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.

About the Author

Julie Cupples is Professor of Human Geography and Cultural Studies at the University of Edinburgh, UK. Her current research is focused on indigenous and Afro-descendant media activism in Central America and Aotearoa New Zealand. She is the author of Latin American Development (2013) and co-author of Communications/Media/Geographies (2017) and Shifting Nicaraguan Mediascapes: Authoritarianism and the Struggle for Social Justice (2018).

Ramon Grosfoguel is Associate Professor of Ethnic Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, USA, and a senior researcher at the Maison des Sciences de l'Homme in Paris, France. He has published many articles on the political economy of the world system and on Caribbean migrations to Western Europe and the United States. He is author of Colonial Subjects: Puerto Ricans in a Global Perspective (2003) and co-editor of Latin@s in the World System: Decolonization Struggles in the 21st Century US Empire (2005) and Decolonizing the Westernized University (2016).

Reviews

"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-a-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

Book Information
ISBN 9781138061804
Author Julie Cupples
Format Paperback
Page Count 284
Imprint Routledge
Publisher Taylor & Francis Ltd
Weight(grams) 450g