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A Decolonial Turn
A Decolonial Turn
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Claire Gallien
This article presents a critical survey that maps out the develop-
ment and reception of the decolonial turn in Western and French aca-
demia. It traces its genealogical foundations, its points of overlap with
and departure from postcolonial studies; illustrates the theoretical contri-
butions of its founding figures; and discusses its limitations in relation to
its own conceptual blind spots and the neo-liberal context and contempo-
rary regime of coloniality which restrict its development.
The article examines key decolonial concepts—such as “epis-
temicide,” the “hubris of the point zero,” “coloniality,” the “zone of
non-being,” “delinking,” “pluriversality”—and how they constitute
new venues for critical thinking in the West, especially regarding the
question of what counts as “knowledge” and what does not. The article
argues that the decolonial turn is not about augmenting and elevat-
ing Western episteme with new content. Rather, responding to Dipesh
Chakrabarty’s call to “provincialize” Europe, it clears a space for other
epistemologies and cosmovisions to circulate in Western academia.
The decolonial approach does not restrict itself to a critique of
the colonial episteme and world order. It entails a recognition of one’s
own positionality as scholar, critic, and speaker, recognizes the neces-
sity to decenter and pluralize knowledge formations, and finally offers
alternative ways to conceptualize and experience the world. Thus, de-
coloniality is best described as a gesture that de-normalizes the nor-
mative, problematizes default positions, debunks the a-perspectival,
destabilizes the structure, and as a program to rehabilitate epistemic
formations that continue to be repressed under coloniality.
The article also explores critical zones insufficiently addressed
by decolonial thinkers, namely, the field’s reliance on a homogenized
version of “the” West and of “modernity,” its controversial relation
to, and participation in, the system itself, and finally the problematic
28 Alif 40 (2020)
Since the 1990s, the postcolonial turn has had a profound impact
on a large number of disciplines, including literary criticism, histo-
ry, and translation studies. Decolonial studies emerged as a university
field a decade later, largely under the impulse of predominantly male
scholars from Latin and South America now working for US and Euro-
pean universities and research centers.1 In the US in particular, the mi-
grant or minority communities are distributed across distinct fields of
study—a higher proportion of scholars from the Caribbean and South
Asia do postcolonial studies, while Native scholars are often allocat-
ed positions in ethnic studies, Black in Black-American studies, and
those from Latin and South America have taken to decolonial studies,
because of their roots on the other side of the imperial border and their
connections with indigenous knowledges.
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Resistant Humanities
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Social races exist and the evidence for this is their strug-
gles. In France, the indigènes have taken up the weapon of
race in order fight against a formidable narrative, namely
universalism. And more specifically, white universalism,
which masks and negates the structural hierarchies that
constitute the French Republic.
In the struggle we wage, we risk through the use of
categories such as “White” and “Indigènes” what we call
with Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak “strategic essentialism.”
Of course, we know that white people and the indigènes
are not to be reduced to that status, that they are infinitely
more complex. . . . But for us, “strategic essentialism” is a
tool, including in the construction of a collective identity
and of political awareness. Furthermore, these concepts
resonate with the intuitive perception of a racial divide,
and consequently they are efficient. How does one un-
derstand the conditions of the proletariat if one does not
understand the concept of class, how does one understand
the conditions of women if one does not understand the
concept of gender, and how then are we to understand the
conditions of the indigènes if one does not understand so-
cial race? . . . I do not believe that it is—in itself or in
the absolute—problematic to essentialize a group. What
is required however is for one to be able to identify the au-
thor of the essentialization and most importantly his/her
position with regards to power. (378-80; my translation)
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Conclusion
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Notes
50 Alif 40 (2020)
what decolonial thinkers name the Western episteme. The interactions are
exposed in several studies, and I refer readers specifically to Mignolo’s The
Darker Side of the Renaissance and Grosfoguel’s “Colonial Difference.”
3 One example, for instance, is the MA Euro-Philosophie at the universities
Alif 40 (2020) 51
Works Cited
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