Q0645

“Philosophy, by definition, is an individual critical activity; the myth of a…” — Paulin Hountondji (African Philosophy: Myth and Reality)

Verified English quotation. Primary source: African Philosophy: Myth and Reality. Theme: critique.

English

Philosophy, by definition, is an individual critical activity; the myth of a collective, unanimous African philosophy must be discarded.
Thinker Paulin Hountondji
School Africana Philosophy
Source African Philosophy: Myth and Reality
Theme Critique
Another quotation More from this thinker

Source and attribution

The archive attributes this English wording to African Philosophy: Myth and Reality and files it under Africana Philosophy. That locator distinguishes the passage from loose internet attributions: readers can return to the named work or section to check translation, surrounding argument, and edition-specific wording.

About Paulin Hountondji

Paulin J. Hountondji (1942–2024) was a Beninese philosopher educated in Paris (including under Althusser) and long associated with the National University of Benin.

How to read this passage

Across 4 recurring voices here (notably Paulin Hountondji and Aimé Césaire), critique is framed through Africana Philosophy and Critical Rationalism. Some passages define critique; others warn how it fails; still others relocate it inside habit, community, or language. This passage enters that discussion through critique, self.

Concepts in this quote

Critique
Critique appears in this archive as a live philosophical concern—not a slogan. These verified English passages show how thinkers treat critique as a problem of judgment, practice, or explanation.
Self
Philosophy quotes about self explore identity, responsibility, and the examined life—from Socrates’ unexamined life to modern phenomenology and existential authenticity.

How to cite this quotation

APA: Paulin Hountondji. (n.d.). Philosophy, by definition, is an individual critical activity; the myth of a collective, unanimous African philosophy must be discarded. In Philosophy Blind Box. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0645

MLA: Paulin Hountondji. “Philosophy, by definition, is an individual critical activity;….” Philosophy Blind Box, https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0645.

Chicago: Paulin Hountondji. “Philosophy, by definition, is an individual critical activity;….” Philosophy Blind Box. Accessed 2026. https://www.philosophydef.com/quotes/q0645.

Frequently asked questions

What is the source of the quotation “Philosophy, by definition, is an individual critical activity;…”?

The passage is attributed to Paulin Hountondji, African Philosophy: Myth and Reality. The archive attributes this English wording to African Philosophy: Myth and Reality and files it under Africana Philosophy. That locator distinguishes the passage from loose internet attributions: readers can return to the named work or section to check translation, surrounding argument, and edition-specific wording.

What does Paulin Hountondji mean by critique?

Across 4 recurring voices here (notably Paulin Hountondji and Aimé Césaire), critique is framed through Africana Philosophy and Critical Rationalism. Some passages define critique; others warn how it fails; still others relocate it inside habit, community, or language. This passage enters that discussion through critique, self.

Explore Paulin Hountondji on critique

Same thinker

More from Paulin Hountondji

  1. By 'African philosophy' I mean a set of texts, specifically, the set of texts written by Africans and described as philosophical by their authors themselves.
  2. So for us African philosophy is a body of literature whose existence is undeniable, a bibliography which has grown constantly.
  3. In fact, it is an ethnological work with philosophical pretensions, or more simply, if I may coin the word, a work of 'ethnophilosophy'.
  4. I observe that it does exist, by the same right and in the same mode as all the philosophies of the world: in the form of a literature.
  5. Contemporary African philosophy, inasmuch as it remains an ethnophilosophy, has been built up essentially for a European public. The African ethnophilosopher's discourse is not intended for Africans.

All quotations by Paulin Hountondji

Same theme

More on critique

  1. It is through wonder that people both now begin and first began to philosophize.
  2. A person's character is their destiny.
  3. What is opposed brings together; from what differs comes the finest harmony.
  4. Death is nothing to us: for what has been dissolved has no sensation, and what has no sensation is nothing to us.
  5. Pleasure is the beginning and end of the happy life — not the pleasures of profligates, but freedom from pain in the body and from disturbance in the soul.

Browse the critique theme