V. Y. MUDIMBE is the R. F. DeVernay Professor of Romance Studies and Professor of Comparative Literature and Anthropology at Duke University. His books include The Invention of Africa: Gnosis, Philosophy and the Order of Knowledge, Fables and Parables, and The Surreptitious Speech.

..". this is a remarkable book. It will occupy a significant place in the critical literature of African Studies." --International Journal of African Historical Studies "To read Mudimbe is to walk through a museum of many exhibits in the company of an erudite companion who explains, with much learned commentary, what you are seeing." --American Anthropologist "Mudimbe's sympathetic yet rigorous accounts of such diverse Africanist discourses as Herskovits's cultural relativism and contemporary Afrocentricity bring to the surface the underlying goals and contexts in which these were produced." --Ivan Karp A sequel to his highly acclaimed The Invention of Africa, this is V. Y. Mudimbe's exploration of how the "idea" of Africa was constructed by the Western world.