Speaker
Description
Africa holds some of humanity’s earliest astronomical knowledge systems - from Nabta Playa and ancient star calendars to the scientific manuscripts of Timbuktu. Today, the continent is once again central to global astronomy through facilities such as MeerKAT, SALT and the emerging SKA, producing high-value data and enabling world-leading theoretical and observational research. Yet a defining question persists: where does this knowledge ultimately reside, and who is empowered by it?
This presentation follows the arc from Africa’s historic sky sciences to its contemporary astrophysics output, interrogating publication patterns, authorship dynamics, and data-governance structures that determine how African-created knowledge is stored, validated and circulated. Using bibliometric evidence and governance analyses of large-scale projects, we examine how global indexing systems, impact metrics and funding architectures confer authority on external platforms while constraining the growth of African-led journals, repositories and curricula.
The aim is not to question Africa’s participation in global science, but to expose the asymmetries that shape epistemic power - why African research often migrates outward for validation and long-term benefit. This requires engaging with decolonial analysis in a practical, non-ideological sense: examining how authority is constructed through publishing systems, data governance, and funding architectures. We then outline pathways toward knowledge sovereignty: continental repositories, open-access strategies, curriculum reform, and policy alignment that strengthens Africa’s ownership of its astronomical output.
Decolonisation in this context is not a metaphor; it means rethinking where knowledge lives, who decides its legitimacy, and how Africa can consolidate intellectual authority within its own scientific ecosystem.
| Stream | Education, Development and Outreach |
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