Socrates In Cameroon

Bernard Nsokika Fonlon, 1924-1986, rose from humble origins to become one of Cameroons most famous sons. He was a scholar, a poet, a politician, a philosopher, a man of action and a man of courage. He was never too busy to see someone who was troubled, never too tired to take up the case of the oppressed or the downtrodden. He was a man who could communicate, with style, in half a dozen world languages but who could also use Pidgin English if it meant putting his listeners at ease. He was a man who moved in opulent circles but who collected for himself not money but the hearts of those who got to know him. It is easy to use superlatives of someone like Bernard Fonlon, easy to make him sound like a sage or a saint; it is less easy to describe the humour and the courtesy and the gentleness that irradiated all that he said and did. This book describes briefly the life and times of a man whose story incorporates the history of a young nation and whose autobiography, The Pathfinder, has all the excitement of an adventure novel. We could use a lot of words and still not get to the heart of the matter because ordinary words are for ordinary men and Bernard Fonlon was unique. To those who knew him, no introduction is necessary; to those who did not know him, no short introduction is enough. Bernard Fonlon did not leave a worldly legacy to his family and friends and country. He left much more. He left ideas that can never be buried and ideals that will challenge new generations.

Cameroon is a land of much promise, but a land of unfulfilled promises. It has the potential to be an economically developed and democratic society but the struggle to live up to its potential has not gone well. Since independence there have been only two presidents of Cameroon; the current one has been in office since 1982. Endowed with a variety of climates and agricultural environments, numerous minerals and substantial forests, and a dynamic population, this is a country that should be a leader of Africa. Instead, we find a country almost paralyzed by corruption and poor management, a country with a low life expectancy and serious health problems, and a country from which the most talented and highly educated members of the population are emigrating in large numbers. To all of this is recently added a serious terrorism problem, Boko Haram, in the north, a separatist movement in the Anglophone west, refugee influxes in the north and east, and bandits from the Central African Republic attacking eastern villages. This fifth edition of Historical Dictionary of the Republic of Cameroon contains a chronology, an introduction, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 300 cross-referenced entries on important personalities, politics, economy, foreign relations, religion, and culture. This book is an excellent resource for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about the Republic of Cameroon.

This is a foundational text on the production and dissemination of Anglophone Cameroon literature. The Republic of Cameroon is a bilingual country with English and French as the official languages. Ashuntantang shows that the pattern of production and dissemination of Anglophone Cameroon literature is not only framed by the minority status of English and English-speaking Cameroonians within the Republic of Cameroon, but is also a reflection of a postcolonial reality in Africa where mostly African literary texts published by western multi-national corporations are assured wide international accessibility and readership. This book establishes that in spite of these setbacks, Anglophone Cameroon writers have produced a corpus of work that has enriched the genres of prose, poetry and drama, and that these texts deserve a wider readership.

Each of the essays in this book is marked by a certain simplicity and clarity, a seriousness tinged with humour, masking a profundity that are unmistakably characteristic of Godfrey B. Tangwa alias Rodcod Gobata, one of the leading critical minds amongst Cameroonians. The essays are centred on the theme of democracy and meritocracy which the author believes to be the pre-conditions for genuine development in Africa. The immediate focus of these essays is Cameroon, a country remarkable for experimenting with French/English bilingualism and for having a political dictatorship which claims, wrongly or rightly, to have transformed itself into a democracy; but they are equally relevant to other countries in Africa and beyond. Each of the essays stands alone but they are all telling various aspects of the same story from various angles at various times using different modes of expression. Anyone who seeks a glimpse of understanding of the trouble with Africa and particularly with Cameroon, 10 years into the 21st century, would read this book with great profit.

