"In The Black Color of The Night" - Theology and Philosophy in Exile - Journal #99 April 2019 - E-Flux

13/01/2021 “In the Black Color of the Night”: Theology and Philosophy in Exile - Journal #99 April 2019
xile - Journal #99 April 2019 - e-flux
Journal #99 - April 2019
Christian Nyampeta
“In the Black Color of the Night”: Theology and
Philosophy in Exile
Notes - “In the Black Color of the Night”: Theology and …
1 The context was a workweek, organized in the framework of research on the

history of arts education in Lubumbashi and in Congo. These studies were
undertaken in collaboration with a cluster of other working groups, as part of
“Another Roadmap for Art Education,” a network of educators, artists, and
researchers from around the world, initiated by the Institute for Artistic
Education, at the Zurich University of the Arts ZHdK. At the level of the African
continent, working groups there included Johannesburg (Keleketla! Library and
Wits), Kampala in Uganda, Nyanza/Huye in Rwanda, Maseru in Lesotho, and
Cairo in Egypt. See: →. Lubumbashi was once a significant location where a
number of important philosophers studied, lived, and worked, most notably V. Y.
Mudimbe, a Congolese philosopher, poet, and novelist concerned with the
formations of African cultures and the continent’s intellectual histories.
Go to Text
2 See: Genocide Archive Rwanda, →. “In less than a hundred days, more than
800,000 Rwandese people were murdered in a deliberate and well-organized act
of genocide, orchestrated by then-members of the Rwandan government. The
genocidal regime targeted the Tutsi population and moderate Hutu who opposed
the killings. Many Hutu and Twa also lost their lives as the genocide unfolded in
the context of a civil war between the Hutu-dominated government and a Tutsi-
dominated rebel movement, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). The killings
started on the 6th of April, following a rocket attack that caused a plane carrying
the presidents of Rwanda and Burundi to crash. Despite the presence of a
considerable UN peacekeeping force at the outbreak of the violence, the
international community failed to intervene, pulling most of their forces out and
ignoring any pleas for help. This failure to act allowed the killings to continue
Journal # 99 until the 4th of July, when Rwandan Patriotic Front forces, then led by the More
current president Paul Kagame, were able to take control of the country, ousting
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those responsible for the genocide from the country.” African Study Centre,
University of Leiden →.
Go to Text
3 Patrice Nganang, Manifeste d’une nouvelle litterature africaine: pour une écriture
préemptive (Éditions Homnisphères, 2007), 36; quoted in Michael Syrotinski,
“The Post-Genocidal African Subject: Patrice Nganang, Achille Mbembe and the
Worldlinesss of Contemporary African Literature in French”, in Transnational
French Studies: Postcolonialism and Littérature-monde, eds. Alec G. Hargreaves,
Charles Forsdick, and David Murphy (Liverpool University Press, 2010), 274-86,
276.
Go to Text
4 Either because he doesn’t know such a text, or because such a text doesn’t exist,
or because if it does, as is sure, it’s not distributed widely enough to have reached
the likes of him.
Go to Text
“Teaching materials such as maps were introduced to the missionary schools in Rwanda under German colonial rule. In this photo, a pupil points
at Bukoba on the map.” Courtesy of the Archive of the White Fathers, Cologne. Published in Hans-Ulrich Duwendag and Wolfgang Völker, Ruanda
und die Deutschen: Missionare als Zeitzeugen der5 Kolonialgeschichte
Mahmood Mamdani, (LIT Verlag, 2017).
Understanding the Crisis in Kivu: Report of the CODESRIA
Mission to the Democratic Republic of Congo, September 1997 (CODESRIA), 2001.
A Visit to Lubumbashi
Go to Text
In December 2018, I visited Lubumbashi, in the

Notes - “InDemocratic Republic
the Black Color of the Theology
of the Night”: Congo, at the
and …
1
invitation of my colleagues at the Centre d’art Waza. In our conversations with Lushois
philosophers of varying generations,history
we reflected on questions
of arts education ofand
in Lubumbashi a somewhat oedipal
in Congo. These nature:
studies were
Despite the noted philosophical achievements originating in this region, why did the atrocities
in Rwanda and Congo happen “on your watch”?
researchers In which
from around waysinitiated
the world, did you and
by the yourforelder
Institute Artistic
philosophers fall short in anticipating and preventing the emergence and the recurrence of
violence on such a scale? Wits), Kampala in Uganda, Nyanza/Huye in Rwanda, Maseru in Lesotho, and
Mudimbe,
My mind was orbiting around the gravity ofathe
Congolese
year philosopher,
2019, which poet,marks
and novelist
the concerned
twenty-fifth with the
commemoration of the Genocide againstGo to Textthe Tutsi.2 This Genocide can be read as a metonymy
for a wider self-destruction in the world at large. Perhaps the genocide against the Tutsi is
inscribed in a history of world barbarism, a genocidal
2 See: Genocide humanism
Archive Rwanda, that
→. “In less thanmarks our
a hundred epoch.
days, It’s an
more than
era in which crisis is the norm rather than theorchestrated
of genocide, exception, an afterlifeofthat
by then-members violently
the Rwandan produces
government. The a
genocidal regime
memory of before, propelling life into an after.3 Iftargeted
so, thetheGenocide
Tutsi population and moderate Hutu who opposed
against the Tutsi points to the
limit of rationality as it was known before
the contextitsofadvent.
a civil war Philosophy reached a limit:
between the Hutu-dominated by not
government and a Tutsi-
foreseeing, by being silent during, and by offering a belated response to this Genocide. If
Thought reached a limit then, even the
within the ofminds
presidents Rwandaof andthe mostto esteemed
Burundi crash. Despiteof
theAfrican
presence ofthinkers,
a
in what way are we, their mere students, equally
international failingfailed
community to rise to thepulling
to intervene, demandsmost ofof our
their history
forces out and
now? If genocidal politics is the norm,
thosewhat are the
responsible ongoing
for the genocidegenocides andAfrican
from the country.” how do weCentre,
Study
intervene? Go to Text
In response, philosopher Emmanuel Banywesize

3 Patrice took off
Nganang, Manifeste his
d’une glasses,
nouvelle scratched
litterature his une
africaine: pour head, and
écriture
noted the confronting tone of my questions: Was I indiscriminately accusing entire generations
of Rwandan and Congolese scholarsWorldlinesss
of being of bad parents? African
Contemporary Banywesize
Literatureset out toinelaborate
in French”, Transnationalon
the historical contexts of his generation’s philosophical
Charles Forsdick, and David formation.
Murphy (LiverpoolThen he pointed
University out 274-86,
Press, 2010), the
276.
conceptual difficulties facing his colleagues of previous generations. For Banywesize, it might be
Go to Text
true that earlier philosophers slacked in committing to the burning questions of their times.
These included the analysis of the4 impact of popular
Either because cultures
he doesn’t know suchon society,
a text, studying
or because the
such a text domestic
doesn’t exist,
realm and its gendered violences, the role ofif minor
or because it does, asfigures such
is sure, it’s as streetwidely
not distributed hawkers
enoughand market
to have reached
the likes of him.
women in the functioning of the economy,
Go to Text etc. But also, for instance, he could not cite a single
text about exile authored by a Rwandan or Congolese philosopher between 1950 and 1997.4 And
yet, exile was central to the recurrent violence
5 Mahmood thatUnderstanding
Mamdani, continually theflared Kivu: Report of5the
Crisis in regionally. ForCODESRIA
philosophers at the time, not reading
Go or writing about exile was the result of the dangers of
to Text
addressing problems of the locale from within the conditions of oppressive regimes.
Additionally, Banywesize suggested, the received disciplinary philosophical wisdom of the time
Notes - “In the
didn’t provide many antecedents for confronting exile Black Color Avoiding
socially. of the Night”:
suchTheology
subjects and … an
was
orderly application of the disciplinary
1 The tradition
context was aofworkweek,
philosophy. This
organized absence
in the frameworkofofworking
research onfromthe the
experiences of life on the ground resulted in a condition whereby it was only possible to write
metaphysically. This discursive limitation
“Another is severe,
Roadmap for because crucial
Art Education,” subjects
a network affecting
of educators, artists,society—
and
particularly the increasingly ethnicized definitions
Education, of University
at the Zurich citizenryof and subjecthood
the Arts devoid
ZHdK. At the level of theof class
African
—remained outside of the questioning continent, working groups
of education, there included
policy making, Johannesburg
and other (Keleketla! Library and
fields which,
arguably, fall under the responsibility ofinscholarship.
Cairo Instead, the
Egypt. See: →. Lubumbashi theorists
was once withdrew
a significant into a
location where
ethnophilosophical metaphysics, a field which itself became a form of intellectual exile.
Go to Text
Go to Text
276.
Go to Text
the likes of him.
Go to Text
5 Mahmood Mamdani, Understanding the Crisis in Kivu: Report of the CODESRIA

