Contributions to Alternative Concepts of Knowledge E-Book
22,99 €
Mehr erfahren.
- Herausgeber: ibidem
- Kategorie: Wissenschaft und neue Technologien
- Serie: Beyond the Social Sciences
- Sprache: Englisch
In the past, the European social sciences labelled and discredited knowledge that did not follow the definition for scientific knowledge as applied by the European social sciences as an alternative concept of knowledge, as “indigenous” knowledge. Perception has changed with time: Not only has indigenous knowledge become an entrance ticket to the European social science world, but the indigenization of European theories is seen by some as the contribution of “peripheral” social sciences to join the theories of the “centers”. This book offers contributions to the discourses about alternative concepts of knowledge, inviting the reader to decide if they are alternative, indigenous, or European types of knowledge. However, in order to make this decision, the reader must know what the nature of the European concepts of science and of scientific knowledge is; this might be a motivation to read a book that presents thoughts claiming to be alternative concepts of knowledge, alternative to the European concept of science.
Das E-Book können Sie in Legimi-Apps oder einer beliebigen App lesen, die das folgende Format unterstützen:
Seitenzahl: 496
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2016
Ähnliche
ibidemPress, Stuttgart
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements
This book presents social thoughtabout"Contributions to Alternative Concepts of Knowledge"with contributions fromsocial scientists across the world reflecting on the contemporary social sciences,in particular on alternative concepts of knowledge,social thoughtinitiatedbydiscourses on threeWorldSSHNetevents:
·Thethinkshopabout"Multiple Epistemologies - Science and Time - Science and Space - Science and Culture - Science and Society",held at UniversidadIberoamericana, Mexico City, Mexico, 22–23 February 2013, funded by theWennerGrenFoundation,
·Thethinkshopabout"The global social science world - beyond the 'Western' universalism",held at and funded bythe University for Applied Sciences, Zwickau, Germany, 27–29 September2013,
·TheWorldSSHNetpanel on the"EighthCongress of the International Asian Philosophical Association", held at theSüleymanDemirelUniversity inIsparta,April30thtoMay3rd2016.
Thisbook publishes the papers resulting from the discourses on these events anddisseminatesthem to invite last but not least those academics who could not participate in our events butwhocanthusjointhesecontroversial debates.
The editors of this book want to take the opportunity to thank all participants of theWorldSSHNetactivities, those who contributed papers to the events, those who contributed chapters to this book and all others who contributed in several other ways to ourthinkshopsand thus also supported the publication of this book.
We gratefully acknowledge the editorial and financial contributions of Professor Michael Christie, of the Northern Institute, Charles Darwin University, Northern Territory, Australia.
As afunding organisationthatgoes beyondpayinglip service to the issues of inter-disciplinary and inter-national social scienceactivities, but really supportsthem,wewishto express our gratitude to theWenner-GrenFoundation for funding ourthinkshopin Mexico City.
We, the editors, consider this book not as the end, but asanotherpoint of departure for further controversial debates and would like to take this opportunity and invite readers to contribute to the continuation of theseconversationswith their critical comments.
Those who are interested in theWorldSSHNetmay visit our www:http://www.worldsshnet.org/
Michael Kuhn and HebeVessuri
Chapter 1:The misery of defining what scientificknowledgeis—and what not
MichaelKuhn and Hebe Vessuri
This book publishes contributions to the debate about alternative concepts of knowledge and it does this with an implicit question mark, in the sense that they are contributions to a controversial debate, both with regard to what alternative concepts of knowledge are, and to the question compared to which knowledge alternative concepts of knowledge are alternatives.
