Conceptions of History: Cheikh Anta Diop & Theophile Obenga by Chris Gray

This is the first published book in English to be devoted to an analysis and examination of the historical and linguistic studies of Cheikh Anta Diop and Théophile Obenga. Diop in particular has had an intellectual impact on African historiography and in the area of Egyptology, but this impact has been established primarily in the West, although Diop has a small, faithful and intensely intellectually committed following throughout the length and breadth of Africa. Obenga who has developed an international reputation within the fields of linguistics and history is a Diop disci-ple, although less known because of the unavailability of his books in translation.

Gray looks at Diop's and Obenga's work as an outsider, and thus brings to the study a fresh, stimulating and controversial in-terpretation. Gray casts the dialogue of Diop's and Obenga's work within the context of an unreceptive mainstream, pointing out the nature of this unbalanced dialogue through the manner by which the mainstream has manipulated certain arguments which have little relevance to the academic intentions of Diop and Obenga.

More than that, Gray states that the mainstream has been primarily silent in their responses to the intellectual challenge of Diop and Obenga. Gray thus offers a serious probing of the issues surrounding this dialogue, and offers an intellectual context for the development of Diop's and Obenga's continued search for effective methods of retrieving African history.

Chris Gray was born in Medway, Massachusetts (USA), and received his B.A. in European History from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. He worked for four years in Africa both as an English teacher in Moulia, Gabon and as an educational consultant in several regions of Senegal. He received an M.A. in Area Studies (Africa) from the School of Oriental and African Studies (London University), and is currently working on a Ph.D in African History at Indiana University (USA).