10th U6+ Consortium of African Universities International Conference

Despite achieving political sovereignty, African Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) continue to operate within Eurocentric pedagogical and structural frameworks, leaving full Uhuru (independence) unreleased. This presentation explores the urgent need for decolonial thinking within the academy, positing that current degree structures, research methodologies, and institutional hierarchies remain deeply tethered to colonial legacies. To break these bonds, we argue for a paradigm shift that centres African Indigenous Knowledge Systems (AIKS) and the core philosophies of Harambee (collective effort), Umoja (unity), and Ubuntu/Umunthu (humanity through others) as foundational academic pillars. The vast diversity of the African continent – with its myriad languages, norms, and values – stems as the academy's greatest pedagogical strength. However, this cultural wealth faces a modern existential threat: the rise of Artificial Intelligence. Within higher education, uncritical AI adoption risks acting as a digital colonizer that could obliterate African languages and indigenous ways of knowing, further entrenching Western hegemony in global research outputs. To counter this digital erasure, we must Africanise educational technology, ensuring digital evolution in lectures and laboratories is dictated by African culture, not replacing it. Drawing on Argyris and Schön’s Theory of Action, this session urges African universities to close the gap between their espoused theories and their actual theories-in-use. By actively leveraging pre-colonial tacit knowledge, institutions can design truly culturally relevant curricula. Ultimately, decolonizing requires humanizing higher education through an ethics of care – dismantling colonial shadows to foster graduates who are both technologically advanced and deeply culturally grounded.