Background
Dike, Kenneth Onwuka was born on December 17, 1917 in Nigeria. Son of Nzekwe and Felicia (Anere) Dike.
Dike, Kenneth Onwuka was born on December 17, 1917 in Nigeria. Son of Nzekwe and Felicia (Anere) Dike.
Student Achimota College, Ghana, 1938-1939, Fourah Bay College, Sierra Leone, 1939-1943. Bachelor of Arts, University Durham (England), 1943. Master of Arts, University Aberdeen (Scotland), 1947, Doctor of Laws, 1961.
Doctor of Philosophy, London University, 1950, Doctor of Laws, 1963.
Doctor of Laws, Northwestern University, 1962, Leeds (England) University, 1963, Columbia University, 1965, Princeton, 1965. Doctor of Literature, Boston University, 1962, Birmingham (England) University, 1964, Ahmadu Bello University, Nigeria, 1965, Ibadan (Nigeria) University, 1975, U. Ghana, 1979.
Doctor of Science, University Moscow (Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics), 1963.
During the Nigerian civil war, he moved to Harvard University, Boston. He is credited with "having played the leading role in creating a generation of African historians who could interpret their own history without being influenced by Eurocentric approaches."
As the head of the organizing committee of the First International Congress of Africanists in Ghana in 1963, he sought for a strengthened meticulous non-colonial focused African research, publication of research in various languages including indigenous and foreign, so as to introduce native speakers to history and for people to view African history through a common eye. In 1965 he was elected chairman of the Association of Commonwealth Universities.
Nwaubani argues that Dike was the first modern scholarly proponent of Africanist history.
His publications were a watershed in African historiography. With a Doctor of Philosophy from London, Dike became the first African to complete Western historical professional training.
At the University College of Ibadan, he became the first African professor of history and head of a history department. He founded the Nigerian National Archives, and helped in the founding of the Historical Society of Nigeria.
His book Trade and Politics in the Niger Delta 1830-1885 dealt with 19th-century economics politics in the Niger Delta.
He focused on internal African factors, especially defensive measures undertaken by the delta societies against imperialist penetration. Dike helped create the Ibadan School of African history and promoted the use of oral evidence by African historians.
During the 1960s, as a member of the University of Ibadan"s history department, he played a pioneering role in promoting African leadership of scholarly works published on Africa.
Married Ona Patricia Olisa, March 5, 1953. Children: Chinwe Maureen, Chukwuemeka George, Nneka Helen, Ona Olive, Obiora Kenneth.