: they must contribute to advancing knowledge and understanding of reality, whether within a disciplinary or thematic field. This should be achieved through solid theoretical and conceptual frameworks, as well as robust and proven empirical data.
In doing so, we aim to address the marginalization of African research and publications within the international scientific production, despite the fact that the continent is a remarkable space where local, national, communal, and transnational issues intersect, leading to innovations and tensions. Such ambition requires providing a demanding and rigorous platform for the voices of African researchers and all research efforts that contribute to rethinking Africa and the world from an African perspective, to describe and understand their trajectories.
Global Africa also aspires to be a vibrant Pan-African community, welcoming anyone who wishes to inhabit a space that may have constraints but preserves their integrity. It is with these aspirations in mind that we seek to navigate the present century, primarily by listening to the voices and vibrations of the intellectual youth from the continent and the diaspora.
Mame Penda BA
Editor-in-chief
The journal download
The members of the Global Africa consortium- Gaston Berger University in Saint-Louis (UGB, Senegal), the Institute of Research for Development (IRD, France), the Laboratoiry for the Study and Research on Social Dynamics and local development (LASDEL, Benin/Niger) and Rabat Internationale University (UIR, Maroc) – are launching the inaugural issue of Global Africa journal today, March 10, 2022. Eight original contributions published in four languages (English, Arabic, French, and Swahili) and available on the journal's website and the Global Africa program, present the viewpoints and analyses of authors such as Cecelia Lynch, Felwine Sarr, Fatima Sadiqi, Walter Mignolo, Giulia Bonacci, on thematic areas and research fields with reimagined paradigms. This new journal is already proving to be the crucible of research that will contribute to rethinking the African continent and the world from an African perspective, describing and analyzing their trajectories in the face of global challenges.
You can access this first issue here. Enjoy your reading!