The Comparative Method does not need Decolonization
Koen Bostoen (Ghent University)
Wednesday 15/07/2026, 12:45-13:45 – Auditorium 1.08
Against current popular opinion on knowledge production in the social and human sciences, this lecture argues that the Comparative Method in historical linguistics does not require decolonization, also not when applied to languages spoken in regions of the world once subjected to European imperialism. In Africa, the reconstruction of Proto-Bantu is one of greatest accomplishments of the Comparative Method. In line with its pre-colonial intellectual roots in German Romanticism, the Comparative Method has been of key importance for retrieving the deep history of languages and societies without long-standing written traditions world-wide. Moreover, the Comparative Method starts out from language divergence and language-internal change following the family tree model, but it also acknowledges the role of contact and multilingualism in language evolution. It has even been indispensable in detecting deep-time contact events in the absence of historical records. To rescue the Comparative Method from attempts to deconstruct it, this essay advocates for its careful and knowledgeable application as an emancipatory and decolonial tool essential for gaining a better understanding of Africa’s deep past and its contributions to human history. By rejecting the universality of the Comparative Method, decolonizers will ultimately deny history to those they intend to liberate.
Koen Bostoen is professor of African Linguistics and Swahili at Ghent University. His research focuses on the Bantu languages and interdisciplinary approaches to the African past. He obtained an ERC Starting Grant for the KongoKing project (2012–2016) and an ERC Consolidator Grant for the BantuFirst project (2018– 2023). His book publications include Des mots et des pots en bantou: une approche linguistique de l’histoire de la céramique en Afrique (2005, Peter Lang) as author, Swahili: A Comprehensive Grammar (2026, Routledge) as a co-author, and Studies in African Comparative Linguistics, with Special Focus on Bantu and Mande (2005, RMCA), The Kongo Kingdom: Origins, Dynamics and Cosmopoli-tan Culture of an African Polity (2018, Cambridge University Press), Une archéol-ogie des provinces septentrionales du royaume Kongo (2018, Archaeopress), The Bantu Languages, 2nd edition (2019, Taylor and Francis), On Reconstructing Proto-Bantu Grammar (2022, Language Science Press), and An Archaeology of the Bantu Expansion Early Settlers South of the Congo Rainforest (2025, Routledge) as co-editor.