ABSTRACT
Archives are by nature the products of Western or Eurocentric epistemologies that do not cater to African epistemologies. Africa’s rich cultural and intellectual traditions were systematically denied during colonialism, which explains their absence from archives. As a result, the African people’s ways of knowing are automatically neglected in the Eurocentric archival setup left by the colonialists. In terms of archiving, this chapter examines how colonial governments viewed Africans and their traditions. In this chapter, decolonisation is linked to Afrocentrism, with researchers attempting to restore hidden and veiled African memories as archives. Furthermore, the chapter explores post-colonial governments, how they perceived African traditions, what differences there were, if any, and how they decolonised archives. It is recommended that although archives can be decolonised, archivists should also focus on (re)Africanisation of archives.
