Decoloniality

We have, so to speak, ‘our own’ ways of being. In fact, I would translate Chatterjee into my own vocabulary: ‘we know that we have to decolonize being, and to do so we have to start by decolonizing knowledge’.

. As we know: the first world has knowl-edge, the third world has culture; Native Americans have wisdom, Anglo Americans have science. The need for political and epistemic de-linking here comes to the fore, as well as decolonializing and de-colonial knowledges, necessary steps for imagining and building democratic, just, and non-imperial/colonial... See more

It would not be convenient for a Maori, Aymara or Ghanian philosopher or an Indian from Calcutta who are modern/colonial subjects and would rather have ‘our modernity’ than to listen to vanguard post-modern critics or Western experts on developing underdeveloped countries. Thus, geo-politics of knowledge comes to the fore. There are many kinds of... See more

Fanon’s dictum applies to the disciplines but also to the sphere of knowl-edge in general: the Negro of the Antilles, the Indian from India and from the Americas or New Zealand and Australia, the Negro from sub-Saharan Africa, the Muslim from the Middle East or Indonesia, etc., ‘will come closer to being a real human being in direct ratio to his or... See more

Thus, it was natural that the annexation of the Third World, its integration in the worldwide capitalist system through trade and colonization, also comprise a ‘scientific’ window, that the draining of material riches goes hand in hand with intellectual and scientific exploitation,

The de-colonial option is the singular connector of a diversity of de-colonials. The de-colonial path has one thing in common: the colonial wound, the fact that regions and people around the world have been classified as underdeveloped economically and mentally.

That is not to say that scientific theories from evolution to neuroscience have nothing to say about the materiality of living organisms propelled by nervous systems, but there are many thou-sands of miles from there to reach a conclusion about ‘human natures’. Furthermore, sociogenesis locates its origins not in the creation of the world by God or... See more

De-colonial options have one aspect in common with de-westernizing argu-ments: the definitive rejection of ‘being told’ from the epistemic privileges of the zero point what ‘we’ are, what our ranking is in relation to the ideal of humanitas and what we have to do to be recognized as such.

But there is still another dimension in de-colonial politics of knowl-edge relevant for my argument: the claim that knowledge-making for well being rather than for controlling and managing populations for imperial interest shall come from local experiences and needs, rather than from local imperial experiences and needs projected to the globe,... See more