An Afrocentric Critique of Race Dialogues: An Application of Theory and Praxis in Africology

Abstract

An Afrocentric Critique of Race Dialogues: The Application of Theory and Practice in Africology is a critical examination of race dialogues based on the Afrocentric paradigm’s constructs of African agency, Afrocentric consciousness-raising and liberatory action. This dissertation critiques race dialogues based on Africology’s mission, function and philosophy to determine its applicability as an educational approach to eradicate racism. This dissertation explores the purpose, goals, motivations, process, impact and outcomes of race dialogues within Africology’s theoretical scope and frames the analysis within the desires, challenges, and possibilities for African-Americans’ relationship with European-Americans based on the major tenets of Malcolm X’s political and social philosophy. Malcolm X’s philosophy and activism provide the rationale for African-American liberatory practice, offer a historical critique of race relations in the United States, establish the terrain for productive, sustained and anti-racist race relations, and justify the need for interracial dialogues. As a result of this approach, this research reveals the compatibility of race dialogues to Africology on theoretical and axiological grounds and challenges the value of resistance to racial collaboration given Africology’s founding mission. While the philosophical and political tensions endemic to African-American-European-American relations continue to complicate educational strategies focused on improving intergroup relations, this critique acknowledges the possibilities that race dialogues can advance Africology’s curricular and pedagogical goals.