Learning from and Teaching Africans

This book brings together stories from the author’s exciting life as a professor, consultant and researcher, mostly in Africa, but also in Japan, New Zealand, Norway and the US. The book is aimed at college students in cross-cultural communication and international education and with a special interest in African countries, their languages, their way of looking at life. It dismantles the myth of the thousands of African languages, and shows that many of them have millions of speakers and all of them are cross-border languages. Africans are not “anglophone”, “francophone” or “lusophone”; they are afrophone. The book also discusses projects that aim at cooperation between universities in the North and the South. Why did two of the projects the author has been involved in succeed so well and a third one fail?

About the Author :
Birgit Brock-Utne is a Professor in Education and Development at the University of Oslo, as well as a Visiting Professor and consultant around the globe. She has served as a Professor at the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania and as the President of the British Association of Comparative and International Education. She was also the Norwegian coordinator of the Language of Instruction in Tanzania and South Africa project, which ran from 2001 until 2013, and one of the Norwegian coordinators of the TRANSLED project, which ran from 2015 until 2021.

Review :
"The book Learning from Teaching Africans is an interesting and very personal book by the Norwegian professor of International Education Birgit Brock-Utne's professional work, particularly in Africa over a time span of more than 45 years. It is a recommended read for students who are interested in Africa, their languages and the African way of life. Professor Brock-Utne has a formidable scholarly career and particularly her work on African languages is remarkable. The biographical account of her research, teaching, supervision of PhD and master students in Africa is a fascinating journey through the African academic landscape."Anders Breidlid,Oslo Metropolitan University"Learning from and Teaching Africans is Birgit Brock-Utne’s deeply personal chronicle of her more than four-decades-long love affair with Africa and its people, languages, and cultures. The book, which is richly illustrated with photographs and detailed descriptions of everyday encounters, both personal and professional, reveals Professor Brock-Utne as an exemplary scholar/educator/activist who respectfully and successfully works with host country nationals at all levels of society. Learning from and Teaching Africans is an extraordinary book about a singular individual that both delights and enlightens readers with its admirable insights and lessons learned."Robert F. ArnoveChancellor's Professor Emeritus of Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at Indiana University, USA