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Copyright of Cameroon Academy of Sciences Journal is the property of Cameroon Academy of Sciences and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The romanticization, Europeanization and Americanization of the African mindset have not helped Africans especially Nigeria to rapidly advance technologically and scientifically as the African continent still sees itself like a slave to the Western countries. This paper seeks to argue that the relationship between Africa and the west intends to benefit the west completely without a corresponding measure of benefits to the African people. This contention is evidenced in the application of western methodology in attempting a solution and resolution of the African challenges. The Igbo notion Ahamefula is derived from two words "Aham" and "Efula" which means "my name will not be lost or my identity will not be lost" These are words used to connote the identity (Ejirimara) of a person, family a community or a nation. Ahamefula is founded on the logic of unity and identity which stand as hallmark for determining and discovering the weight and potentials of any given individual, family, community and nation. It is argued in this paper that leadership that is anchored on internal mechanism of local circumstance with full conviction and adoption of native ideology will lead the Nigerian State to an enviable political, social, scientific, religious and economic heights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How might one make sense of the intimate but often assumed connection between social inequality and social death? In this paper, I offer an answer. It develops in stages. First, I set out in some detail an account of person prominent in sub-Saharan African thought systems, specifically the version of it found in the writings of Ifeanyi Menkiti. Second, I show how this account entails both that persons are social entities and that consequently they belong in a social ontology. Third, I suggest a perspective on Orlando Patterson's notion of social death and then show how Menkiti's account of persons as psycho-social entities can provide ontological grounding for the phenomenon of social death. Roughly, the overarching claim is that rather than merely disrespect their victims, oppressive forms of social inequality essentially depersonalise them in the sense at issue in Patterson's social death. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What role can aspirations play in small-scale human development interventions? In this paper, we contribute to answering that question with both conceptual and empirical work. Aspirations can play at least two roles in small-scale human development interventions: the capabilities-selecting role and the agency-unlocking role. While aspirations also face the challenge of adaptation to adverse circumstances and unjust social structures, we argue that this challenge can be met by embedding the formulation and expression of aspirations within a setting of public discussion and awareness-raising activities, and that adaptation can be further countered by including a commitment to action. We then report on field research done in Khayelitsha, a township in Cape Town, South Africa, where a group of women went through a process of voicing, examining, and then realizing their aspirations. The action research confirms our theoretical hypotheses. We also do not find any evidence of adaptation of the women's aspirations, and argue that the absence of such adaptation might be a result of active capability selection, reflection, deliberation, and the exercise of agency throughout the action research programme. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on historical/Xam and recent Kalahari San (Bushmen) sources, the paper exam ines an aspect of San hunting that is underreported in the ethnography on these hunter-gatherers (ns opposed to other such peoples elsewhere in the world, specifically in the context of the New Animism paradigm): its relational and mystical -- i.e. myth-, spirit- and ritual-informed -- aspect. I show how myth and ritual express the animistic theme of human-animal identity blurring that is at the core of San cosmology, in different, mutually reinforcing ways, so that it becomes both an integrated, salient feature of San worldview -- something of a philosophical postulate -- and integral to and constitutive of experience. The latter includes the practice of hunting, the focus of this paper. Also examined are the reasons why in San studies the supererogatory aspect can be, and has been, overlooked by anthropologists and archaeologists. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper observed that the various ethics that constitute the system of African environmental ethics are not based on or linked to any known African ontology and formal logic. It argued that the contextualisation of African environmental ethics on African ontology and African logic is essential since Western ontology and logic do not serve to adequately explain and provide proper meanings to the various concepts and propositions employed in the African environmental ethics. Therefore, the paper aimed to, and indeed, link and establishes African environmental ethics on a definite and sound African ontology and formal logic based on Ibuanyidanda complementary ontology and Ezumezu integrativist logic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

African jurisprudence, in contemporary times, seems to be faced with two difficult tasks: one, the challenge of the possibility of a worthy cerebral contribution to jurisprudence and the history of ideas in general, and, two, the disturbing reality of what is known as the Eurocentric foundation of choice concepts, persistent questions and controversial issues in Western jurisprudence, which passed itself as the standard definition of universal jurisprudence. This paper observes that the first task is defined by and a direct response to the second task. In transcending this myopic understanding of African contribution to the history of ideas, Western jurisprudence and jurisprudence in general, this paper takes issues on the controversy between naturalists and positivists on the relation between law and morality in the light of African legal theory. Examining three African cultures, the paper discovers that the more forceful and popular positivists', the separability thesis is not easily and commonly entertained. The paper also equally discovers that law, in those cultures, not only has an ontological moral foundation, but that the impossibility of separating law from morals which derives not just because morality is one of the sources, but also from the argument that no legal concept or rule exists without an ethical implication or dimension. