Unsettling Eurocentrism in the Westernized University by Cupples, Julie; Grosfoguel, Ramón;

Short description:

This book draws on decolonial theory to explore the ways in which Eurocentrism in the westernized university is both reproduced and unsettled. It outlines some of the challenges that accompany the decolonization of teaching, learning, research and policy, as well as providing examples of successful decolonial moments and processes. It draws on examples from universities in Europe, New Zealand and the Americas. This book represents a highly timely contribution from both early career and established thinkers in the field. Its themes will be of interest to student activists and to academics and scholars who are seeking to decolonize their research and teaching.

Long description:

The westernized university is a site where the production of knowledge is embedded in Eurocentric epistemologies that are posited as objective, disembodied and universal and in which non-Eurocentric knowledges, such as black and indigenous ones, are largely marginalized or dismissed. Consequently, it is an institution that produces racism, sexism and epistemic violence. While this is increasingly being challenged by student activists and some faculty, the westernized university continues to engage in diversity and internationalization initiatives that reproduce structural disadvantages and to work within neoliberal agendas that are incompatible with decolonization.

This book draws on decolonial theory to explore the ways in which Eurocentrism in the westernized university is both reproduced and unsettled. It outlines some of the challenges that accompany the decolonization of teaching, learning, research and policy, as well as providing examples of successful decolonial moments and processes. It draws on examples from universities in Europe, New Zealand and the Americas.

This book represents a highly timely contribution from both early career and established thinkers in the field. Its themes will be of interest to student activists and to academics and scholars who are seeking to decolonize their research and teaching. It constitutes a decolonizing intervention into the crisis in which the westernized university finds itself.

"This book takes the critique of neoliberalism and higher education far beyond elite nostalgia for a pristine intellectual past. Situating the terms of contemporary engagement vis-à-vis the westernized university's deep colonial legacies, Cupples and Grosfoguel curate a stunningly diverse set of contributions that scope out what it might actually mean to decolonize research and teaching. This book is recommended reading for all those who wish to think differently about the cultivation of knowledge in our crisis-prone era."　　　

— Professor Robbie Shilliam, Queen Mary University, London, UK

"Across the globe, students and staff are calling for the decolonisation of universities. Too often, that call is heard by university leadership as a need for non-threatening diversity initiatives or, worse, an attack on free speech. This important edited volume sets the record straight. To decolonise the university is to struggle to make real different kinds of social relations based not on domination and exploitation but on critical and collaborative knowledge production　for epistemic justice."

— Professor Akwugo Emejulu, University of Warwick, UK

Table of Contents:

1. Introduction: Coloniality Resurgent, Coloniality Interrupted 2. The University as Branch Plant Industry 3. The White University: A Platform of Subjectification/Subjugation 4. Can the Master’s Tools Dismantle the Master’s Lodge? Negotiating Postcoloniality in the Neoliberal University 5. Black Studies in the Westernized University: The Interdisciplines and the Elision of Political Economy 6. Black Feminist Contributions to Decolonizing the Curriculum 7. Denaturalizing Settler-Colonial Logics in International Development Education in Canada 8. Planetary Urbanisation and Postcolonial Geographies: What Directions for Critical Urban Theory? 9. Decolonizing Legal Studies: A Latin Americanist Perspective 10. The Challenges of Being Mapuche at University 11. Learning from Mayan Feminists’ Interpretations of Buen Vivir 12. Other Knowledges, Other Interculturalities: Colonial Difference, Epistemological Bias, and Eurocentrism in Intercultural Dialogue 13. Poetical, Ethical and Political Dimensions of Indigenous Language Practices in Colombia 14. Surpassing Epistemic Hierarchies: A Dialogue Between Expanded Art Practices and Human Scale Development 15. "Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité": Debunking the Myth of Egalitarianism in French Education 16. Dismantling Eurocentrism in the French History of Chattel Slavery and Racism 17. Beyond the Westernized University: Eurocentrism and International High School Curricula 18. What is Racism? Zone of Being and Zone of Non-Being in the Work of Frantz Fanon and Boaventura De Sousa Santos