Go to Text

“Donkeys, mules, and zebras were the only four-leggedresearchers from around
means of transport thelong
to cover world, initiated
distances by the Institute
in Rwanda. for Artistic
But sometimes it was also the
back of a local. Distances were measured not in kilometers but in day
Education, trips,
at the and moving
Zurich up and
University of down hillsZHdK.
the Arts and wadding
At the through
level of swamps was
the African
everyday business for the missionaries during their expeditions.” Courtesy of the Archive of the White Fathers, Cologne. Published in Hans-Ulrich
continent,
Duwendag and Wolfgang Völker, Ruanda und die Deutschen: workingals
Missionare groups thereder
Zeitzeugen included Johannesburg
Kolonialgeschichte (LIT(Keleketla! Library and
Verlag, 2017).
Intertwined Histories of Christianity and Philosophy in the Great
Lakes Region formations of African cultures and the continent’s intellectual histories.
Go to Text
Modern and contemporary philosophy in Rwanda owes its formation to Catholic Christianity.
American historian Timothy Longman narrates
800,000 Rwandesehow thewere
people first Catholic
murdered missionaries
in a deliberate arrived in
and well-organized act
Rwanda in 1900, and how they committed themselves
of genocide, orchestrated bytothen-members
becoming of major political
the Rwandan agents.TheThe
government.
Society of Missionaries of Africa—better known
the killings. Many as
Hututhe
andWhite
Twa alsoFathers—reached Rwanda
lost their lives as the genocide from
unfolded in
neighboring Burundi, where, after several failed attempts, they had just succeeded in
establishing their first mission nearstarted
Bujumbura
on the 6thin
of1898. “Two years
April, following a rocketlater,
attack in
thatFebruary 1900,
caused a plane the
carrying
first White Fathers arrived at the Rwandan capital in Nyanza to request permission to begin
mission work in Rwanda.” Rwanda fell under community
international the missionary authority
failed to intervene, of Monsignor
pulling Jean-
most of their forces out and
Joseph Hirth,
Journal the
# 99apostolic vicar of until
the the
vast4thgeographic regionPatriotic
of July, when Rwandan comprising Congo,
Front forces, Rwanda,
then led by the and More
Urundi, then known as Nyanza Meridional. Hirthforwished
those responsible to establish
the genocide his mission
from the country.” nearCentre,
African Study Burundi:
this location was advantageous for the
Go tomission
Text as it was “heavily populated”; it was situated
near supply stations in Burundi; and it was near the royal seat. After overcoming royal
resistance, a site was granted to the mission
3 Patrice on Save,
Nganang, and
Manifeste “within
d’une a year, africaine:
nouvelle litterature the kingpourgranted two
une écriture
other stations, Zaza in the east near“The
thePost-Genocidal
TanganyikaAfrican border and Nyundo in the north, and two
Subject: Patrice Nganang, Achille Mbembe and the
years later another northern mission was founded
Worldlinesss at Rwaza
of Contemporary andLiterature
African one in the southwest,
in French”, in Transnational
Mibirizi.”6 According to Longman, some
Charles attributes
Forsdick, and “that marked
David Murphy mission
(Liverpool workPress,
University in Rwanda from
2010), 274-86,
the beginning appear in hindsight to276.
have shaped indelibly the nature of Christianity in
Go to Text
Rwanda.” For one, the missionary emulation of the conversion of Emperor Constantine in
Rome led Cardinal Charles Lavigerie, founder
4 Either because of the Missionaries
he doesn’t know such a text, oforAfrica, to believe
because such thatexist,
a text doesn’t “once
the chiefs and kings were converted,orthey
becausewould create
if it does, an it’s
as is sure, accommodating environment
not distributed widely for the
enough to have reached
the likes of him.
conversion of the masses and that where tension existed between missionaries and civil
Go to Text
authorities, the church would never develop a firm footing.”7
Longman writes that Go to Text
the success of the strategy of building up political power and developing strong alliances with state
Notes and
leaders (success in terms of rates of conversion - “Inease
the Black Color offor
of operation thethe
Night”: Theology
church) and …
led church officials
in subsequent decades to seek to maintain a close
1 The context wasalliance with
a workweek, the state.
organized The
in the value placed
framework on popular
of research on the
obedience to civic authorities and thehistory of arts education
acceptance of churchin Lubumbashi
involvementandin
in ethnic
Congo. These studies
politics have were
also
shaped subsequent church social engagement in Rwanda.
This is due in part to the ethnic interpretation given
continent, working bythere
groups the included
missionaries to Rwandan
Johannesburg powerand
(Keleketla! Library
relations. This understanding led them to
set as their primary goal gaining the support and
formations ultimately
of African theand
cultures conversion of the
the continent’s ruling class,
intellectual histories.
Go to Text
necessitating that the missionaries consciously avoided defending the interests of the masses against
their chiefs, for fear that the chiefs would view them as rivals for power.
2
See: Genocide Archive Rwanda, →. “In less than a hundred days, more than
At first, the missionaries failed in converting the royal by
of genocide, orchestrated court, and instead
then-members the missionaries
of the Rwandan government. The
focused on enrolling the youth of thetheruling classHutu
killings. Many intoandtheir education
Twa also programs.
lost their lives Theyunfolded
as the genocide furtherin
relied “on the support of the [initially German] colonial state, particularly after the transfer to
Belgian control in 1916,” when “the started
missionaries
on the 6th ofeventually achieved
April, following theirthat
a rocket attack goal” inaconverting
caused plane carrying
the presidents of Rwanda and Burundi to crash. Despite the presence of a 8
the royal court and thus achieving “the subsequent conversion of much of the populace.”
African philosophy inherited this Thomist tradition
those responsible ofgenocide
for the missionary
from theeducation, andStudy
country.” African to this day it
Centre,
sustains and preserves theological views on culture, society, education, and governance.
Go to Text
According to Congolese philosopher Kasereka Kavwahirehi, “pioneers and contemporary
leading figures of African philosophy [were
3 Patrice formed]
Nganang, in missionary
Manifeste institutions,”
d’une nouvelle litterature and
africaine: pour unethis stamp
écriture
of Christianity onto the general regional and Rwandan intellect is still widely evident.9 The
dominant ideologies, the institutions they represent,
Worldlinesss and the
of Contemporary types
African of social
Literature sciences
in French”, privileged
in Transnational
in education also reflect this Christian idealism. 10 reaches back to the colonial era when
Charles Forsdick, andItDavid Murphy (Liverpool University Press, 2010), 274-86,
churches, cloisters, and seminaries were established, as sites of ideological conversion.11
276.
Go to Text
However, this colonial enterprise of cultural conversion through Christianity “was appropriated
by Africans who perceived it as a4vehicle of modernity
Either because or found
he doesn’t know in itortools
such a text, tosuch
because resist
a textcolonialism
doesn’t exist,
or because 12
and domination, that is, tools of liberation.” But still, missionary institutions were, have
if it does, as is sure, it’s not distributed widely enough to andreached
still
the likes of him.
are, technologies of transmission and enforcement
Go to Text of colonial exploitation. Writing in 1979, the
then-priest and now-Archbishop Smaragde Mbonyintege attested that:
5
Mahmood Mamdani, Understanding the Crisis in Kivu: Report of the CODESRIA
The missionary activities had a common goal with that of the colonisers. For Rwandans, to become a
Go to Text
Christian was not only a matter of conversion to Christianity: it was a total act of abandoning “imico ya
kinyarwanda,” the Rwandan rhythms, which were suspected, rightly or wrongly, to be vectors of
Notes -Christian
paganism. Between 1900 and 1960, the Rwandan “In the Black Color
moved of theaNight”:
toward culturalTheology and … the
death. Through
Christian religion, the new Rwandan Christian was formed at school, at work, to become an admirer of
the White, and to become his often clumsy
history imitator. Becoming
of arts education a Christian
in Lubumbashi and inmeant
Congo.speaking differently,
These studies were
eating differently, dressing differently,“Another
prayingRoadmap
differently.
for ArtMore dramatically,
Education,” a network becoming
of educators,Christian
artists, andmeant
researchers
to hate one’s own tradition and to admire fromisaround
all what 13 initiated by the Institute for Artistic
the world,
European.
I want to suggest that despite this devastating effort to make Christianity the rhythm of
modernity,14 what is properly African wasofnot
number fully erased.
important Also,
philosophers thelived,
studied, appropriation,
and worked, most adaptation,
notably V. Y.
and cultivation of Christianity by the new African Christians led to a distinct emergence of an
African Christianity and modernity Go that used the same arguments to fight against colonial
to Text
injustice. But other thinkers find that the civil wars, genocides, and massacres “that plague
Africa today are signs of an anaemic political sphere” that is a product of foreign institutions
enforcing an external order on African societies.
of genocide, 15
orchestrated by then-members of the Rwandan government. The
In the meantime, Christianity, “which arrived
the context of ain Africa
civil within
war between thethe colonial context
Hutu-dominated government ofand a Tutsi-
subjugation and domination,” is now “profoundly
started on the 6th oflinked to thea rocket
April, following African experience
attack that caused aof history
plane carryingin
the presidents of Rwanda and Burundi to crash. Despite the16
its multiple manifestations: spiritual, social, political, ethical and intellectual.” presence of a
Therefore, “all
analysis of African issues that does not take into
international account
community failedthe Christian
to intervene, (ormost
pulling Islam) factor
of their as well
forces out and
as African religious
Journal # 99 systems ends upuntil
by the
renouncing an understanding of African societies’ More
4th of July, when Rwandan Patriotic Front forces, then led by the
dynamics.”17 The institution of Christianity erased
those responsible thegenocide
for the Rwandan rhythms,
from the country.” imico
African ya Kinyarwanda,
Study Centre,
such that Christianity caused the cultural
Go to Textdeath of the Rwandan ways of being in the world,
decimating existing life practices that didn’t separate “its expression in social action, nor readily
classified as theological, political,3 orPatrice
sociological.” 18 Christianity
Nganang, Manifeste d’une nouvelle was deployed
litterature africaine: as
pour“a powerful
une écriture
tool for the transformation of physical and human spaces,” and “as an institution of
domestication of bodies and minds,Worldlinesss
forcing integration
of Contemporary into a manner
African Literatureofinbeing,
French”,living and
in Transnational
thinking presented as the actualisation ofForsdick,
Charles a revealed Word,
and David and(Liverpool
Murphy as the truth and
University norm
Press, of274-86,
2010), all
authentic existence.”19 276.
Go to Text
For some thinkers, this fragmentation explains,

