Soviet Historiography of African History in the Context of World African Studies

Abstract

Recently Soviet studies of African history, as well as Soviet journalistic writing on Africa draw a significant attention of non–Russian historians. The image of Africa which was created by Soviet Africanists seems an obvious and easy subject to those who use post-colonial methodology. Soviet historiography of African history is usually characterised out of historical and comparative context, which prevents an analysis of its multi–layered and complex nature, as well as its historical transformation, its real achievements and its no less real limitations. The article investigates the major tendencies and trends in Soviet historiography of African history in the context of major developments in world African studies. It analyses their trajectories and assesses them from the point of view of their contribution to the academic understanding of African history. It also defines the main stages of the development of Soviet historiography of African history from the late 1920s until the late 1980s and gives a short overview of its main schools, each with its different topics, approaches and sources. The importance of this study derives from the fact that until now no comparative–problematic analysis of the Soviet historiography of African history has been done. A particular stress was made on its historical context, which helps to prevent a distortion of its image.

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