This book examines African philosophy of education and the enactment of ubuntu justice through a massive open online course on Teaching for Change. The authors argue that such pedagogic encounters have the potential to stimulate just and democratic human relations: encounters that are critical, deliberate, reflective and compassionate could enable just and democratic human relations to flourish, thus inducing decolonisation and decoloniality. Exploring arguments for imaginative and tolerant pedagogic encounters that could help cultivate an African university where educators and students can engender morally and politically responsible pedagogical actions, the authors offer pathways for thinking more imaginatively about higher education in a globalised African context. This work will be of value for researchers and students of philosophy of education, higher education and democratic citizenship education.

The central argument in this book revolves around the significance of an African philosophy of higher education. Such a philosophy is geared towards cultivating democratic iterations, co-belonging, and critique within human encounters. Together, these actions can enhance intellectual activism within and beyond the encounters. A philosophy of higher education is constituted by a philosophical act of reflexivity according to which (how), freedom (both autonomous and communal), cosmopolitanism (learning to live with differences and otherness), and caring with others (ubuntu) can be rhythmically practised. What makes an African philosophy of higher education distinctive and realisable is that practices ought to be based on iterations, co-belonging, and critique. If intellectual activism were not to become a major act of resistance on the basis of which educational, political, and societal dystopias can be undermined, such a philosophy of higher education would not have a real purpose. An African philosophy of higher education is an intellectually activist endeavour because of its concern to be oppositional to constraints in and about higher education. In conversation with such an understanding of this philosophy, contributors to this volume offer responses to why human freedom, cosmopolitanism, and caring with others (ubuntu) can be rhythmically enacted.

The African Union (AU) declared 2024 the year of Education, with the motto: “Educate an African fit for the 21 st Century: Building resilient education systems for increased access to inclusive, lifelong, quality, and relevant learning in Africa.” In response, this book delves into issues plaguing African education, and proposes some solutions. The book attempts to attune African education towards the integration of African cultural values with contemporary societal demands. It draws inspiration from the writings and teachings of the late Professor Bernard Nsokika Fonlon, a foremost Cameroonian philosopher, literary luminary and public intellectual to explore the foundational features of African philosophy of education, outlining the four-fold dimensions of education from a Fonlonian perspective. Topics covered include the physical, aesthetic, intellectual and moral dimensions, as well as judicious conservative-progressivism in African education. Through an eclectic approach, the book constructively brings into conversation African conceptions of education with other philosophical foundations of education to make a case for genuine education as a revolutionary tool for a better and dynamic African community. “In this book Kijika Billa argues that Afropessimism can be defeated. It takes courage, first expressed by Fonlon in what I have learned from reading this book to be his visionary works, and now laid out by Billa himself herein, that there is only one way any society lifts itself up from grim levels of societal decay, and that is through carefully defined educational system with clear goals which become the goals of the overall national aspiration and objective around which everything else coalesces.” D. A. Masolo (PhD), Professor of Philosophy, distinguished University Scholar at the University of Louisville “This book accentuates significant themes of integrating philosophy of education with African education systems from a Fonlonian perspective. Bernard Nsokika Fonlon’s advocacy for a holistic, morally integrous, and culturally rich education is presented as a visionary framework for transcending current educational limitations, aiming to cultivate wise, ethical, and engaged citizens. Kijika Billa offers a brilliant integrated approach which calls for a reimagined, resilient education system that deeply reflects African values and aspirations, preparing individuals for meaningful contributions to the continent’s development.” Yusef Waghid (DEd, PhD, DPhil), Emeritus Professor of Philosophy of Education, Stellenbosch University “This book constitutes a springboard in the direction of proper African cultural context of education or Africanization of educational values.” Remi Prospero Fonka (PhD), Senior Lecturer, Catholic University of Cameroon, Bamenda “It is gratifying to see Kijika Billa, a young and emerging scholar, take up Fonlon’s challenge on the need for genuine intellectuals steeped in African cultural philosophies of education as dynamic products of a world in perpetual motion. Fonlon could have wished for no better in intergenerational intellectual conversations.” Francis B. Nyamnjoh, Professor of Social Anthropology, University of Cape Town

The Afrocentric Praxis of Teaching for Freedom explains and illustrates how an African worldview, as a platform for culture-based teaching and learning, helps educators to retrieve African heritage and cultural knowledge which have been historically discounted and decoupled from teaching and learning. The book has three objectives: To exemplify how each of the emancipatory pedagogies it delineates and demonstrates is supported by African worldview concepts and parallel knowledge, general understandings, values, and claims that are produced by that worldview To make African Diasporan cultural connections visible in the curriculum through numerous examples of cultural continuities––seen in the actions of Diasporan groups and individuals––that consistently exhibit an African worldview or cultural framework To provide teachers with content drawn from Africa’s legacy to humanity as a model for locating all students––and the cultures and groups they represent––as subjects in the curriculum and pedagogy of schooling This book expands the Afrocentric praxis presented in the authors’ "Re-membering" History in Teacher and Student Learning by combining "re-membered" (democratized) historical content with emancipatory pedagogies that are connected to an African cultural platform.

Developing Teaching and Learning in Africa is a collection of chapters that carry on the topical discussions on indigenous knowledges and western epistemologies. African societies still aspire towards knowledge that is liberatory, enhance critical thinking and decentre Eurocentrism. The contributors explore these decolonial debates as they navigate ways of moving towards epistemic freedom and cognitive justice.