4 Either because hein part,know
doesn’t thesuch
extraordinary flare-up
a text, or because indoesn’t
such a text civil exist,
wars
and atrocities in Africa in recent years. According
or because if it does,to the
as is Congolese
sure, priest
it’s not distributed andenough
widely philosopher
to have reached
the likes of him.
Bénézet Bujo, “In the genuine AfricanGo totradition,
Text the genocide in Rwanda would be impossible.
Palaver and rites of reconciliation in the name of the ancestors would ensure that the worst
would be avoided and peace re-established.” Perhaps
5 Mahmood Mamdani, “the recognised
Understanding the Crisis in or concealed
Kivu: genocides,
Report of the CODESRIA
Mission to the Democratic Republic of Congo, September 1997 (CODESRIA), 2001. 20
massacres, intercommunity clashes,Gorapeto Textand violence, are … signifiers of the obvious failure”
of modernity, Christianity, and other rhythmic apparatuses enforced upon Africans by colonial
governments of before and their contemporary military technocratic surrogates.
Although African Christendom and its context

1 The Rwandan was a variants have developed
workweek, organized newofidioms
in the framework researchthat
on theare no
longer identical to Roman Christianity, Christendom remains an ideological instrument that is
central to the formation of the subject in all
“Another aspects
Roadmap of Education,”
for Art education. Even of
a network more so, Christianity
educators, artists, and
and philosophy are linked, and bothEducation,
take onatmore importance
the Zurich University ofunder
the Artsconditions of recurring
ZHdK. At the level of the African
violence. As we know, the Genocide against the Tutsi is unique, but sadly, violence asLibrary
continent, working groups there included Johannesburg (Keleketla! such and
is not
a single event, it’s a recurring condition that
Cairo in attempts
Egypt. to take hold
See: →. Lubumbashi of alife.
was once Thislocation
significant recurrence
where a
means that philosophy only becomes necessary over time, since violence is never consigned to a
single event in time. Violence continually ruptures
formations of African time.
cultures“Philosophy” may
and the continent’s be continually
intellectual histories. called
Go to Text
upon to account for, to understand, and to come to terms with these ruptures: a rupture that
was, and the rupture that is coming. A rupture, an exile, is always ahead as well as behind.
Philosophy seems to be even more necessary under
800,000 Rwandese such
people conditions.
were murdered in a deliberate and well-organized act
Go to Text
276.
Go to Text
the likes of him.
Go to Text

