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Professor Semeneh Ayalew Asfaw, awardee of the Fatema Mernissi Postdoctoral Fellowship in Social and Cultural Studies for the academic year 2022-2023 conducted a seminar titled, “The figure of the vanguard in the Ethiopian Revolution: A historiographical critique” on November 8, 2022.
“The secondary literature on the Ethiopian revolution portrays university students as “generators” of the Ethiopian revolution. The literature covers the history of the 1974 Ethiopian revolution by proxy through the reconstruction of the history of the Ethiopian Student Movement,” said Professor Asfaw
“My research emphasizes that such a reading of the revolution, as primarily a product of (university) student activity has become an orthodoxy in thinking and writing about radical social change and revolution in Ethiopia. Hence, I seek to expose the assumptions that lie behind looking for the vanguard figure to explain militancy and revolution.”
Professor Asfaw holds a Ph.D. in Political Studies from the University of Cape Town. His dissertation, “The Young and the Urban in Addis Ababa: Towards a popular history of the 1974 Ethiopian Revolution, c. the 1950s-1974” explores the nexuses between sociocultural processes, subject formation, and the Ethiopian revolution.
The session was moderated by Professor Elizabeth Giorgis, Associate Professor of Art History, Theory & Criticism who further probed the discussion to explore the impact of depicting the university educated as forgers and “purveyors” of social change and radical politics also has the effect of downplaying the place that the radicalization and formation of other social groups and classes who participated in the popular protest movement of 1974.
“By assigning university students as the chief agents of revolution and influencers of social action the historiography explains militancy as a preserve of the educated, while it consigns other social groups either as followers or their actions as subordinate to the truly revolutionary actions of vanguard groups. In my research, I argue, a critique of the history of Ethiopian Student Movement is much needed for a more nuanced understanding of the Ethiopian revolution that goes beyond this dominant vanguardist narrative,” said Professor Asfaw whose research and publications cover themes ranging from social and cultural history, political consciousness, revolutionary terminology, youth subject formation, city making, and urbanism in 20th-century Ethiopia.
He concludes by suggesting an alternative, “A systematic study of the actions demands and concerns of the majority participants of the social protests of 1974, along with the processes that led to the radicalization of the variously situated youth in the years before 1974, would provide a more comprehensive and nuanced history of the Ethiopian revolution.”
As a fellow at The Africa Institute, Professor Asfaw plans to further his research on the relationship between cultural processes and subject formation. By examining social and cultural formations of everyday youth in Addis Ababa between the 1950s and 1974, as well as by mobilizing “archives”, such as musical and literary documents, hitherto unexplored in the study of the history of political militancy, his work seeks to reframe accounts of the Ethiopian Revolution by going beyond the study of student activism.
Through these lectures and workshops, The Africa Institute reaffirms its mission as a center for the study and research of Africa and its diaspora, and its commitment to the training of a new generation of critical thinkers in African and African Diaspora studies.
Professor Semeneh Ayalew Asfaw, awardee of the Fatema Mernissi Postdoctoral Fellowship in Social and Cultural Studies for the academic year 2022-2023 conducted a seminar titled, “The figure of the vanguard in the Ethiopian Revolution: A historiographical critique” on November 8, 2022.
Professor Semeneh Ayalew Asfaw, awardee of the Fatema Mernissi Postdoctoral Fellowship in Social and Cultural Studies for the academic year 2022-2023 conducted a seminar titled, “The figure of the vanguard in the Ethiopian Revolution: A historiographical critique” on November 8, 2022.
“The secondary literature on the Ethiopian revolution portrays university students as “generators” of the Ethiopian revolution. The literature covers the history of the 1974 Ethiopian revolution by proxy through the reconstruction of the history of the Ethiopian Student Movement,” said Professor Asfaw
“My research emphasizes that such a reading of the revolution, as primarily a product of (university) student activity has become an orthodoxy in thinking and writing about radical social change and revolution in Ethiopia. Hence, I seek to expose the assumptions that lie behind looking for the vanguard figure to explain militancy and revolution.”
Professor Asfaw holds a Ph.D. in Political Studies from the University of Cape Town. His dissertation, “The Young and the Urban in Addis Ababa: Towards a popular history of the 1974 Ethiopian Revolution, c. the 1950s-1974” explores the nexuses between sociocultural processes, subject formation, and the Ethiopian revolution.
The session was moderated by Professor Elizabeth Giorgis, Associate Professor of Art History, Theory & Criticism who further probed the discussion to explore the impact of depicting the university educated as forgers and “purveyors” of social change and radical politics also has the effect of downplaying the place that the radicalization and formation of other social groups and classes who participated in the popular protest movement of 1974.
“By assigning university students as the chief agents of revolution and influencers of social action the historiography explains militancy as a preserve of the educated, while it consigns other social groups either as followers or their actions as subordinate to the truly revolutionary actions of vanguard groups. In my research, I argue, a critique of the history of Ethiopian Student Movement is much needed for a more nuanced understanding of the Ethiopian revolution that goes beyond this dominant vanguardist narrative,” said Professor Asfaw whose research and publications cover themes ranging from social and cultural history, political consciousness, revolutionary terminology, youth subject formation, city making, and urbanism in 20th-century Ethiopia.
He concludes by suggesting an alternative, “A systematic study of the actions demands and concerns of the majority participants of the social protests of 1974, along with the processes that led to the radicalization of the variously situated youth in the years before 1974, would provide a more comprehensive and nuanced history of the Ethiopian revolution.”
As a fellow at The Africa Institute, Professor Asfaw plans to further his research on the relationship between cultural processes and subject formation. By examining social and cultural formations of everyday youth in Addis Ababa between the 1950s and 1974, as well as by mobilizing “archives”, such as musical and literary documents, hitherto unexplored in the study of the history of political militancy, his work seeks to reframe accounts of the Ethiopian Revolution by going beyond the study of student activism.
Through these lectures and workshops, The Africa Institute reaffirms its mission as a center for the study and research of Africa and its diaspora, and its commitment to the training of a new generation of critical thinkers in African and African Diaspora studies.
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