I recently had the chance to go with Professor Ghirmai Negash to the University of Pittsburgh. He was giving a public lecture at the Center for African Studies there, and it was called, “Nervous Conditions of the Educated Class: A.J. Ahmed and African Intellectuals.” I thought the lecture was really thought-provoking, and honestly, one part of it has just stuck with me quite a bit.
Professor Ghirmai Negash made this observation, and he said, “The comprador intellectual is educated enough to understand oppression and articulate enough to condemn it but too invested in its rewards to act against it. This is the nervous condition of the African educated elite, knowing what liberation demands yet protecting the comfort that inaction affords.” It’s a powerful statement.
That particular framing immediately made a lot of sense when I thought about the political and intellectual realities back home in Kenya. Also, you can see these patterns across quite a bit of the continent; it is not just Kenya. It brings up this uncomfortable, but absolutely necessary, question. About what is the real worth of education and intellectual consciousness if people who have them, even if they can pinpoint injustice and critique it very precisely, are still not willing to challenge the systems that they themselves benefit from?.
For me, this lecture really brought a difficult lesson into focus. Education, all on its own, does not necessarily bring about liberation. If you want to think about a defining challenge for the African intellectual class today, it might not be about not knowing enough. It probably has more to do with having the courage to actually act on what they already understand.
Overall, it was a very enriching intellectual experience, and I am pretty sure this conversation will stay with me for a long time. My thanks go to Professor Assan Sarr and the Center for their hospitality.