Go to Text

Go to Text
“This picture was probably taken by Brother Alfred (orthe
by Father Dufays?)
killings. Many near
HutuRuaza in August
and Twa 1909.
also lost It shows
their lives the cutting
as the down of
genocide trees after
unfolded in
their bark had been peeled a few week before. Dr. Richard Kandt [the first ‘resident’ of Rwanda] felt that this slow killing of trees was unethical
and wrote about it in his bestseller Caput Nili: Eine Empfindsame Reise Zu Den Quellen Des Nils (1904).” Courtesy of the Archive of the White
Fathers, Cologne. Published in Hans-Ulrich Duwendag and Wolfgang
dominated Völker,
rebel Ruanda the
movement, und Rwandan
die Deutschen: Missionare
Patriotic als Zeitzeugen
Front (RPF). der
The killings
Kolonialgeschichte (LIT Verlag, 2017).
Interdictory Exiles of Philosophy considerable UN peacekeeping force at the outbreak of the violence, the
Philosopher Isaïe Nzeyimana jokes those
about how heforisthe
responsible often reproached
genocide for being
from the country.” AfricanaStudy
philosopher.
Centre, 21
“It’s so difficult!” complains public Go
opinion.
to Text Nzeyimana retorts that philosophy is difficult
because life is difficult! Philosophy is but the narration of the world, and if living was easy,
philosophy would be as well. But3thePatrice
typeNganang,
of Christianity that
Manifeste d’une gave
nouvelle form africaine:
litterature to philosophy in former
pour une écriture
colonies is a practice of interdictory“The
exiles, symbolized by withdrawal from society, embodied in
Post-Genocidal African Subject: Patrice Nganang, Achille Mbembe and the
its demands for seminaries, convents and monasteries.
Worldlinesss of Contemporary OnAfrican
the one hand,
Literature philosophy
in French”, in the
in Transnational
Great Lakes region of Africa laboredCharles
under political,
Forsdick, moral,
and David ethical,
Murphy andUniversity
(Liverpool disciplinary
Press, 2010), 274-86,
276.
interdictions. Some of these interdictions were external to philosophy—for instance, the
Go to Text
political conditions at the time, exemplified by the oppressive regimes of Juvenal Habyarimana
(Rwanda) and Mobutu Sese Seko4 (Zaire/Congo). But on
Either because he doesn’t thesuch
know other
a text,hand, philosophy
or because already
such a text doesn’t exist,
understood itself as an interdictory discourse: it was a form of knowledge forbidden to be
the likes of him.
studied in “ordinary life.” But also, it
Goprohibited
to Text itself to write about this “ordinariness,” which,
in hindsight, was a continual crisis. Philosophy’s role, then, was to analyze philosophy from
within devotional segregation. The predominant
5 Mahmood Mamdani, role of philosophical
Understanding practices
the Crisis in Kivu: Report ofhad been to
the CODESRIA
elucidate particular moments in canonical
Go to Text works by Gabriel Marcel, Kant, Hegel, and Heidegger,
or from the perspective of Thomist philosophers.22
During the period of postindependenceNotes until -the

