Hamjatta, I wrote that Ayittey is a critic, writer and scholar. You don't have to agree. I have read Ayittey intensely enough to vouch for his erudition, objectivity, insight and scholarship. Again, you are at liberty to disagree with me. You write: "as for Ayittey when I read his piece, that this is some scholarly work was laughable and a big joke. For Cherno Baba to load plaudits on Ayittey's erudition as a scholar tells you why Cherno is a dilettante in disquinshing(sic)between flowery prose and sholarly work." You are casting doubt on Ayittey's scholarship. You have every right to, but on what grounds? You did not provide any evidence why Ayittey's scholarship is piffling. But the solace is, you didn't find anything in his article worth your skepticism of being scholarly. Atleast, you didn't mention it in your article. Better still, you went the whole hog emphasizing Ayittey's point to Halifa: "Frankly,you assert,"had Halifa read Ayittey's central theme with detached emotions of someone with every right to be annoyed but nonetheless sanguine, he would have discovered that Ayittey's contention is thus: the Nyereres and Nkrumahs of Africa are certainly not saints. Heroes they are but saints they aint." Here, you are defending not refuting, Ayittey's arguments. Dawdling over who is a scholar, isn't, what is scholarshp, isn't, can fritter away our energies and make us take polarizing interpretations or definitions. We can argue about this for the entire next millenium. It is unnecessary. For example: You called Halifa a "scholar of great distinction and erudition." What makes your scholar or his arguments in this debate, scholarly, is open to question. While neither you nor Halifa has been able to refute anything in Ayittey's article, you tried to raze to the ground, your scholar's scientific methodology and enquiry. You are in doubt of your scholar: " If you had displayed this principle of scientific inquiry into your answer and defense of Nyerere and Nkrumah," you told Halifa, "you would set your sympathies and Pan African prejudices aside and employ the cold logic of scientific inquiry to dissect the lives and times of these two African leaders." Here, you defend, or if you please, emphasize, Ayittey's central theme in his article that you don't find scholarly, and in the same breath, you cast doubts on your scholar's scientific methodology and inquiry. Re-arrange your arguments; they are upside down. Like a cat on hot bricks, you jumped from your criticism of Halifa to the "pomp and sententious piffle" in my writings. And you add: "you seem to forget that you have yet to graduate and mistake your flowery prose and immature verbosity with(sic)intellectual precision." Well. It is surprising that this criticism has come belatedly. First, you didn't say what was "immature verbosity" about my writings. Second,when you commented on my critique of Halifa's rejoinder to Ayittey's and Shirima's article, my "flowery prose and immature verbosity" didn't strike you. You wrote: "Cherno, whilst you were very correct in debunking Halifa's misconceived and misplaced afrocentrism, perchance you were a bit harsh on him;even name-calling. Anyway, thanks for such a brilliant and gallant piece." How short is your memory. In your compliment, you had simply qualified my article as "brilliant and gallant." I assume that since you found my article so, you must have read it over and again. Surprise, surprise, it never stroke you that my article was choke-full with "flowery prose and immature verbosity." Which compels me to wonder if you are simply borrowing a line of thinking from Halifa, who, currently, like in the past, continues to be pettifogging over my prose and choice of words. I hereby assert: your originality of thinking in this regard is sans teeth, sans taste, sans eyes, sans everything. It is skewed and sullied. Or worse, blindness of vision and confusion of imagination, clogged your deciphering of "flowery prose and immature verbosity" in my article before giving it thumbs-up. Or are you referring to other articles I wrote not this one? Either way, I find your arguments incapacitated by contradiction. Let me confess: I love words; it is no joke. Ever since primary six, I have cultivated the habit of introducing myself to new words, finding their meanings and utilizing them as and when necessary. Everywhere I am, I am armed with a vocabulary book, which records any new word, phrase,idiom I come across in my readings. Over the years of writing, my vocabulary has enriched itself, my familiarity with words and expressions has come in handy - time and again. Many of my readers in both The Gambia and elsewhere, continue to tell me how my stretch of prose brings into locus, issues and realities that they otherwise couldn't have deciphered or couldn't have commented upon for limited eloquence. Needless to say, as I write this response, my e-mail account is full of compliments from many people, on my prose and style of writing. You see, words serve as vessels of message. They quicken the pace of communication. You may not like how the message is being carried or the message itself. This is why it is imperative that you do not lump my "flowery prose and immature verbosity" with my arguments and ideas into the same camp. They need compartmentalization. Judge me in each case. And it is an unruly rush to judgement for you to think that I "mistake {my} flowery prose and immature verbosity" for intellectual maturity. I am not an intellectual. Nor do I claim any intellectualism;I am not there, yet. Let the intellectuals be. I see myself simply as a young, budding reporter and writer trying to make sense of my existence and realities around me, yet occasionally prone to youthful immaturities and peccadilloes, and limited in my human capacity to grapple with the elasticities of world complexities. You stressed that I hadn't graduated yet. Translation: university graduation or degree will propel me to "intellectual precision." Wrong. True, I am only an undergraduate, but university graduation or degree is certainly not the only path to intellectual maturity and wisdom. In my opinion. Again, you are at liberty to disagree. Anyway, thanks for the stimulating criticism, and the compliments earlier. Best regards, Che' Detroit, MI ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html ----------------------------------------------------------------------------