Remembering Rodney

Jun 14, 2010 Editorial

It is hard to believe that for all intent and purposes Walter Rodney has been forgotten by this generation of Guyanese. If for nothing else, there is his scholarship. Here is a man whose fourth-form history paper was published; won an open scholarship to UWI where he also won the Faculty of Arts prize, and a scholarship to the University of London(SOAS) to earn his PhD (in African History) at the age of twenty-four. And that was just the beginning.

Apart from publishing his PhD thesis (“A History of the Upper Guinea Coast”) he went on to write the immensely popular (and readable) groundbreaking work, “How Europe Underdeveloped Africa”. This work made Rodney a name that is still instantly recognisable wherever and whenever the history of Africa is studied. While many before him had explored the conquest and degradation of Africa by the Europeans, Rodney was the first to focus on the economic structures imposed by Europe that changed “underdevelopment” from a noun into a verb.

These structures are still, by and large, largely intact – not only in Africa but in many parts of the colonised Third World, such as Guyana. The EPA imposed last year by Europe on CARICOM to replace the Cotonou Agreement is simply a newer arrangement designed to perpetuate our structural underdevelopment. If Rodney’s book had been circulated more widely in our educational institutions, there would have been greater understanding of President Jagdeo’s fervent opposition to the EPA. Guyanese university academics should note that Rodney produced this work while he was teaching full time in Tanzania – under very difficult conditions.

Rodney’s other noted publication, History of the Guyanese Working People -1890-1905, was produced under even more onerous conditions – to say the least. After his appointment to teach history at UG in 1974 was rescinded by the PNC regime, Rodney plunged into anti-dictatorial politics with the WPA. We do not have to rehearse the intensification of that struggle that saw him arrested, jailed, beaten, threatened, restricted from travelling – apart from being denied employment. In the midst of all of that, he was able to conduct the research that resulted in the work that was published posthumously by Johns Hopkins Press. He also retrieved, footnoted and published a survey of late 19th century sugar plantations in British Guiana and a booklet for children, Kofi Badu out of Africa.

One would have thought that with a government that has focused so single-mindedly on resuscitating our educational standards since their accession to office in 1992, they would have jumped at the opportunity to trumpet the accomplishments of an individual who is arguably one of our very best and brightest. Just the bare bones of his scholastic achievements circulating in our schools should be enough to add a fillip to our pursuit of better results in the halls of academia. Five years ago, on the 25th anniversary of his assassination, a chair of history was established in his name in addition to naming the new building housing our archives in his honour. But these tributes are too removed from the hustle and bustle of everyday life in which Rodney situated his academics as well as his politics.

But those that claim to be working in his tradition – some even calling themselves “Rodneyites” – have also faltered in honouring his memory. There have been their now obligatory speeches and symposia – this year there will also be a monument unveiled at the spot where he was assassinated – after which most will wipe the dust off their feet of Guyana (literally and figuratively) as they retreat into their academic cocoons. We will be inundated with missives on analyses of “dictatorships”. Where is the Rodneyite praxis? Rodney was the epitome of the grounded organic intellectual who did not only reject the ivory tower of the sequestered academia but strove always to live, learn and teach among ordinary folks.

Finally we do believe that Queens College, his Guyanese alma mater, which more than any institution helped to nurture and shape his quest for excellence under the motto, Fideles Ubi Que Utiles (Faithfulness and usefulness always) should have honoured his memory.

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