“In the Black Color of the Night”: Theology and …
Rwandan genocide (1959–94), these external
and internal interdictions forced1philosophy into
The context was a metaphysical
a workweek, domain.
organized in At first,
the framework philosophy
of research on the
saw itself as “ethnophilosophy.” This is an ethnographic effort concerned with the aim of
asserting the existence of “rationality” in African
“Another Roadmap cultures, as an aundertaking
for Art Education,” opposing
network of educators, the then-
artists, and
dominant European discourse which justified
Education, theZurich
at the “civilizing
Universitymissions” partly
of the Arts ZHdK. onlevel
At the theofaccount
the Africanof
the absence of reason in Africans.23 continent,
Gradually, working groups therebecame
philosophy included Johannesburg
an impenetrable(Keleketla! Library and
metaphysical empire which saw itself asinthe
Cairo master
Egypt. See: →.discourse,
Lubumbashi wastheonce
discourse
a significantoflocation
all discourses.
where a In
so doing, philosophy suffered from number of important philosophers studied, lived, and worked, most notably V. Y.
a principled impotence, by forbidding itself dialogue with its
outside. While philosophizing socially mightofhave
formations Africanbeen prohibited
cultures by political
and the continent’s authorities
intellectual histories. of
Go to Text
that time, philosophy’s own disciplinary heritage equally prohibited itself from undertaking
exterior analysis. This self-exiling aspect or “strangeness” of philosophy has been expressed in
various ways across time. Political theorist Terence
800,000 Rwandese Ballwere
people asserts
murderedthat
in philosophers were “often
a deliberate and well-organized act
outsiders, even complete strangers,”genocidal
albeitregime
“in a targeted
ratherthe
special sense”:
Tutsi population and moderate Hutu who opposed
The citizens of [the] polis regarded hisdominated
activity rebel
as anmovement,
alien activity, though for quite different reasons than
the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). The killings
citizens of present-day America mightstarted
give. on
For,
theif6th
“being a man”
of April, wasa rocket
following synonymous
attack thatwith
causedbeing an carrying
a plane active
participant in the life and affairs of the city, the theorist
considerable was only
UN peacekeeping half
force a man;
at the or, rather,
outbreak part human
of the violence, the and
international community
part something else. His activity of contemplation, failedof
unlike that to politics,
intervene, was
pulling
notmost of their
wholly offorces out and it
this world;
had, both Plato and Aristotle agreed, an element 24
Journal # 99 until the 4th ofofJuly,
divinity about it.Patriotic
when Rwandan Front forces, then led by the More
Writing further on this “strangeness” ofresponsible
those philosophy,for theBall suggests:
genocide from the country.” African Study Centre,
Go to Text
Plato made much of Socrates’ daemon, with which the latter consorted while in trance-like states, and
which advised him to stay out of politics.
3 PatriceElsewhere Plato emphasises
Nganang, Manifeste d’une nouvellethe loneliness,
litterature africaine:the privacy
pour (idion)
une écriture
préemptivelife.
bordering on madness, of the contemplative (Éditions Homnisphères,
He even 2007),theorising
suggests that 36; quoted in Michaeltaking
means Syrotinski,
leave of
life, a kind of separation or death. These themes of
Worldlinesss run through Plato,
Contemporary especially,
African asFrench”,
Literature in a leitmotif or better,
in Transnational
perhaps, as a defence, the theorist’s own apologia pro vita sua. There is a poignant and moving passage in
the Republic, in which Plato has Socrates
276. justify his abstention from political life. His abstention is not
Go to Text
that of a coward or shirker of his rightful duty; it has a lonely, heroic quality about it. Socrates laments the
fallen state of politics, which he has observed, as it were, from the outside. “One who has weighed all this
keeps quiet and goes on his way, like the traveller
or because if it who takes
does, as shelter
is sure, it’s notunder a wall
distributed from
widely a driving
enough storm
to have of
reached
the likes of him.
dust and hail; and seeing lawlessness spreading on all sides, is content if he can keep his hands clean from
Go to Text
iniquity while life lasts …” This outpouring of bitterness, leavened only by a sense of resignation to fate,
seems to betoken an antipolitical sentiment of the strongest kind. And yet bitterness immediately gives
way to a sentiment which is political in character.
Go to Text
Both Plato and Aristotle emphasise the alien or foreign character of theoria or contemplation. In his later
dialogues the image of the “stranger” is that of the theorist. In the Statesman, the Laws and the Sophist, for
example, the “stranger,” who has traveled far and seen much, is the central figure. In casting the theorist
1
The context was a workweek, organized in the framework of research on the
as a stranger, Plato deliberately heightens and dramatises the “foreign” character of the theorist, who is
given no name, age, or any significantundertaken
attributesinother than his
collaboration vocation
with orother
a cluster of “way” (aporie).
working Inasanpart
groups, almost
of
“Another Roadmap for Art Education,” a network of25educators, artists, and
Jungian fashion, Plato reduces the theorist, as stranger, to an archetypal figure.
Aristotle wonders “which way of lifeWits), is more
Kampaladesirable—to join with
in Uganda, Nyanza/Huye otherMaseru
in Rwanda, citizens and share
in Lesotho, and in
Cairo
the state’s activity, or to live in it like aninalien,
Egypt. absolved
See: →. Lubumbashi
from the was ties
once aof
significant location
political where a26
society?”
There are significant differences between Mudimbe,Plato’s alienated
a Congolese philosopher
philosopher, andconcerned
poet, and novelist the theorist
with the
envisioned by Aristotle. For Aristotle, the theoretical life can more readily exist independently
Go to Text
of the political. Politics and philosophy are two “ways.” It is not necessary, nor would it be
desirable, to subordinate one to the other.
2 See: In contrast,
Genocide concerning
Archive Rwanda, →. “In lessthe
than role of the
a hundred days,individual
more than and
political action, and the foundations of democracy, Plato finds freedom to be the defining
characteristic of democracy. Democracygenocidalfacilitates the the
regime targeted koinon, “the sharing
Tutsi population of friends,
and moderate property,
Hutu who opposed
the killings. Many Hutu and Twa also lost their lives as the genocide unfolded in27
and family.” But also, democracy should encourage the development of a world of one’s own.
“Hereditary” philosophy has thus long contemplated
the presidents of Rwandatheand merits
Burundi toor downfalls
crash. ofpresence
Despite the removingof a itself
from the world. But so did vocational considerable UN peacekeeping
Christianity, force at the
out of which the outbreak of the violence,
educational the
missionary
institutions issued. From the Frenchignoring
literary criticforRoland
any pleas help. ThisBarthes weallowed
failure to act learnthe
that in the
killings period
to continue
startingJournal # 99
culminating in the fourth century, a significant More
until the 4th of July, when Rwandan Patriotic Front forces, then led by the
from the first century of ourcurrent
era and
president Paul Kagame, were able to take control of the country, ousting
number of individuals gradually leftthose
their societies
responsible for behind and
the genocide made
from their way
the country.” into
African the
Study desert of
Centre,
Egypt. These men and women became Go toascetics,
Text hermits, and later, monks and clergymen and -
women. To this day, some of them are referred to by the church and Christians across the globe
as the Desert Fathers and Mothers. This phenomenon
3 Patrice Nganang, Manifesteis also
d’une found
nouvelle outside
litterature of theology.
africaine: In
pour une écriture
English, the word hermit (ερημίτης) derives its meaning from ἔρημος, érēmos, and ἐρῆμος,
erêmos: “Greek” and Attic words forWorldlinesss
“desert.”ofThe EnglishAfrican
Contemporary wordLiterature
“desertion” alsoin originates
in French”, Transnational
from the literal meaning of going toCharles
the desert.
Forsdick,This period
and David Murphysurrounding the birth
(Liverpool University Press,of2010),
Christianity
274-86,
276.
was a time of pivotal transformations for the Roman Empire. Some of these ascetics, hermits,
Go to Text
monks, and nuns were forced to seek exile from Roman military service, fleeing imperial taxes,
heritage, or marriage.28 But, even4 for those
Either whohehad
because doesn’tnoknow
social
suchreason
a text, or to flee such
because other than
a text desire,
doesn’t exist,
the desert had its own singular attraction:
the likes of him.
Go to Text
[The desert] was both the place where God is to be found—here the classic prototype was Moses, who
met God face to face in the desert 5of Sinai—and at the Understanding
Mahmood Mamdani, same time itthewas thein place
Crisis where
Kivu: Report theCODESRIA
of the demons
dwell. The second meaning is vividly emphasised in the Life of Antony: as Antony withdraws into the
Go to Text
desert, he hears the demons shouting, “Depart from our territory. What business have you here in the
desert?” So the solitary, in withdrawing into the desert, has a double aim: to meet God and to fight the
Notes
demons. In both cases the ascetic is not being - “In the
selfish, andBlack Color ofisthe
the purpose Night”:
not Theology
to escape but toand …
encounter.
The ascetic goes out to discover God and to achieve union with the divine through prayer; and this is
something that helps others. Equally the ascetic
history of artsgoes out to
education confront the
in Lubumbashi anddemons, not running
in Congo. These away from
studies were
danger but advancing to meet it; and this also is a way of helping others. Because, the devil with whom the
ascetic enters into combat is the common enemy
researchers ofaround
from all humankind. 29
the world, initiated by the Institute for Artistic
Like Christianity itself, these desertWits), Kampalaformations
Christian in Uganda, Nyanza/Huye in Rwanda, Maseru
were composed in Lesotho, andbelief
of philosophies,
systems, and life practices from Northern,
number ofSouthern, and Eastern
important philosophers origins,
studied, lived, andalongside
worked, mostinfluences
notably V. Y.
from Hebraic, “Greek,” and Roman formations
traditions. However, this theological mixing receded at the
of African cultures and the continent’s intellectual histories.
moment of division between East and Go toWest,
Text which occurred around the collusion of
Christianity with the Roman Empire in 380, following the edict of Theodosius. Particularly in
the new “West,” the ascendance 2andSee: Genocide Archiveof
centralization Rwanda, →. “In less as
Christianity than a hundred
the days,of
religion more
thethan
Roman
empire resulted in the gradual “ordering” of orchestrated
of genocide, all asceticbylife practicesofinto
then-members “cenobitic”
the Rwandan government. The
monasteries. This making of “order”themarginalized and criminalized most other types of ascetic
killings. Many Hutu and Twa also lost their lives as the genocide unfolded in
life, in the Egyptian desert and elsewhere in ofthe
the context Roman
a civil Empire.
war between Instead, thegovernment
the Hutu-dominated cenobitic and a Tutsi-
monastery became the model institution ofthe
started on subject formation
6th of April, following aand
rocketethical governance,
attack that caused a planeand the
carrying
the presidents
“desert” became an interior state. Because theofascetic
Rwanda andandBurundi
hermit to crash.
wereDespite
fightingthe presence
againstofthea
“demon” symbolized by the desert, international
this “demon” remained
community failed tothe enemy
intervene, against
pulling most ofwhich theout and
their forces
monastic infrastructure defended. Perhaps,
Journal # 99
then, there remains a demonological defensiveness
until the 4th of July, when Rwandan Patriotic Front forces, then led by the More
to Western institutions modelled after
thosethe monastery,
responsible including
for the genocide from missionary schools.
the country.” African Study Despite
Centre, the
enormous temporal distances—historical
Go to Texttransformations and geographic expanses—the
seminaries and convents in former Western colonies could exemplify some of the material
legacies of these early Christian cenobitic histories.
In any case, naming, accounting, and definingoflevels
Worldlinesss of social
Contemporary commitment
African is thus
Literature in French”, an age-old
in Transnational
concern of paramount importance in bothForsdick,
Charles philosophy
and David and theology.
Murphy InUniversity
(Liverpool Rwanda, it’s2010),
Press, as if274-86,
philosophy placed an obligation on 276.
those who would study it to give up on anything other than
Go to Text
philosophy, by entering the seminary or convent. Once inside, the philosophical canon is
predefined as the only meaning of
4 value. This pre-agreement
Either because he doesn’t know suchmakesa text, orthe motions
because of thought
such a text turn
doesn’t exist,
into a predefined circle. or because if it does, as is sure, it’s not distributed widely enough to have reached
the likes of him.
Go to Text

Go to Text

Go to Text
Go to Text
276.
Go to Text
Brother Privatus Jakob Brauchle during basic training or because
in Kigali if it does, 22,
on November as is1914. Courtesy
sure, it’s not of
distributed
the Archivewidely
of the enough to have
White Fathers, reached
Cologne.
Published in Hans-Ulrich Duwendag and Wolfgang Völker, Ruanda und
the likes of him. die Deutschen: Missionare als Zeitzeugen der Kolonialgeschichte (LIT
Verlag, 2017).
Go to Text
Theoretical Limits of Narrating LifeUnderstanding

