Abstract

The purpose of this study is to demonstrate that the African philosophical concept of time is phenomenological . This approach is different from some scholars' which led to the denial of Africans any capability of reflecting on their experiences. This denial is mainly due to a comparative study of different cultural thought systems which must meet the definition of Western philosophy . It is this blatant prejudice that my project disputed by presenting and describing authentic African system of thought from an experiential perspective. It is on this experiential foundation that I investigated the African concept of time subject to many criticisms, especially, the future. Some scholars claim that Africans do not have the concept of the future because for them Africans have no other time-consciousness apart from regulating time by events and cyclically. Thus, since the events in the future are not yet perceivable, the future does not exist. But as the thesis demonstrates, Africans have the concept of the past, present and future experientially, and that it is prevalent throughout their existence, metaphysically and epistemologically. ;The thesis is presented in the following order: First, a general introduction which presents the problems of the thesis: African philosophical concept of time. Second, the description of African philosophy as experiential analyzed in African traditional aesthetics , myths, proverbs, folktales, and dilemma tales. Third, a phenomenological description of the African concept of time in African consciousness, naturally, socially, historically and religiously; and a discussion of the helicoidal notion of time which ties cyclical and linear aspects of time together simultaneously. Fourth, a description of the metaphysical and epistemological ramifications of time investigated in African existence from before birth to beyond death in terms of the experience of biological and generational changes. Metaphysically, aspects of time-consciousness in African philosophy are destiny, predestination, reincarnation and immortality; epistemologically, these aspect are known by divination. Fifth, a conclusion which suggests that this concept requires further research as African contribution to a global enterprise of philosophy