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Africa Knows! It is time to decolonise minds

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Accepted Paper: B11-06. To panel B11.

Title of paper:

Authors:

Aarti Kawlra (International Institute of Asian Studies);

Philippe Peycam (IIAS);

Paul van der Velde (IIAS).

Long abstract paper:
Since 2012, IIAS has been engaged in the facilitation of an inclusive South-South Africa-Asia intellectual platform engaging academic institutions and individuals from the two world regions. The process began with an exploratory programmatic workshop in Chisanba, Zambia, in 2012, which laid the ground for the establishment of a pan-African African Association for Asian Studies (A-ASIA) and the running of triennial Asia-Africa open conferences in Africa. The first of these major (historical) events was organized in Accra, Ghana, in 2015, in collaboration with Legon university. A second such event was held in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, in 2018. The next event is scheduled to take place, in 2022 in Saint-Louis, Senegal, (with one-year delay because of the Covid pandemic). All these activities are built on close collaborations involving multiple actors (academic, arts and civil society), with the objective of supporting an inclusive, non-hegemonic, humanistic space of intellectual interactions between the two continents, that is not limited to geo-economic or political considerations. Partners from the other world regions, including Europe, are of course welcome to participate in the A-A platform.

Thanks to its wide global multi-sector network and its post-colonial institutional standing, IIAS plays an important role as logistical facilitator, especially by incorporating the know-how it acquired in running the world renown biennial International Convention for Asia Scholars (ICAS). The institute supports the activities of the A-ASIA network and it works closely with AA conference host institutions.

In addition, IIAS supports the development of an alternative transregional knowledge production and dissemination initiative through the 'Humanities Across Borders (HaB), Africa and Asia in the World' programme. HaB is not only set to re-imagine a truly multi-centered collaborative educational academic effort. The programme is also characterised by its revolutionary pedagogical approach in which knowledge is shaped, and shared, from the stand-point of local communities (vis-à-vis the state) around themes drawn from the lived experiences of making (craft), speaking (language), eating (food), and dwelling (space). Supported by the Mellon Foundation, New York, and built around a consortium of 20 institutions in Africa, Asia, North and Latin America and Europe, the HaB programme is primarily built on an active Africa-Asia 'axis of knowledge'.

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