Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Introduction:
Knowledge,
globalization
and
coloniality
I
work
at
the
University
of
Sydney
in
Australia.
This
is
a
moderately
large
and
wealthy
institution
devoted
to
teaching
and
producing
knowledge.
The
managers
of
the
University
are
much
concerned
with
the
visible
production
of
knowledge
and
our
standing
in
global
league
tables.
Therefore,
when
they
got
the
budget
sums
wrong
in
2011
and
proposed
to
get
themselves
out
of
trouble
by
sacking
three
hundred
of
my
fellow
workers,
the
academics
they
targeted
were
those
who
had
failed
to
produce
enough
academically
certified
publications.
The
managers
were
on
trend.
The
Australian
government
has
been
trying
for
years
to
introduce
systems
for
ranking
universities,
departments,
and
individuals
in
terms
of
research
productivity,
borrowing
these
schemes
mostly
from
Britain.
Publication
and
patent
counts,
citation
rates,
journal
impact
factors
and
peer
rankings
are
among
the
dismal
devices
for
making
university
research
output
measurable,
and
so
auditable.
These
devices
share
a
basic
feature.
To
make
neoliberal
ranking
exercises
work,
authorities
must
assume
there
is
a
homogeneous
domain
of
knowledge
on
which
the
measuring
operations
may
be
performed.
In
this
model
there
is
a
single
domain
of
biochemistry,
on
which
all
biochemistry
journals
and
their
contributors
can
be
arrayed
and
ranked.
There
is
a
single
domain
of
sociology,
a
single
domain
of
philosophy,
and
so
on.
The
Web
of
Knowledge
stretches
out
smoothly
in
all
directions,
embracing
all
countries,
connecting
all
practitioners
in
a
global,
homogeneous
tissue.
In
the
last
decade
or
so,
social
scientists
on
six
continents
have
been
arguing
that
this
model
of
knowledge
is
false
though
its
hegemony
is
a
matter
of
importance.
Quijano
(2000)
shows
the
coloniality
of
power
shaping
the
intellectual
worlds
of
Latin
America;
the
argument
applies
elsewhere.
Chakrabartys
well-known
Provincializing
Europe
(2000)
argues
that
the
categories
and
reasonings
of
social
history
do
not
in
any
simple
way
translate
from
Europe
to
India.
Alatas
(2006)
documents
a
rich
arena
of
social-scientific
thought
in
the
Arab
world,
south
and
south-east
Asia
markedly
different
from
northern
models.
The
anthropologists
Comaroff
and
Comaroff
(2011)
show
in
fine
detail
experiences
and
ways
of
theorising
in
Africa
that
may
show
the
future
usual
starting
point
-
all
colonized
people
try
to
make
sense
of
what
has
happened
to
them.
Narratives
of
events
are
preserved
among
the
survivors
as
oral
tradition,
and
sometimes
written
down
as
Somerville
and
Perkins
did.
The
picture
of
the
colonizers
is
not
likely
to
be
flattering.
Al-Afghani
(1881),
one
of
the
great
Islamic
modernisers,
understood
the
British
-
the
superpower
in
his
world
-
quite
straightforwardly
as
a
band
of
tyrants
and
robbers.
It
is
difficult
to
imagine
any
other
view
being
taken
by
indigenous
thinkers
of
Corts
or
Pizarro
in
the
conquest
of
Mexico
and
Peru.
Documenting
the
violence
of
conquest
is
still
an
uncomfortable
matter
for
settler
populations,
as
shown
by
right-wing
complaints
about
black
armband
history
in
Australia,
or
by
the
backlash
against
Hochschilds
book
King
Leopolds
Ghost
(2006),
which
narrated
the
ghastly
massacres
of
Congolese
people
by
Belgian
colonialism
a
hundred
years
before.
When
the
conquerors
stayed,
when
the
missionaries
dug
in,
the
plantations
were
set
up,
the
colonial
cities
were
built,
and
the
settlers
began
to
reproduce
themselves,
a
third
knowledge
project
formed.
Analysis
of
colonial
and
global
social
orders,
not
just
conquest
and
domination,
was
required.
This
has
been
a
huge
task,
continuing
to
our
day,
and
it
is
shared
(though
unevenly)
across
all
the
intelligentsias
of
empire.
Among
the
great
works
in
this
genre
are
Jos
Rizals
(1887,
1891)
two
novels
dissecting
the
corrupt
late-colonial
society
of
the
Philippines;
Solomon
Tsekisho
Plaatjes
Native
Life
in
South
Africa
(1916),
on
the
causes
and
consequences
of
the
neo-colonial
states
grab
for
indigenous
communities
land;
Frantz
Fanons
Black
Skin,
White
Masks
(1952),
on
the
psychology
of
racism
and
colonial
identity;
Heleith
Saffiotis
Woman
in
Class
Society
(1969),
a
strikingly
original
analysis
of
gender
relations
in
colonial
and
postcolonial
Brasil;
Samir
Amins
Accumulation
on
a
World
Scale
(1974),
analyzing
the
economics
of
global
capitalism;
and
Ashis
Nandys
The
Intimate
Enemy:
Loss
and
Recovery
of
Self
under
Colonialism
(1983),
which
includes
a
brilliant
account
of
the
dynamics
of
masculinity
in
British
colonialism.