5 Mahmood Mamdani, in the Afterlife
the Crisis in Kivu: Report of the CODESRIA
Go to Text
If that is the case, I am of course unable to trespass the horizon of such a circle; I am hardly
qualified to author a work of political science, conflict resolution, peace studies, nor philosophy.
Even if I were, there would be a horde ofNotes
theoretical
- “In the limits opposing
Black Color of the my passage.
Night”: Forand
Theology instance,
…
how to speak against violence from a “complicit” position of that same violence? What
disciplinary strategies can address such
historycomplicit narration?
of arts education in Lubumbashi and in Congo. These studies were
A limit can give rise to a theoreticalresearchers
metaphor, fromwhich
around can in turn
the world, propose
initiated a certain
by the Institute “hyperbolic
for Artistic
re-narrativization” of the problem at hand, working
continent, “not only asthere
groups pasts, but Johannesburg
included as futures.” A limit,Library
(Keleketla! then,andcan
be seen as a “necessity in the form of Wits), Kampala finality,
a certain in Uganda, even
Nyanza/Huye
wheninplaced
Rwanda,under
Maseru intheLesotho,
markand of
death,” which “may well be understood numbertoofyet always
important remain studied,
philosophers distended lived, in
andits ownmost
worked, possibility.”
notably V. Y. In
this sense, “a limit can only manifest through its other side: possibility. Limit, approached on
the order of necessity itself, is still, Go to Text thus already a thought of the future as possibility.”30
always,
What possibility can arise from the limit of speaking against violence from within the position
of complicity? Here I am writing 2“against”
See: Genocide Archive Rwanda,
Christianity, “In my
and→.yet less than
name a hundred days, moreIthan
is Christian. am
quarrelling with philosophy, and yetofIgenocide,
share most of mybyintellectual
orchestrated then-members of intimacy with
the Rwandan BarthesTheand
government.
Nzeyimana. Barthes’s biography is complicit in French imperialism: Barthes’s grandfather Louis
Gustave Binger was “the French explorer and
the context of colonial officerthewho
a civil war between claimed Côte
Hutu-dominated d’Ivoire
government and afor
Tutsi-
France in the 1880s.” Binger even “served
started onfor
thea6th
time as the
of April, colony’s
following a rocketgovernor, and lent
attack that caused a planehis name
carrying
to Bingerville, the city that remains the presidents
named of Rwanda
in his honorandtoBurundi
this day.” 31 Nzeyimana
to crash. Despite the presence
couldof abe said
to represent the general intellect formalized
internationalthrough
communityafailed
dualtoThomist and Hegelian
intervene, pulling most of theirtradition. As
forces out and
outlinedJournal
above, Christianity is a rationality
# 99
that contributed to the false raciality at the heartMore of
until the 4th of July, when Rwandan Patriotic Front forces, then led by the
the Genocide against the Tutsi.32 Inthose
addition, aspects
responsible for the of Hegel’s
genocide fromwork placeAfrican
the country.” him among the
Study Centre,
writers who were ideologists of the Go
century-long
to Text crimes by committed Europeans against
Africans, who became the object of economic exploitation in the form of slavery, the plunder of
their natural resources, forced labor, and Nganang,
3 Patrice political subjection.
Manifeste These
d’une nouvelle crimes
litterature were
africaine: given
pour literary
une écriture
accents by thinkers and ideologists,“The
whoPost-Genocidal
conductedAfrican
“a systematic campaign of denigration of
Subject: Patrice Nganang, Achille Mbembe and the
the Black Race, so as to reduce its peoples to aof sort
Worldlinesss of biological
Contemporary speciesinthat
African Literature wanders
French”, like a
in Transnational
somnambulist between human and Charlesanimal.” 33 Worse than material denigration, the “West”
Forsdick, and David Murphy (Liverpool University Press, 2010), 274-86,
276.
wanted “to kill Africans spiritually, by denying them the human quality of exercising their
Go to Text
intellectual faculties.” For, “it’s less serious for a people to be exploited economically than to be
stripped of the quality of humanity in itsbecause
4 Either own right and,
he doesn’t above
know such aall,
text,toorbe forced
because suchto believe
a text doesn’toneself
exist,
incapable of being anything other than slaves.”
or because Moreover,
if it does, it’snot
as is sure, it’s likely that widely
distributed “slavery and
enough to have reached
the likes of him.
colonisation would not have occurred
Go toifText
the Europeans had not first achieved in their own
psyche the step of reducing the quality of a humanity into those they wished enslaved or
colonised.” Concurrently, for the5 exploiters, “it wasUnderstanding
Mahmood Mamdani, necessarythetoCrisis
convince themselves
in Kivu: Report that
of the CODESRIA
ultimately, their captives have no value other than that of a beast of burden or a simple
Go to Text
instrument, in order not to have too bad a conscience while abusing them as such.”34

Go to Text
Go to Text
276.
Go to Text
the likes of him.
Go to Text
“Preparations in anticipation of the Belgian attack5at Gisenyi

Mahmood Mamdani,
in 1915. A MaximUnderstanding the Crisis
machine gun and a 77 mmin Kivu: Report were
field cannon of thedeployed,
CODESRIA but were
later captured by the Belgians.” Courtesy of the Archive of the to
Mission White Fathers, Cologne.
the Democratic Published
Republic in Hans-Ulrich
of Congo, Duwendag
September 1997 and Wolfgang
(CODESRIA), 2001.Völker,
Ruanda und die Deutschen: Missionare als Zeitzeugen der Kolonialgeschichte (LIT Verlag, 2017).
Go to Text
Example of the Limit of Reason: Hegel’s Concept of History

According to Rwandan philosopher Maniragaba Balibutsa,35 Hegel contributed directly to this
forcefully globalizing and dehumanizing
history reason. Hegelindeveloped
of arts education Lubumbashi andsubdivisions
in Congo. Theseofstudies
the epochs
were of
universal history according to the peoples he wanted
“Another Roadmap toEducation,”
for Art privilege: universal
a network historyartists,
of educators, moves and from
researchers from
the patriarchal Natural world, corresponding to around the world,world,
the Eastern initiatedand
by the Institute for
ascends Artistic to the
through
Greek world, and then to the Romancontinent,
world.working
History culminates
groups in Johannesburg
there included the Germanic era and
(Keleketla! the
Library and
Wits), Kampala in Uganda, 36
Nyanza/Huye in Rwanda, Maseru in Lesotho, and
Christian world, when the spirit becomes autonomous.
The Dehumanization of Life by Hegel formations of African cultures and the continent’s intellectual histories.
Go to Text
But for Hegel, Africa south of the Sahara is nowhere near any of the stages of universal history:
“Africa represents a state of humanity still below the values that constitute History and
Civilization.” According to Balibutsa: “Hegel orchestrated
of genocide, imposes upon Africansofathe
by then-members setRwandan
of very violent ideas
government. The …
which can practically be summed uptheinkillings.
one sentence: ‘Black
Many Hutu and Africans
Twa also lost theirrepresent a degree
lives as the genocide of in
unfolded
the context
evolution of humanity still so low that of a civiltalk
we cannot war between
about the Hutu-dominated
history, culture,government
the state, andreligion,
a Tutsi-
social institutions in general.’” Africa is “‘ahistorical’”;
started on the 6th of April,its “‘humanity
following is inthat
a rocket attack a state
causedof barbarism
a plane carrying
and savagery’”; and “‘it is the land ofthe presidents of Rwanda and Burundi to crash. Despite the presence of a
gold, folded onto itself, the country of childhood which,
beyond the day of conscious history,international
remains community
wrappedfailed
in the black colour
to intervene, of the
pulling most forces 37
night.’”
of their out and
According to Balibutsa, Hegel’s further
thoseelaborations ongenocide
responsible for the religion,
from human relations,
the country.” andCentre,
African Study political
constitution among Africans are “deeply violent,” and in summary, “Hegel exiles Africans
Go to Text
forever from the history of human culture, past, present, and future.” Although Hegel’s writings
on this subject have long been demystified, it’s not
3 Patrice Nganang, indulgent
Manifeste to revisit
d’une nouvelle Hegel’s
litterature africaine: views. “He
pour une écriture
formulated these from the stories narrated by slave traders, who needed to justify their
inhuman behavior, and from the accounts of colonizers
Worldlinesss of Contemporary and missionaries
African Literature in who also
French”, needed to
in Transnational
pretend to be heroes or saints in theCharles
mindForsdick,
of their andpeers who remained
David Murphy in Europe.”
(Liverpool University Hegel’s
Press, 2010), 274-86,
words about Africa “summarise the276.
opinions of the ‘white’ world on us during these last
Go to Text
centuries.” They reflect the ideology of slavery, colonization, and missionary work, and their
reality extends itself into the post-Genocide present.
the likes of him.
Go to Text

