SOAS Research Online

Abstract

How is knowledge acquired, stored and retrieved in African places? What is the cognitive process of acquiring, learning and remembering knowledge claims about anything in African places? I proffer answers to these questions by exploring what I term communo-cognition as an African theory of cognition. By communo-cognition, I mean the process of knowing in African traditions and the related cognitive features such as learning, perceiving, storing and remembering that are essentially community-centred processes, managed and controlled by the community of selves. I explore (i.) what defines a communo-cognitive process, paying attention to the power of orality, collective authorship and collective and relational minds, perception and memory; (ii.) how and to what extent communo-cognition challenges and enriches the individualistic and subjective understanding of cognition in the dominant literature and (iii.) the major challenges that a communo-cognitive approach may face such as deeply entrenching ignorance and obstructing individual autonomy. My interests here are in line, and interweave, with concerns in the philosophy of cognition, social and decolonial epistemology and the epistemology of ignorance. I conclude by highlighting how commune-cognition is a universal cognitive episteme that should be given proper scholarly attention in the field of cognitive sciences and interdisciplinary studies.