Historiography, Representation and the History of Buganda Guweddeko Fred

SSR 7101
Major Debates in the Study of Africa
Title
Historiography, Representation and the History of Buganda
Guweddeko Fred
May 2012

Abstract
Scholars concerned with the challenges of method in studying the past and reflecting it in later periods are torn between intellectual veracity and the problem of multiple discourses on historicity and history. On this premise, this essay examines the problematics of the history of Buganda; the problems of historiography in its compilation and in the factors that have intermediated in the representation of this history before, during and after its construction. Through the controversies its presentation has generated, this essay reflects on the history of Buganda as a problem. It places into this perspective the conceptual debates, problems and questions of historiography and representation in theory and praxis. It is adducing that pre-developed historiography and pre-disposed representation have, through their assumptions and expectations, superimposed modeled and prescribed trajectories, albeit contestable, on the history of Buganda. This essay argues that Buganda history has been a captive of images of its past and visions of colony status within the ideology of 19th century British imperialism. That subsequently Buganda history became a theater of parallel and contesting historiography and representation positions by intellectual and political interests. It seeks to conclude that Buganda may have no history independent of the history of the challenges of historiography and representation in general and in its trajectory.

Essay Outline
1 Introduction
2 Problem of Buganda History
3 History and Buganda
4 Historiography of Buganda History
5 Representations in Buganda History
6. Conclusion

Introduction
The history of Buganda has since its documentation in 1901 been the subject of challenges, conflicts, rejections, court cases, and revisions in contests over its sources, compilation, construction and

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