Africanist, n. (and a.)
(ˈæfrɪkənɪst)
[f. African + -ist.]
An expert or specialist in African affairs, culture, etc.
| 1895 19th Cent. XXXVIII. 455 (heading) Africanists in Council. 1926 E. W. Smith Chr. Mission in Afr. vii. 56 A representative gathering attended by the leading Africanists of many nationalities. 1932 W. L. Graff Language xi. 433 Some Africanists make of the latter a distinct West African group. |
b. An adherent of Africanism (sense b); an African nationalist.
| 1958 Cape Times 22 Dec. 12/7 What is the origin of the Africanists, the extreme Black nationalist group which recently broke away from the African National Congress? 1960 Times 12 Feb. 13/5 The Africanist would..like to know to what extent rule of Europeans in the West Indies ever resulted in the creation of economic privilege of the kind built up by European minorities in Africa. 1963 Fenner Brockway African Socialism iii. 47 Touré is..the classical Africanist, unwilling to be the tool of any external Power or bloc of Powers, rejecting alike Western capitalism, European social democracy and Soviet communism. |
Hence as adj. Also Africaˈnistic a.
| 1958 Spectator 13 June 760/2 The African National Congress and other Africanist forces. 1959 Cape Times 28 Apr. 10/8 A Pan-Africanism, which is in a narrow and violent sense Africanistic. 1960 Daily Tel. 22 Aug. 8/2 Maybe Mr. Krushchev will find himself in the awkward position of being more ‘Africanist’ and more racialist than some of the independent African leaders themselves. |