These
remarkable
writers
did
more
than
analyze
colonialism
or
neo-colonialism.
Rizal
had
an
ambivalent
relationship
with
the
underground
resistance
but
he
was
shot
by
the
Spanish
authorities
as
a
subversive
and
became
the
national
hero.
Plaatje
was
unambiguously
the
general
secretary
of
the
South
African
Native
National
Congress,
which
became
the
ANC.
Fanon
went
on
to
activism
in
the
Algerian
war
of
independence
and
to
write
the
enormously
influential
The
Wretched
of
the
Earth.
Amin
worked
for
the
post-colonial
Nasser
regime
in
Egypt
and
then
was
deeply
involved
in
African
development
debates.
Saffioti
was
a
socialist
militant
and
became
an
activist
against
gender
violence.
Nandy
went
on
to
become
one
of
the
leading
public
intellectuals
in
India,
and
a
critic
both
of
the
secular
developmentalist
state
and
militant
Hindu
nationalism.
This
third
project,
understanding
the
new
society
created
by
colonialism
and
neocolonialism,
articulating
interests
and
purposes
within
that
society,
and
constructing
art
and
knowledge
from
the
periphery,
is
a
dynamic
project,
significantly
different
from
the
preservation
of
traditions.
It
means
creating
theories
that
have
not
existed
before,
or
greatly
changing
existing
theories.
The
project
requires
experimentation,
boundary-crossing,
and
risk;
it
is
likely
to
be
Disability.
Meekosha
(2011)
has
made
a
full-scale
postcolonial
critique
of
disability
studies,
pointing
out
that
the
majority
of
disabled
people
are
in
the
global
south
and
colonialism
itself
is
massively
disabling.
Meekosha
and
Soldatic
(2011)
apply
the
critique
to
human
rights
discourse
and
argue
for
an
embodied-
social
alternative.
Applied
Psychology.
Burns
(2008a,
b)
has
applied
southern
theory
to
counselling
practice
and
education,
including
career
development,
with
suggestions
for
postcolonial
practice
in
relation
to
indigenous
culture.
There
is
an
older
Latin
American
literature
of
liberation
psychology
(Montero
2007)
in
which
practice
supporting
anti-colonial
struggle
is
central.
Youth
Studies.
Nilan
(2011)
offers
a
postcolonial
critique
of
the
intellectual
division
of
labour
in
youth
studies,
and
conceptions
of
globalization
such
as
the
inappropriate
generalization
of
ideas
of
individualization.
Social
Work.
Ranta-Tyrkk
(2011)
offers
a
postcolonial
critique
of
orthodox
social-work
thinking
and
training,
from
a
Scandinavian
starting-point,
with
discussion
of
practice
in
India
and
Nordic
involvements
in
the
colonial
world.
Management
Studies.
Westwood
and
Jack
(2007)
offer
nothing
less
than
a
postcolonial
manifesto
for
management
studies!
-
arguing
for
overthrowing
the
dominant
perspectives
in
this
field.
Development
Studies.
This
is
where
southern
perspectives
might
be
expected
in
strength;
and
postcolonial
critiques
are
not
lacking
(Escobar
1995).
Nevertheless
Schech
(2012)
shows
that
northern
hegemony
in
this
field
continues,
and
explores
the
possibility
of
an
antipodean
perspective
within
it.
Criminology.
White
(2009)
examines
which
global
actors
accounts
of
criminality
count,
and
develops
a
concept
of
transnational
environmental
harm.
Aas
(2012)
provides
a
remarkable
synthesis
of
the
geopolitics
of
criminological
knowledge
and
their
consequences.
Geography.
Not
an
applied
field
in
quite
the
same
sense,
but
closely
involved
with
development
policy
issues,
so
Ill
note
the
vigorous
discussion
going
on
about
southern
perspectives
in
geographical
knowledge
(Parnell
and
Robinson
2012)
and
the
implications
for,
among
other
things,
mapping
(Sidaway
2012).
Urban
Studies
and
Planning.
Robinsons
Ordinary
Cities
(2006)
has
already
had
a
large
impact
as
an
alternative
to
global
city
models.
Watson
(2008,
2009)
argues
for
refocussing
urban
planning
theory
and
practice
on
the
worlds
central
urban
issues,
i.e.
those
of
the
south,
requiring
a
critique
of
dominant
models
in
planning.
This
list
is
certainly
not
exhaustive,
but
it
shows
the
scope
of
discussions
already
under
way
about
practical
uses
of
southern
and
postcolonial
perspectives
from
the
social
sciences.
It
is
enough,
I
hope,
to
support
a
few
reflections
on
the
possibilities
and
problems.
10
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