The question of migration with relation to Africa in twenty-first century is pivotal to challenges continent faces. Yet it must first be construed as a holdover from antecedent of late twentieth century catalyzed by various human and non-human evolutionary processes, ranging from technological to economic to social and political. All these variables serve to frame reconfiguration and designation of spaces and epochs in consonance with dictates of globalization. Thus, simultaneous leveling of time and space that is a defining trope of globalization also ironically and dialectically endorses a cleavage of world into multiple categories. Invariably and for purpose of convenience, cleavage sanctions a broad categorization of globe into North and South. Migration as an integral index of present epoch is manifested in various hues and textures, inspiring formulation of a plethora of abstractions aimed at capturing appropriate pulse of each of these strands of migration. Of these strands, cosmopolitanism, particularly in recent times, appears to enjoy most attention in view of volume of conceptual reflections it continues to receive from theorists and scholars in various fields of enquiries in social sciences and humanities. Its panoptic rendition as both an abstraction and practice in which entire world is involved is one reason that can be ascribed for this. Redefining Cosmopolitanism At another level, cosmopolitanism is engaging also because there is something immanently holistic in its imagination and practice. This is precisely because within conceptual context of term, cosmopolitanism does not only suggest physical movement of people and materials, but also resonates with movement of information and ideas across spaces. Viewed from this angle, cosmopolitanism is not exclusively about voluntary movement of people across spaces in process of which they exhibit a wide range of tastes of commodities, cultures, and other forms of socialization. It also entails an involuntary streak in which apparently indifferent and passive local community is actively involved, precisely because of migration of ideas, tastes, and information into and out of most interior of local spaces (Ferguson 168). Against this backdrop, we must necessarily return to question of dichotomization of present age into Global North and South. Doing this thus allows for a critique of normative conception of cosmopolitanism as emanating from philosophical pontificating of Kant and Habermas which necessarily constructs cosmopolitanism in elitism and voluntarism (Beck 18-19). It is on account of this perception that aspiration of such conceptual expression towards a form of universalism continues to face serious opposition in Global South. In this sense, Kantian notion of cosmopolitanism as serving exclusive interest of highly educated, rich, and pleasure-seeking individuals whose disposition towards travel is instigated by a form of voluntarism does not hold much water. This indicates affirmation of a form of association beyond national space. If such conceptual rendition serves any purpose, critics of Global South regard such purpose as functional only within spatial domain of Euro-American epistemic and cultural confines (Dowdeswell 176; Strand 240-41). What is more, such assumptions are further read as instigating in South, and postcolonial world generally, a call for a methodological review of rendition and practice of cosmopolitanism (Beck 28). The contention of such a call for a reconsideration of understanding of cosmopolitanism stems from realization that the contemporary mantra of cosmopolitanism ... carries new social images and epistemic shifts (Strand 240). With respect to caveat of elitism and voluntarism, Beck, for instance, argues that: In reality today, however, a banal, coercive and impure cosmopolitisation unfolds unwanted, unseen-- powerful and confrontational beneath surface or behind facade of persisting national spaces, jurisdictions and labels. …

Crashed Dreams in the Sahara: African Cosmopolitanism in across the Desert

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