In this second week of Inter-Cultural Knowledge and Practices we reflected on the following question through the material referenced, including Aman (2017), Guilherme (2019) and Barry and Thompson-Fawcett (2020).
What do you understand by the notion of the ‘decolonial’ as is discussed by the authors of the readings?
In the readings for this week, decolonial is discussed by the authors as the action and pursuit of theorising and challenging the colonially-imposed systems through which knowledge creation, theory and practice take place. In Robert Aman's (2017) paper on Colonial Differences in Intercultural Education, his argument highlights how the inter-cultural discourse as structured predominantly by the west (e.g. by UNESCO) has failed to consider historical hierarchies and colonial power-relations that exist between different knowledges.
In order to represent this de-colonisation that exists within the inter-cultural, Aman (2017) uses and discusses through the term ‘interculturalidad’, its context and meaning in countries where interculturalidad is as well a political movement. As Aman (2017) explains, interculturalidad “actualizes a question of epistemological rights rather than cultural ones as the difference that straddles the geopolitical contexts from where the concepts are articulated goes beyond cultural differences as they are above all colonial.” According to Aman (2017), interculturalidad, which he distinguishes from inter-culturality by using the Spanish word, is not only a subject on the educational agenda, but a key element in a process of de-colonisation movements taken on by indigenous communities.
Interestingly enough, the word interculturality itself exposes much about colonial systems even in the definitions (present or not) and use of the word itself. Guilherme (2019) discusses how he goes as far as to say that in British English, the word ‘intercultural’ is not customary, and that his use of the word stems from a translation. This would also synchronise with what Aman (2017) wrote about the particular use of the word interculturalidad.
I identify here a sort of circular cycle where the processes of interculturality seem to be exposing the colonial systems and workings within structures of society and industry, giving rise to a practice of decolonising and or through interculturalidad, which then furthers inter-culturality and so keeps on going. At this point, it is not only about culture and being sensitive and open to other cultures, but also actively working with them and making space, recognising or restructuring our systems to support ideals and mechanisms on indigenous communities and cultures alike.
In what ways are questions of the decolonial linked to the methodological tool of critical-self reflexivity in the context of intercultural knowledges and practices?
Methodologically speaking, the processes involved in decolonial action, practice or research involves the crucial step of recognising your positioning whether you are on the colonising body side or the colonised or an ambiguous body floating in between (as we know a lot of the times it is not one OR the other but both). In the decolonial, it is integral to question the geo-political positioning within, say, knowledge creation as Aman (2017) discusses in his article. The purpose of doing this is to expose power dynamics and imbalances that resulted out of colonisation which is then leading to change of positioning and dynamics to be more inclusive. For example, even in the consideration of geo-political positioning itself, as Aman shows, exposes colonial differences in the quest for the decolonial. While in the west it has been customary to eliminate the geopolitical position of the knowledge created (Quijano, 1989) (a sort of anti-reflexivity), when viewing knowledge created by the colonised, geopolitical positioning has been a method against universality of this knowledge, a privilege held for the colonial/imperial.
While the above is an example of coloniality in existing knowledge lines (Aman, 2017). We see the same thing happening in planning as Barry and Thompson-Fawcett discuss in their paper about indigenous planning development (2020), where they discuss how in New Zealand, Indigenous movements and involvement in planning and development is exposing some of the colonial planning mechanisms by which the planning profession has deprived Indigenous rights, ways of planning, and their unique methods of doing so. Not only so, but Barry and Thompson-Fawcett track how "the local rūnanga (tribal council) was thus able to make significant changes incorporating local cultural knowledge.... a very impactful change that local rūnanga argued was of absolute importance in terms of (re)claiming their connection to the space." (2020, pg 8).
In this aspect, decolonial discourse and methodology runs closely with reflexive methodology in the context of intercultural practices and knowledges. Due to reflexive methodology requiring us to question our positioning, it exposes inherent geo-political power relations in what we do and how we get to do it. Taking this forward through the inter-cultural discourse and practice decolonisation would be a necessary part of our going forward.
Figure 1: “The End of the Line” Classic photo of the original Border Arts Workshop, Border State Park/Playas de Tijuana, 1985. Photo: Jay Lussard. Source: https://www.guillermogomezpena.com/works/
The above image depicts a workshop by artist, writer and activist Guillermo Gómez-Peña. Gómez-Peña was born in Mexico in 1955 and moved the the USA in 1978. His work (including 21 books) deals with cultural, generational, gender diversity, border-culture issues and relations between North and South.
References:
Aman, R. (2017). Colonial Differences in Intercultural Education: On Interculturality in the Andes and the Decolonization of Intercultural Dialogue. Comparative Education Review, 61(S1), S103-S120
Barry, J. & Thompson-Fawcett, M. (2020) Decolonizing the Boundaries between the ‘Planner’ and the ‘Planned’: Implications of Indigenous Property Development, Planning Theory & Practice, 21:3, 410-425
Guilherme, M. (2019) The critical and decolonial quest for intercultural epistemologies and discourses, Journal of Multicultural Discourses, 14:1, 1-13
Quijano, A. 1989. “Colonialidad y modernidad/racionalidad.” In Los conquistados: 1492 y la población indígena de las Américas, ed. H. Bonilla. Quito, Ecuador: Tercer Mundo Editores
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