This issue of Socrates has been divided into five sections. The first section is Language & Literature- English. The paper authored by Mehnaz Khan and Hasnain Mashood Ali applies Goffman’s model as a comprehensive approach to analyze the data to understand the role of health in identity formation. The findings examined within the context of ideological and cultural background and interpreted in the light of Althusser’s (1971) ideological framework. The paper concludes by stating that identity is the product of social relationships implicitly formed in the ideological background and is a source of motivation and expectations to transform one into social being capable of expressive control. The paper authored by Amaladhas Dr J. analyses the consciousness that grew out of the unrelieved suffering and psychological traumas of a group of people who were subjected to overt and covert racism in the USA for about four centuries. The second section of this issue is Psychology. The Paper authored by Ioanna C. Bitchava, Paleologou Angie-M. P, Chrousos George P., Artemiadis Artemios K. and Darviri Christina is an innovative quasi-experimental study, whose core aim was not only to investigate the role of Stress and Stress-Management on the Physical, Mental, and Cognitive Health of first-year University Students during the transition period into the tertiary education system (especially in the contemporary Greek Society), but also to apply an innovative Stress Management Technique [based on the Ancient Greek Philosophy - with contemporary successful effects], Pythagorean Self-Awareness –comparatively to the worldwide "classic" Stress-Management Techniques – for the first time worldwide into this target-group, as well. This paper is an issue of great importance. The third section of this issue is Sociology. The paper authored by Neha Singh and Dr Neeraj Mishra explores the nuances that industrialization is mired with, in relation to the rivers, associated large infrastructure and rivers attributed sacredness. The paper uses the case of river Kshipra flowing in the city of Ujjain to explain the shifting attribution of ‘sacred’ from natural things like rivers to materialistic things like money. The paper discusses the change in the significance of river during a world famous festival of Hindus for holy dip Simhastha. The paper explains the shift in focus of Simhastha from holy dip to crowd control, space allocation, crass commercialisation and unchecked competition. It explains using the theory of sacred and profane of Durkheim and Eliade, how in the modern time's secularisation of religion and sacralization of secular has created the sacred/profane distinction which is making the rivers only the source for consumption forgetting their actual significance. The fourth section of this issue is Politics, Law and Governance. The paper authored by Dr Adesanya Olusegun Paul and Olominu Tomi explores some of the responsible variables are a mind-body problem, alternative thinking, and poverty to mention a few. These variables are the identified drivers of dimensions of insecurity and/or crises that are witnessed in both countries. Given this, the study demonstrates the role of the fugitive youths in the abating terror attacks at the frontiers and within some regions of Nigeria and Cameroun. Also, the study argues that priority should be accorded to the factors inducing fugitive youths to embrace anti-social/anti-societal behaviours, especially terrorism within the Nigeria and Cameroun. The fifth section of this issue is Digital government/E-government/Electronic government/Online government. The paper authored by Alsaeed Abraheem and Dr Carl Adams undertakes a comparison of eGov strategies among countries at different levels of instability. It highlights the different approaches for implementing activities, and thus directs policy makers in highly unstable societies to important aspects and to embrace gaps during the implementation process. Consequently, the lessons learned by adopting best practice from different contexts enhances the process of activities’ development in an unstable environment. This paper aims to emphasise on the factors that influenced strategic planning in societies with different levels of stability to adopt eService successfully. This comparison study explores the eService strategies among three cases namely: eGov Strategy in Syria, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. The result reveals the approaches that each government had adopted in order to reach their eGov potential. Authors have applied the Reinventing Government approach by Osborne and Gaebler (1992) as a theoretical framework. By using their ten principles of transforming governments this provides understanding about the context and issues of providing eGov services within the three case studies and to what degree each case strategy has an influence on the activities implemented. The paper authored by Dr Tetiana Fesenko and Dr Galyna Fesenko aims to outline the role of ICT in urban management. The digital segment is presented as significant for making cities sustainable, and for expanding access to basic services for large numbers of people. The matrix of ICT-tools in relation to sustainable cities development targets is developed. The comparative review of Digital City, Intelligent City, and Smart City is provided. The municipal e-government data of international ratings are analyzed with the special focus on aspects of online services management. The existing digital gaps between cities are pointed out in terms of e-governance maturity. It is proposed the maturity model of the municipal digital office, which it consists eight levels of the functional responsibility for urban online services development.

