2nd Biennial Kwame Nkrumah International Conference -call for papers

(deadline for submissions extended to February 15, 2012)*

2nd Biennial Kwame Nkrumah International Conference (KNIC2), September 21-24, 2012

JOINTLY ORGANIZED BY KWAME NKRUMAH UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY AND KWANTLEN POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY (OF CANADA)

VENUE: THE KWAME NKRUMAH UNIVERSITY OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY, KUMASI, GHANA

The Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana and Kwantlen Polytechnic University, Vancouver, Canada, invite you to participate in the 2nd Biennial Kwame Nkrumah International Conference at the beautiful campus of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Kumasi, Ghana.

THEME: “Africa’s Many Divides and Africa’s Future”

“If in the past the Sahara divided us, now it unites us.” Dr. Kwame Nkrumah declared some fifty years ago. Keenly aware of Africa’s many artificial divides, Nkrumah was determined to lead a revolution that would bridge those divides. One way to achieve this goal, Nkrumah proposed, was a continental pan-African government, which would provide the African people the opportunity to pool and marshal their enormous real and potential economic, human and natural resources for the optimal development of their continent. A continental union government, Nkrumah was convinced, would ensure that Africa ended the divisions created by the trilogy of enslavement, colonization and neo-colonization of Africans. Nkrumah was concerned by other divisions as well; those created by time/history, nature and above all those created by Africans themselves, such as ethnic/ racial, and religious discrimination, classism, sexism, ageism, as well as atavistic and backward traditional practices, including ‘tribalism’ and patriarchy.

Nkrumah had long predicted that unless Africans formed a political and economic union to address the continent’s acute problems, the raging ‘revolutions’ in the north of the continent, religious, and ethnic strife and civil wars in other parts of Africa were inevitable. He warned that unless urgent steps were taken to bridge Africa’s divides, Africans would be warring among themselves as their detractors and neo-colonialists hide behind the scene pulling “vicious wires” to cut “each other’s throats.” For him, these upheavals are all masked economic “wars.” In other words, these wars and unrests are struggles over scarce economic resources and scrambles to control political power. Religion and “tribalism” are mere fronts for deep-seated grievances over economic deprivation.

Topics to be discussed include, (but not limited to) the following:

The Northern Africa-Southern Africa Divide

The Linguistic Divide

The Class Divide

The Ethnic Divide

The Ideological-Political Divide

The Gender and Sexuality Divides

The Generational Divide

The Religious Divides

The Rural-Urban Divide

The Afro-Pessimism-Afro-Optimism Divide

The Continental Africa-Diaspora Africa Divide

The Intellectual-Non-intellectual Divide

The Elitism-Non-Elitism Divide

The Global South-Global North Divide

The Cold War Ideological Divide (the Soviet-East-American-West) Divide

The Post-Cold War Divide (s)

The slaver-raiders/sellers and the enslaved Divide

The rhetoric (theory)/action (practice) Divide

Paper Abstract Submission

Abstracts of approximately 250 words for papers of 20 minutes duration, and suggestions of panels consisting of 3 panelists each are welcome and should be e-mailed, with a short bio-note (50 words) contact address, and one to three keywords related to the area of research to Dr. Charles Quist-Adade, knic@kwantlen.ca no later than February 15, 2012, final notification of selection to be communicated by March 30, 2012.

For More Information, Contact

Charles Quist-Adade, PhD

Department of Sociology

Kwantlen Polytechnic University

12666 72nd Avenue

Surrey, British Columbia

V3W 2M8, Canada

E-mail: charles.quist-adade@kwantlen.ca

Telephone: 604.599.3075

Conference website: http://www.kwantlen.ca/knic/