Go to Text

Go to Text
2
See: Genocide Archive Rwanda, →. “In less than a hundred days, more than
World Philosophy Day, Kabgayi, Rwanda, January 23, 2019. Convened
genocidal by targeted
regime Dr. Isaïe Nzeyimana and Christian
the Tutsi population Nyampeta.
and moderateOrganized
Hutu whoby UNESCO,
opposed
Kabgayi Philosophicum, and ARPHI. the killings. Many Hutu and Twa also lost their lives as the genocide unfolded in
Polyrationality and Intellectual Survival

How do Rwandan philosophers reconcile theircommunity
international existence asto“Africans”
failed with
intervene, pulling their
most intellectual
of their forces out and
affection towards Hegel’s philosophy? Despite its violent stance towards Nzeyimana’scontinue
ignoring any pleas for help. This failure to act allowed the killings to own
existence, how to account for his attraction to the
those responsible forGerman idealism
the genocide Hegel African
from the country.” professes, and
Study Centre,
Hegel’s elaborations of a comprehensive and systematic philosophy from a purportedly logical
Go to Text
starting point? This is an instance in which “what appears as a conflict of rationalities is
probably only discomfort (on the3 part of Nganang,
Patrice those who ared’une
Manifeste ‘monorational’).” Indeed,
nouvelle litterature africaine: pour une écriture
“polyrationality” is one of the effects of colonialism’s imposition of Western methods onto
Africa. Nzeyimana employs “his own” philosophical
Worldlinesss methods
of Contemporary alongside
African “Western”
Literature in ones, and his
French”, in Transnational
work encourages us to “shift back and forth between multiple 38 This is because
models.”University
Charles Forsdick, and David Murphy (Liverpool Press, 2010), 274-86,
276.
current and historical violent realities have generated new experiences: Islam and Christianity
Go to Text
are by now also African experiences; in the same way that, as Senegalese philosopher
Souleymane Bachir Diagne suggests, English, 39
4 Either becauseFrench,
he doesn’tand
knowPortuguese are also
such a text, or because suchAfrican.
a text doesn’t exist,
Perhaps, then, Hegel is also “African”?
the likes of him.
Go to Text
Regardless, the brutalities and extinctions committed in the name of “History,” “modernism,”
and its “rationality” call for a complete rejection
5 Mahmood ofUnderstanding
Mamdani, its rhythms the in African
Crisis in Kivu: societies, cultures,
Report of the CODESRIA
and politics. For instance, the possible
Go tobenefits
Text of Christianity throughout the Great Lakes
region pale in comparison to the atrocities committed by missionaries and by Christian (and
Muslim) African leaders and their willful or manipulated followers. And yet, in the wake of these
Notes - “In
terrible encounters, those tasked with subject the Black are
formations Color of the
still Night”: Theology and …
Christians.
1
The context was a workweek, organized in the framework of research on the
This contradiction embodies one ofhistory of arts education in Lubumbashi and in Congo. These studies were
the challenges facing current and future generations of
philosophers, educators, artists, policy makers,
“Another Roadmap andforother civic bodies:
Art Education,” a networkHow and where
of educators, to bury
artists, and
the ghosts of a defunct modernism Education,
and the ghosts of its
at the Zurich victims?
University of theNow that At
Arts ZHdK. Christianity
the level of the has
African
continent, working groups there included Johannesburg
become “African,” where to bury its African ghosts? The ghosts of our troubled histories have (Keleketla! Library and no
resting place. Some are addressed asCairo
living, andSee:
in Egypt. others are buried
→. Lubumbashi in the
was once wronglocation
a significant graves. Thea
where
“Christian,” the “French,” the “English,” the “Islamic,” and the “African” now have ghosts in
common, intertwined and fused. Burying
formationsa defunct Christianity
of African cultures would bury
and the continent’s the living
intellectual “African”
histories.
Go to Text
with it, again in the wrong grave. How to ascribe proper graves to our common ghosts?
Attending to this question could foreground a conflicted historical mutuality and reciprocity, in
a way that implicates us, for example, in thinking
800,000 Rwandese negatively with Hegel
people were murdered or Christianity,
in a deliberate in order
to survive it all.40 genocidal regime targeted the Tutsi population and moderate Hutu who opposed
Go to Text
276.
Go to Text
4
Either because he doesn’t know such a text, or because such a text doesn’t exist,
Christian Nyampeta, Comment vivre ensemble, 2015, video still, 30 min, color, sound.
the likes of him.
Go to Text
Sharing Time, and Planting Trees
In January 2019, I co-convened a conference
Go to Text
with Nzeyimana on the occasion of World
Philosophy Day, an event organized annually by the National Commission of UNESCO, in
collaboration with ARPHI (the Association Rwandaise des Philosophes). This year’s theme was
Notes -and
the relationship between art and philosophy, “In the Black
it was Color of
hosted bythetheNight”:
GrandTheology
Séminaire and …
Philosophicum de Kabgayi St. Thomas Aquinas.

1 The context was aGuests included
workweek, Archbishop
organized in the frameworkSmaragde
of research on the
Mbonyintege, Senator Laurent Nkusi, members of the philosophers’ association, artists, and
faculty from various universities. The majority
“Another Roadmapof the guests
for Art were
Education,” current
a network studentsartists,
of educators, of theand Grand
Seminary, who are future priests. The conference was organized following what Nzeyimana and
I call the “postcard method.” In thecontinent,
preceding months,
working we visited
groups there artists and(Keleketla!
included Johannesburg philosophers
Library and
across the country, and we held recorded conversations
Cairo in Egypt. with our
See: →. Lubumbashi hosts
was once on themes
a significant of where
location translation,
a
number of important philosophers studied, lived, and
memory, and education.41 During the conference—with the use of two simultaneous projectorsworked, most notably V. Y.
—we screened the results, with audio and video
formations fragments
of African ontheone
cultures and projector,
continent’s and histories.
intellectual highlights from
Go to Text
the transcripts of our visits on the other. Nzeyimana livened up the room; a microphone
circulated, and anyone present could pose questions or offer comments, opinions, and remarks.
At one point, the discussion was on800,000
how toRwandese
definepeople
“art”:were
What translational
murdered models
in a deliberate are
meaningful for such an understanding? Should the artist/philosopher follow the world’s major
tendencies, or should they invent solely fromMany
the killings. theHutu
contexts
and Twaand “languages”
also lost of genocide
their lives as the their own locale?
unfolded in
Archbishop Mbonyintege remarkeddominated
on how rebel concerns about translation had already been
movement, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). The killings
considered by a generation before him. For
started instance,
on the Abbé
6th of April, Alexis
following Kagame
a rocket andcaused
attack that Aloysa plane carrying
Bigirumwami42 represent respectively the school
considerable of translation
UN peacekeeping force atand the school
the outbreak of interpretation.
of the violence, the
internationalMbonyintege
This generational repetition led Archbishop community failed to
to intervene,
lament pulling most of their forcesartists
that contemporary out and
lack “historical
Journal # inspiration.”
99 The next
untilspeaker
the 4th of to
July,request the microphone
when Rwandan was then
Patriotic Front forces, a young
led by artist
the and
More
singer, one of the very few women present, who objected
those responsible to the
for the genocide fromArchbishop’s characterization
the country.” African Study Centre, of
her generation. “Why do you consider
Go tothe
Textsingers and artists of your time more inspired than
us?” she asked. “Our experience of the world is vastly different from yours, and therefore our
artistic delivery can’t be the same.
3 You may
Patrice not like
Nganang, ourd’une
Manifeste forms, but
nouvelle you can’t
litterature accuse
africaine: usécriture
pour une of not
being inspired, and therefore, of not“The
having any context.” The Archbishop acquiesced and
Post-Genocidal African Subject: Patrice Nganang, Achille Mbembe and the
acknowledged the artist’s sentiment. He thenofpointed
Worldlinesss out African
Contemporary how her response
Literature might
in French”, imply that
in Transnational
she, and the youth she represents, live in aForsdick,
Charles time entirely separate
and David Murphy fromUniversity
(Liverpool the timePress,
in which the
2010), 274-86,
Archbishop and his colleagues live. 276.
“In truth,” he said, “we all share the same time.”
Go to Text
By way of conclusion, I return to4myEither

