Paper short abstract:

Introduced in the mid-twentieth century, the term 'African Traditional Religion' was originally tied to a forward-thinking vision of African spirituality. The paper focuses on the vision(s) of the future that the concept promised and the alternative futures that were disregarded as a result.

Paper long abstract:

The paper explores visionary aspirations behind the technical term ‘African Traditional Religion’. Introduced by Geoffrey Parrinder in the mid-twentieth century and developed by John Mbiti and Bolaji Idowu, the concept was originally tied to a particular, forward-thinking vision of African spirituality. The intention was to challenge a long history of demeaning representation of African religiosities and replace markers like ‘paganism’ and ‘heathenism’ with a positive, collective representation of African spirituality structured along the Judeo-Christian template that revolves around belief rather than practice. Mindful of the controversial reverberations of the concept, the paper focuses on the vision(s) of the future that the term ‘African Traditional Religion’ promised in Anglophone Africa, and the alternative futures that were disregarded or pushed out of the intellectual and scholarly discourse as a result. Particular attention is paid to the preconceptions rooted in the construction of ‘African Traditional Religion,’ as well as foreign additions that have been represented as inherent constituents of timeless ‘traditional religion’ and how these have shaped the way African religions are being taught, understood, and explained by religious actors today.