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Tony Allott: A Colleague's Tribute

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

James S. Read
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Extract

It is entirely appropriate that this Special Volume, completing the thirtieth year of publication of the Journal of African Law, should acclaim the rich and many-sided contributions of the founding Editor of the Journal, Professor A. N. (Tony) Allott. His name has been inseparable from the study of African law throughout the existence of the Journal. The present writer was privileged to share in the excitement when the page proofs for the first issue arrived from Butterworths, the original publishers, in 1957. In the years that have followed the Journal has continued to offer its characteristically varied but always rewarding diet of articles, notes, case reports and reviews under a title which at first prompted sceptical reaction: “African law?” Could a field of true scholarship be given such a broad and essentially territorial designation? Should it not more aptly be titled the Journal of African Laws? Such carping comments are no longer heard. It is perhaps the greatest testimony to Tony Allott's achievement that, having started his academic career at a time when any notion of “African law”” was completely novel, he has by his creative industry and breadth of vision made a unique contribution not merely to the development of his subject but to its emergence and recognition as an important and distinctive field of legal scholarship.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of African Law , Volume 31 , Issue 1-2: Essays in Honour of A. N. Allott , Spring 1987 , pp. 3 - 14
Copyright
Copyright © School of Oriental and African Studies 1987

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References

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