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper examines the traditional Yoruba conceptions of illness, sound health and healthcare practices to show that they are not contrary to the Western orthodox medical practice and also establishes that the Yoruba healthcare practice offers a holistic approach. Thus, it highlights the Yoruba ontology,focusing on the impact of the Yoruba belief in various spiritual entities on both their traditional and modern medical practices. It also examines how the belief in spiritual agents persists in the minds of the modern Yoruba people and the implications of this on his/her health condition and the orthodox Western medical practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the vibrant topics of debate among African and non-African scholars in the 20th and 21st centuries centered on the existence of African philosophy. This debate has been described as unnecessary. What is necessary is, if African philosophy exists, we should show it, do it and write it rather than talking about it, or engaging in endless talks about it. A popular position on the debate is that what is expected to be shown, done and written is philosophy tailored along the stereotyped and paradigmatic sense peculiar to Western philosophy. Interestingly, a non-African scholar, Barry Hallen argues that using the method of ordinary language philosophy, African philosophy is philosophy per se, and should be recognised as such. The focus of this paper is to analyse what Hallen refers to as ordinary language philosophy and explain how it authenticates African philosophy as unique 'species' of philosophy, thus, putting an end to the controversy on the ontology of African philosophy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study focuses on the ontology and development of the socio-political ideas of Mokwugo Okoye, a radical Nigerian nationalist, thinker and socialist. It is an attempt at shifting emphasis from the largely reformist and conservative nationalist leaders who won power at independence to those leaders that have been characterized as "Oppositional Counter-Elite." This approach becomes more justifiable when it is noted that, with the notable exception of Frantz Fanon and Amilcar Cabral, existing studies on radical theoreticians in Africa have focused largely on those radical leaders that won state power at independence (Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, Modibo Keita of Mali and Sekou Toure of Guinea). Indeed, this current approach to political thought has resulted in the neglect of the ideas of radical thinkers that featured in such movements like the Zikist Movement that did not win power at independence or were suppressed by the colonial state during the national liberation struggle. Through historical analysis and based on oral interviews and extant literature, the study fills an important gap in the existing scholarship on African political thought by focusing on Mokwugo as a figure who has not featured in the mainstream historiography. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Physiological colour change is rare in insects. Unusually, both the males and females of Spesbona angusta (Odonata: Platycnemididae), Red Listed as Endangered, are capable of rapid and reversible colour change. There is only one known population of this species, which occurs in a unique habitat in the Cape Floristic Region, South Africa. Appreciation of this unusual phenomenon of distinct physiological colour change helps us appreciate that we need to conserve phenomena in the insect world as well as the species themselves. Using controlled experiments, we evaluated the importance of ambient temperature as the possible primary cue for physiological colour change. We found that S. angusta responds rapidly to short-term changes in ambient temperature, even in the absence of additional environmental stimuli and without the body temperature matching the ambient temperature. Colour change is reversible when temperature returns to its earlier level. The reason why S. angusta shows this rapid and reversible colour change may be a combination of reproductive enhancement, competitive advantage and thermoregulation. This colour change appears to have strong selective advantage in a very particular habitat type, meaning that careful conservation of its habitat in all respects is important, and must be considered in any possible future translocations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Western public administration as a discipline and practice has been foisted on Africa. In its evolutionary trajectory, the dominant narratives of public administration tend to assume a totalizing, universalistic, nomothetic posture as they both undermine and ignore other worldviews. In Africa the upshot has been public policy that scarcely responds robustly to the continent's "wicked problems." While the dominant corpus of Western public administration has seemingly evolved over time, its ontological underpinnings, securely strapped to Enlightenment ideals, remain intact. However, the current turn to process in the literature and the search for alternative ontologies offer a philosophical opening for an authentic African public administration. Such a project is validated by several African ontological values. Drawing on the work of some of Africa's leading philosophers, this article shows how these ontological values are critical for crafting a new public administration for Africa. It argues that a new African public administration must interrogate the ontological bases of the dominant public administration narratives in order to gauge their suitability vis-à-vis Africa's worldview while engaging and possibly accommodating the emergent process orientation turn. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we present a model of gender within patrilineal descent for a broad region covering Asia, Europe, and North Africa. We develop the concept of “lineal masculinity,” a perceived ontological essence that flows to and through men over the generations. It is especially expressed through people's notions of the past, present, and future of their patrilineages. We elaborate lineal masculinity in terms of male achievement, lineage founders, lineage segmentation, and male reproduction. Our model offers cross-cultural analysis and so provides an alternative to the position of strong cultural relativism in kinship and gender studies. [ patriliny, masculinity, lineage theory, kinship, gender, identity, memory] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article focuses on tropical environments of Africa. Tropical Africa was one of the last regions of the world to experience formal European colonialism, a process that coincided with the advent of a range of new scientific specialties and research methods. Often generated within a transnational and interdisciplinary context, this knowledge increasingly assumed that vector-borne diseases in tropical environments were highly complex, dynamic, and interrelated phenomena. The history of British efforts to understand African trypanosomiasis provides a useful lens to explore the dynamic interplay between ontology and epistemology.

Discusses the religious position of Africans and the moral codes that governed social constructs and human behaviors. Manifestations of African religion and philosophy; Separation of religion and culture of an individual; Details on the African Traditional Religion; Components of the African Traditional Religious ontology.