Decolonizing Epistemologies

This anthology gathers the work of three generations of Latina/o theologians and philosopher who have taken up the task of decolonizing epistemology by transforming their respective disciplines from the standpoint liberation thought and of what has been called the "decolonial turn" in social theory, theology, and philosophy. At the heart of this collection is the unveiling of subjugated knowledge elaborated by Latina/o scholars who take seriously their social location and that of their communities of accountability and how these impact the development of a different episteme. Refusing to continue to allow to be made invisible by the dominant discourse, this group of scholars show the unsuspecting and original ways in which Latina/o social and historical loci in the US are generative places for the creation of new matrixes of knowledge. The book articulates a new point of departure for the self-understanding of Latina/os, for other marginalized and oppress groups, and for all those seeking to engage the move beyond coloniality as it continues to be present in this age of globalization.

European colonization played a major role in the acquisition, formation, and destruction of different ways of knowing. Recently, many scholars and activists have come to ask: Are there ways in which knowledge might be decolonized? Epistemic Decolonization examines a variety of such projects from a critical and philosophical perspective. The book introduces the unfamiliar reader to the wide variety of approaches to the topic at hand, providing concrete examples along the way. It argues that the predominant contemporary approach to epistemic decolonization leads one into various intractable theoretical and practical problems. The book then closely investigates the political and scientific work of Frantz Fanon and Amílcar Cabral, demonstrating how their philosophical commitments can help lead one out of the practical and theoretical issues faced by the current, predominant orientation, and concludes by forging links between their work and that of some contemporary feminist epistemologists.

Freedom is celebrated as the definitive ideal of modern western civilization. Yet in western thought and practice, freedom has been defined through opposition to the unfreedom of most of the world's people. Allison Weir draws on Indigenous political theories and practices of decolonization in dialogue with western theories, to reconstruct a tradition of relational freedom as a distinctive political conception of freedom: a radically democratic mode of engagement and participation in social and political relations with an infinite range of strange and diverse beings perceived as free agents in interdependent relations in a shared world.

What can movements for decolonization teach Wesleyan theology? This book faces this question to show that decolonial voices are reshaping the contours of Methodist and Wesleyan traditions. Contributors to this volume include theologians, pastors, and leaders in the Global South who are leading the people called Methodists to encounter the tradition anew in the radical spirit of decolonization.

Decolonizing Interreligious Educationexplores multiple injustices, focusing on the lived experience, unaddressed grief, and acts of resistance and resilience of populations most impacted by coloniality and white supremacy. It lifts up the voices of those speaking from embodied experience of suffering multiple oppressions based on negative constructs of race, religion, skin color, nationality, etc. Engaging ideological critique, construction of knowledge beyond dominant lenses, and acts of resistance are presented from the perspective of those most impacted by systemic injustice. It challenges interreligious education to frame encounters where the impact of intergeneration trauma and the realities of power differentials are recognized and the contributions of all voices are truly integrated. It challenges the fields of religious and interreligious education to imagine a broadened view that includes recognition of the role played by religion in harm done and to take a leadership role in engaging processes of accountability and redress.

Ranging between the fields of sociology, political science philosophy, cultural anthropology & literature, this volume offers a critique of normative models of modernisation derived from Eurocentric & North Atlantic paradigms, claiming that autonomous paths to modernity exist in the Mediterranean & the so-called Global Souths.

Philosophy of education basically deals with learning issues that attempt to explain or answer what we describe as the major questions of its domains, i.e., what education is needed, why such education, and how would societies undertake and achieve such learning possibilities. In different temporal and spatial intersections of people’s lives, the design as well as the outcome of such learning program were almost entirely indigenously produced, but later, they became perforce responsive to externally imposed demands where, as far as the history and the actualities of colonized populations were concerned, a cluster of de-philosophizing and de-epistemologizing educational systems were imposed upon them. Such realities of colonial education were not conducive to inclusive social well-being, hence the need to ascertain and analyze new possibilities of decolonizing philosophies of education, which this edited volume selectively aims to achieve. The book should serve as a necessary entry point for a possible re-routing of contemporary learning systems that are mostly of de-culturing and de-historicizing genre. With that in mind, the recommendations contained in the 12 chapters should herald the potential of decolonizing philosophies of education as liberating learning and livelihood praxes. “This collection of critical and scholarly analyses provides an insightful and timely resource for decolonizing philosophies of education that continue to shape discourses, policies, curricula and practices in all levels of educational and social institutions. It also usefully challenges versions of postcolonial studies that fail to recognize and demystify the continuity of colonial hegemony in contemporary societal formations in both the global north and south.” Toh Swee-Hin, Distinguished Professor, University for Peace, Costa Rica & Laureate, UNESCO Prize for Peace Education (2000) “Decolonizing philosophies of education edited by Ali A. Abdi is a collection of twelve essays by noted scholars in the field who provide strong readings of postcolonialism in education with an emphasis on decolonizing epistemologies. It provides a clear and comprehensive introduction to the critical history of colonization, postcolonial studies and the significance of education to the colonial project. This is an important book that provides a global perspective on the existential and epistemological escape from the colonial condition.” Michael A. Peters, Professor, Educational Policy Studies, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

This book brings together 11 prominent scholars and political activists to discuss and explore issues around postcolonialism, decoloniality, Theories of the South and Epistemologies of the South. These wide-ranging discussions touch upon issues from academic research methods and writing conventions to global struggles for justice. Together the chapters, as well as the interventions from forum participants which are characteristic of this series, paint a complex and dynamic picture of areas of thought and action that are constantly evolving in response to the demands of a world in flux. The book is a major intervention in current debates about the geopolitics of knowledge, as well as an illustration of the ways in which scholarship in the Global North(s) is indebted to the diverse traditions of scholarship in the Global South(s).