Kwame Gyekye
A person is shaped by community but is not swallowed by it – African thought can hold communal values and individual rights together.
Placement
Ghanaian philosopher: reconstructed the Akan conceptual scheme and argued for a “moderate communitarianism” that leaves room for individual rights.
Key ideas
- Akan conceptual scheme
- Moderate communitarianism
- Personhood
Influence
Influenced by 1
Aristotle
influenced by
Gyekye, trained in Greek and Arabic philosophy, translated Ibn al-Tayyib’s commentary on Porphyry’s Isagoge, the gateway to Aristotle’s logic (Arabic Logic, 1979). K. Gyekye (trans.), Arabic Logic: Ibn al-Tayyib’s Commentary on Porphyry’s Eisagoge (1979); An Essay on African Philosophical Thought (1987)
Evidence: AI draft
Aristotle › 384–322 BCE
Criticism
Criticizes 4
John S. Mbiti
criticised
Gyekye read Mbiti’s ‘I am, because we are’ as radical communitarianism without room for individual rights, and proposed a moderate version (‘Person and Community in African Thought’, 1992). K. Gyekye, “Person and Community in African Thought”, in K. Wiredu & K. Gyekye (eds.), Person and Community (1992); Tradition and Modernity (1997), ch. 2; J. S. Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy (1969)
Evidence: AI draft
John S. Mbiti › 1931–2019
Kwasi Wiredu influenced by
influenced by
Gyekye shared Wiredu’s programme of critically analysing Akan concepts and co-edited with him Person and Community (1992), while disputing his reading of the okra. K. Wiredu and K. Gyekye (eds.), Person and Community: Ghanaian Philosophical Studies I (1992); K. Gyekye, An Essay on African Philosophical Thought (1987)
Evidence: AI draft
criticised
Against Wiredu’s quasi-physical reading of the Akan okra, Gyekye held the Akan person to be dualistic, with an immaterial soul (An Essay on African Philosophical Thought, 1987). K. Gyekye, An Essay on African Philosophical Thought (1987), ch. 6; K. Wiredu, “The Akan Concept of Mind”, Ibadan Journal of Humanistic Studies 3 (1983)
Evidence: AI draft
Kwasi Wiredu › 1931–2022
Ifeanyi Menkiti
criticised
Gyekye objected that Menkiti’s ‘radical’ communitarianism, with personhood acquired in community, leaves no room for individual rights or criticism (‘Person and Community in African Thought’, 1992). K. Gyekye, “Person and Community in African Thought” (1992); Tradition and Modernity (1997), ch. 2; I. Menkiti, “Person and Community in African Traditional Thought” (1984)
Evidence: AI draft
Ifeanyi Menkiti › 1940–2019
Paulin Hountondji
criticised
Gyekye objected to Hountondji that traditional African thought, though unwritten and anonymous, goes back to individual thinkers and can be philosophy (An Essay on African Philosophical Thought, 1987). K. Gyekye, An Essay on African Philosophical Thought: The Akan Conceptual Scheme (1987); P. Hountondji, Sur la « philosophie africaine » (1976)
Evidence: AI draft
Paulin Hountondji › 1942–2024
Works
Akan ideas of God, person, destiny and community, reconstructed as philosophy.
Position
Gyekye wanted to show that the thought of the Akan of Ghana forms a coherent philosophical system, not just a collection of customs. In his main work he reconstructed Akan views of God, the person, destiny, evil and community, and argued that individual sages, not just the anonymous collective, contributed to it. Against radical communitarian readings of African thought, including some of his colleagues’, he defended a “moderate communitarianism”: the person is deeply shaped by the community, yet retains rights, a will of their own and the capacity to question tradition. Later he applied these ideas to the challenges of modernizing African societies.
Life & context
Gyekye was born in the Gold Coast in 1939 and studied at the University of Ghana and then at Harvard, where he earned his doctorate with a study of Greek and Arabic logic. He taught for decades at the University of Ghana and also as a visiting professor in the United States, including at Temple University in Philadelphia. He died in 2019.
Further main works
- Arabic Logic (1979)
- Tradition and Modernity (1997)
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