The presentation draws from an ongoing research project, ‘Historicising Humanities at Makerere University since 1922’, which seeks to rethink and reshape the role of humanities in Uganda.
The teaching of languages, including local and foreign languages in Uganda and at Makerere University in particular contends with the challenge of relying on western epistemic traditions in the quest for new knowledge, translating and disseminating this knowledge. Whereas there are efforts to decolonize the curriculum by teaching African languages (Kiswahili, Luganda, Luo, Runyakitara), the theoretical and methodological approaches tend to replicate the "Eurocentric epistemic canon[s]" (Mbembe, 2016), which prioritizes Anglo-American scholarship at the expense of other knowledge systems. Therefore, this paper reflects on the current positionality and intellectual locations of languages scholarship at Makerere University. It begins by exploring the praxis of language scholarship at the University since the 1920s. It examines the continuities and discontinuities of language studies by underscoring which linguistic knowledge systems have been privileged and dominant, the emergence of African languages on the university curriculum. It also highlights the neo-liberal market reforms in high education that affected the teaching of languages at Makerere. Finally, it explicates the challenges that scholars in the language disciplines encounter and reflects on the future trends of languages scholarship at the University.
