A PhD research assistant in History
History
Bielefeld Graduate School in History and Sociology (BGHS)
A PhD research assistant
The Ethiopian constitution of 1994 both proclaims the integrity of Ethiopia as a supranational state, and enshrines the concept of national self-determination for its constituent communities. How can these two contradictory principles co-exist? Why have they been juxtaposed this way? The tensions between these ideas have shaped the “national question” which has transfixed contemporary Ethiopian life since the revolution in 1974. This project investigates this conundrum by examining the thought of the actors who shaped the protest against the old regime in the 1960s and 1970s, and contested the revolutionary regime which followed, that is members of the Ethiopian Student Movement studying in local, European and American universities during the 1960s and 1970s. Using as primary texts their abundant newsletters, pamphlets, newspapers, and hand-written poems (held largely at the Institute of Ethiopian Studies archives), this study is also theoretically informed by Koselleck’s Begriffsgeschichte and Gadamer’s Philosophical Hermeneutics. Adopting an adductive approach––a back and forth movement between the project’s theoretical underpinnings and fresh insights generated from its empirical context––students’ writing will be used to place their spatial and temporal definitions of Ethiopia in a fresh context. This means of thinking about contemporary Ethiopia in a new framework might throw light on the “national question.”
History Instructor at Bahir Dar University , Ethiopia
Amhara-Oromo Ethnic Interaction in Salale, Ethiopia from 1941-2000: Ethnic Dynamism, Ethnicity and Constructions of Identity in Salale Area, Ethiopia across three Regimes. Germany: VDM Verlag, 2009.
“The Concept of a Nation and Its Problematic Appeal to Universality: A Critique from an African [Oromo] Vantage Point,” Journal on African Philosophy (Forthcoming in 2017).
Proceeding of the 2nd Social Sciences National Conference, Bahir Dar, 2015.
Bielefeld Graduate School in History and Sociology