Fabien Eboussi Boulaga 1934 – 2018
Fabien Eboussi Boulaga was a Cameroonian philosopher and former Jesuit and one of the sharpest critics of ethnophilosophy in the African philosophical tradition. His Christianity Without Fetishes, written in dialogue with the African experience of Christian missions, argued that Christianity must be received without becoming a fetish that disguises colonial domination, while his The Crisis of the Muntu diagnosed the modern African person as caught in a long colonial-postcolonial crisis of voice and self-understanding. His later work on democracy in Africa and on the conditions of authentic African discourse continued these concerns.
Key facts
- Nationality
- Cameroonian
- Era
- Contemporary
- Movements
- Postcolonial Philosophy, Christian
Selected quotes
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Attributed to Fabien Eboussi Boulaga:
“African philosophy must be a reasoned response to African crises, not a museum of customs.”
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Attributed to Fabien Eboussi Boulaga:
“Christianity in Africa must be received without becoming a fetish.”
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Attributed to Fabien Eboussi Boulaga:
“The crisis of the Muntu is the crisis of the African person seeking voice.”
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Attributed to Fabien Eboussi Boulaga:
“True philosophy contests as much as it constructs.”
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Attributed to Fabien Eboussi Boulaga:
“The colonial mind is healed only by self-critical thought.”