visitbecause
to theheLushois
doesn’t know philosophers. Maybe
such a text, or because suchBanywesize was
a text doesn’t exist,
discerning: unwittingly, I might have
or been
because“accusing”
if it does, as is philosophy indiscriminately,
sure, it’s not distributed inhave
widely enough to thereached
same
the likes of him.
way that the Archbishop was questioning
Go to Textmy generation’s “artistic” contribution to society. The
encounter between the artist and the philosopher involved “a language that holds us hostage,
5 43
and yet we are the hostage takers.” It was Mamdani,
Mahmood a “logically absurd”
Understanding the moment that
Crisis in Kivu: reaffirmed
Report our
of the CODESRIA
own limits and contradictions.44 Supposedly,
Go to Text one of the many “functions” of art is to heal the
ruptures of history, and to “puncture” the membrane of the future, so as to render its advent
felt in the present. In other words, the task of art is to invent a sense of shared time, across
Notes - “In
geographical expanses and ideological divides. Whythedo
Black Colorart,
today’s of the Night”:
and Theologyfail
philosophy, andto…
achieve this? The underlying question

1 The is: Why
context wascan’t “art” organized
a workweek, and “philosophy” prevent
in the framework violence?
of research on the
Ultimately, artists and philosophersundertaken
are reproaching each other for their failure to solve
in collaboration with a cluster of other working groups, as part of
problems that belong to the fields of“Another
medicine,
Roadmapeducation, political
for Art Education,” science,
a network architecture,
of educators, artists, andhistory,
design, engineering, psychology, anthropology,
Education, at thegenocide studies,
Zurich University of theetc.
Arts Is it only
ZHdK. At theart
leveland
of the African
continent,
philosophy that have failed in the face of theworking groups there
Genocide of theincluded
Tutsi?Johannesburg
Haven’t (Keleketla!
politics,Library and
technology, science, journalism—the listinisEgypt.
Cairo endless—also failed?
See: →. Lubumbashi was What aspect of
once a significant living
location doesn’t
where a
face its limit in such a terrible encounter with death? I have no illusions that mere philosophers,
or artists, can save the world! Why reproach
formations ofthe inadequacies
African ofcontinent’s
cultures and the entire societies
intellectual based
histories.solely on
Go to Text
the ethics and aesthetics of two bodies of thought?
In 2015, during a conversation I had800,000
with philosopher
Rwandese peopleQuinet ObedinNiyikiza
were murdered a deliberateat his
and home in Huye
well-organized act
for my film Comment vivre ensemble,of hegenocide,
describedorchestrated by then-members of the Rwandan government. The
philosophy as the mutual inventing of the tools
needed for refusing misery. For him,theone form
killings. this
Many refusal
Hutu and Twatakes istheir
also lost running
lives asathe
gardening
genocide unfolded in
association. Niyikiza’s garden is an application
dominated rebelof an ideatheattributed
movement, to German
Rwandan Patriotic theologian
Front (RPF). The killings
started
Martin Luther. Reputedly, Luther said: “IfonI the 6th ofthe
knew April, following
world a rocket
would endattack that caused Ia plane
tomorrow, would carrying
plant
a tree.” If there are survivors, then they wouldUNbenefit
considerable fromforce
peacekeeping theatfruits of that
the outbreak tree.
of the Thethe
violence,
soundtrack to the harvest of such fruits is a song whose lyrics are our own critical elegy for our
intellectual formation
Journal # 99 and inheritance
untilas
thethe formerly
4th of July, when racialized andFront
Rwandan Patriotic colonized, asled
forces, then modernists,
by the More
postmodernists, Christians, and so those
on. Ifresponsible
our lifefor
really resembles
the genocide ancountry.”
from the afterlife, such
African anCentre,
Study encounter
between ethics and aesthetics couldGoalso take the form of a “self-autopsy” of our intellectual
to Text
bodies. To perform such auto-optics—eye-witnessing or seeing for oneself—is to accept the
burden of conversing outside of our languages,
3 Patrice Nganang,beyond our nouvelle
Manifeste d’une zoneslitterature
and times, as pour
africaine: exiles of
une écriture
knowledge. It’s writing or conversing as “exploratory surgery,” as Algerian writer Christiane
Chaulet-Achour describes Bound to Worldlinesss
Violence, the groudbreaking
of Contemporary Africannovel about
Literature Africa
in French”, by Yambo
in Transnational
Ouologuem.45 Charles Forsdick, and David Murphy (Liverpool University Press, 2010), 274-86,
276.
Go to Text
×
A talk related to this essay was delivered at Exile: Art after
or because if itCulture:
does, as A
is second
sure, it’sdecade of e-fluxwidely
not distributed journal, a conference
enough co-
to have reached
organized by Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art
the likes of him.and e-flux journal, in collaboration with Erasmus University
College and the Rotterdam Arts & Sciences Lab. Go to Text
convenes the Nyanza Working Group of Another Roadmap School. His recent solo exhibitions include École du soir at
SculptureCenter in New York; A Flower Garden of All Kinds of Loveliness Without Sorrow at the Museum of Contemporary Art
GfZK in Leipzig, co-commissioned with Contour Biennale 9 in Mechelen, and co-produced with Kunstenfestivaldesarts,
Go to Text
Brussels, Perdu Amsterdam, and Wilfried Lentz Gallery in Rotterdam; and Words after the World at Camden Arts Centre in
London.
© 2019 e-flux and the author Notes - “In the Black Color of the Night”: Theology and …

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13/01/2021 “In the Black Color of the Night”: Theology and Philosophy in Exile - Journal #99 April 2019

xile - Journal #99 April 2019 - e-flux

Journal #99 - April 2019

Notes - “In the Black Color of the Night”: Theology and …

1 The context was a workweek, organized in the framework of research on the

In December 2018, I visited Lubumbashi, in the

In response, philosopher Emmanuel Banywesize

5 Mahmood Mamdani, Understanding the Crisis in Kivu: Report of the CODESRIA

Notes - “In the Black Color of the Night”: Theology and …

1 The context was a workweek, organized in the framework of research on the

For some thinkers, this fragmentation explains,

Although African Christendom and its context

5 Mahmood Mamdani, Understanding the Crisis in Kivu: Report of the CODESRIA

Notes - “In the Black Color of the Night”: Theology and …

1 The context was a workweek, organized in the framework of research on the

During the period of postindependenceNotes until -the

5 Mahmood Mamdani, Understanding the Crisis in Kivu: Report of the CODESRIA

Notes - “In the Black Color of the Night”: Theology and …

1 The context was a workweek, organized in the framework of research on the

Theoretical Limits of Narrating LifeUnderstanding

Notes - “In the Black Color of the Night”: Theology and …

1 The context was a workweek, organized in the framework of research on the

“Preparations in anticipation of the Belgian attack5at Gisenyi

Example of the Limit of Reason: Hegel’s Concept of History

5 Mahmood Mamdani, Understanding the Crisis in Kivu: Report of the CODESRIA

Notes - “In the Black Color of the Night”: Theology and …

1 The context was a workweek, organized in the framework of research on the

Polyrationality and Intellectual Survival

Philosophicum de Kabgayi St. Thomas Aquinas.

By way of conclusion, I return to4myEither

achieve this? The underlying question

1 The context was a workweek, organized in the framework of research on the

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