The book examines the creative industries of Cameroon and Africa and makes bold the cultural triumphant assertion that Africa is home to some of the most diverse cultural patrimony and the most versatile creative professionals. It also discusses indigenous development models and questions the rationale for Eurocentric democratic paradigms which have partly contributed to the demise of a concrete democratic development entitlement in most African countries. Ngwane weaves both the cultural and political strands into a search for a homegrown development web which he calls 'glocalisation'. Ngwane's essays, most of which have animated debate and discourse in national newspapers, online blogs and International journals are lucid in their arguments, poignant in their ideological focus, rich in their non-fiction craftsmanship and urgent in their message delivery. The essays will make good reading for students of Africa studies, Development studies, Politics and Culture.

This is a significant and timely book on the politics of belonging. It captures, with fascinating detail and insight, the current widespread disaffection with the sterile rhetoric of nation-building that has characterised much of postcolonial African politics. Until the liberation struggles of the 1990s, dictatorship only paid lip service to democracy with impunity, often by silencing those perceived to threaten national unity. Since then, individuals and groups have reactivated claims to rights and entitlements and nowhere more so than in Cameroon. The book articulates the experiences and predicaments of the country's Anglophone community trapped in a marriage of inconvenience pregnant with tensions and conflicts.

The African Union (AU) declared 2024 the year of Education, with the motto: “Educate an African fit for the 21 st Century: Building resilient education systems for increased access to inclusive, lifelong, quality, and relevant learning in Africa.” In response, this book delves into issues plaguing African education, and proposes some solutions. The book attempts to attune African education towards the integration of African cultural values with contemporary societal demands. It draws inspiration from the writings and teachings of the late Professor Bernard Nsokika Fonlon, a foremost Cameroonian philosopher, literary luminary and public intellectual to explore the foundational features of African philosophy of education, outlining the four-fold dimensions of education from a Fonlonian perspective. Topics covered include the physical, aesthetic, intellectual and moral dimensions, as well as judicious conservative-progressivism in African education. Through an eclectic approach, the book constructively brings into conversation African conceptions of education with other philosophical foundations of education to make a case for genuine education as a revolutionary tool for a better and dynamic African community. “In this book Kijika Billa argues that Afropessimism can be defeated. It takes courage, first expressed by Fonlon in what I have learned from reading this book to be his visionary works, and now laid out by Billa himself herein, that there is only one way any society lifts itself up from grim levels of societal decay, and that is through carefully defined educational system with clear goals which become the goals of the overall national aspiration and objective around which everything else coalesces.” D. A. Masolo (PhD), Professor of Philosophy, distinguished University Scholar at the University of Louisville “This book accentuates significant themes of integrating philosophy of education with African education systems from a Fonlonian perspective. Bernard Nsokika Fonlon’s advocacy for a holistic, morally integrous, and culturally rich education is presented as a visionary framework for transcending current educational limitations, aiming to cultivate wise, ethical, and engaged citizens. Kijika Billa offers a brilliant integrated approach which calls for a reimagined, resilient education system that deeply reflects African values and aspirations, preparing individuals for meaningful contributions to the continent’s development.” Yusef Waghid (DEd, PhD, DPhil), Emeritus Professor of Philosophy of Education, Stellenbosch University “This book constitutes a springboard in the direction of proper African cultural context of education or Africanization of educational values.” Remi Prospero Fonka (PhD), Senior Lecturer, Catholic University of Cameroon, Bamenda “It is gratifying to see Kijika Billa, a young and emerging scholar, take up Fonlon’s challenge on the need for genuine intellectuals steeped in African cultural philosophies of education as dynamic products of a world in perpetual motion. Fonlon could have wished for no better in intergenerational intellectual conversations.” Francis B. Nyamnjoh, Professor of Social Anthropology, University of Cape Town