The European social sciences answer this question with their typical way to discuss any controversial issue as the answer to the question of what one defines whatscientific knowledge is and what not—and by translating the question what the cognitive nature of alternative knowledge is into the methodological question of what one defines as scientific knowledge; alternative concepts of knowledge are seen as deviating from what the European social sciences define as what scientific knowledge is. What else could a science approach do, that insists that whatknowledge is and what it is not, depends on ex ante definitions of its topic, its approach and its methods, and therefore answers the question of what alternative knowledge is, also depending on what one defines ex ante as scientific knowledge and, thus, on what the alternatives to this knowledge are. Just as judging about any social sciences theory must be a matter depending on such ex-ante definitions, choices of both how any object of thinking is approached through meta theories and what the chosen methods for thinking are, the question what is alternative knowledge, is also made a matter of definition.[1]
Though the social sciences approach to theorizing via such ex ante definitions, which allow any contradictory and exclusionarythought as scientific knowledge, would also allow to define any other than the European concept of knowledge as arbitrarily as scientific knowledge, the European approach to sciences has defined that the attributes of what this European approach to science considers as scientific knowledge must be exclusively defined as scientific knowledge.It has thus established this approach to social thought as the scientific reference system against which any other knowledge that does not coincide with the European definitions of what science is, is non-scientific knowledge, as in this sense alternative knowledge.
Such knowledge, deviating from the European definitions, has been earlier labelled and discredited as indigenous knowledge and excluded from the privilege of belonging to those sciences that claim to decide about what scientific knowledge is, no matter what this knowledge is saying. Thanks to a more recent redefinition of what the very European sciences consider as science, the same knowledge has become via the post-colonial discourses by social scientists such as Wallerstein, Gadamer or Foucault a now welcomed approach to knowledge and is since then a contribution to what the European approach to social sciences consider as scientific knowledge. Without ever arguing about what any knowledge tells us about the world, simply because it does now fulfil the new definitions of what the European sciences defined as scientific knowledge. No matter what this knowledge is telling us about the world it now contributes to knowledge.Knowledge is considered as scientific thought or not according to what the European meta-theorists define as knowledge, either excluded or generously invited by thinkers of the European science tradition—thinkers from Merton to Foucault—to contribute to what the European post war II social sciences define as belonging to the scientific universalism or to what Wallerstein, in his contribution to the post-colonial discourses, defines as the universal universalism, both knowing what knowledge is and what it is not without making any attempt to understand what this knowledge is about.
And this, judging about knowledge without judging about what knowledge says, is only consequent. Since the European social science approach also decided per definition that social sciences cannot create any objective knowledge, they can neither decide about what scientific knowledge is via what the knowledge says, but again via definitions, they may be more exclusive or inclusive definitions.
How else but by definition, of what knowledge is and what it is not, could an approach to social science decide about what alternative knowledge is, an approach which per definitions of social sciences thinking—definitions created from Kant via Popper to Foucault—also definesthedogma that social sciences can only create relative objective knowledge, relative to the ex ante choices of theories through which social sciences theorize. Hence, any knowledge, no matter what it says, no matter whether it contradicts other knowledge, any knowledge must be accepted as knowledge, as long as it follows the rules the dogmas the European social sciences established via definitions about what counts as scientific knowledge.
Rather than the indigenous forms of knowledge, that the European social sciences once discredited and excluded and then later invited as contributing to what they consider as knowledge, it is this dogmatism of the European approach to social science that discredits them, an approach to science that only knows to decide about knowledge via definitions, definitions not only of what this approach considers as knowledge but also of what it considers as science.
The congenial partner of this tautological concept of social thought, defining what knowledge is in accordance to what it defines as being knowledge or not, is inevitably the arrogance with which this European approach to social thought glosses over the fact, that these very debates, deciding about what scientific knowledge is and what not via definitions, at the same time frankly admit that they have not any secure knowledge. As T. Kuhn, otherwise admired as a witness for the dogma that there is no objective knowledge, phrases it: There is no knowledge the social sciences created in a 200 years history, which until today could be considered as a paradigm, such as any secure knowledge in the natural sciences.
And this is truly frivolous: Insisting on the one hand on their definition that social sciences by their nature cannot create any objective knowledge, insisting that social sciences are not able to create any objective theories, and at the same time defining what this approach to social thought considers as scientific knowledge and what not, is a truly unique combination of non-knowing and arrogance claiming to decide about what knowledge is and what it is not.
It is this uniqueness of a concept of scientific knowledge that only securely knows that it does not have any secure knowledge and at the same time is arrogant enough to decide what scientific knowledge is and what it is not. It is this very combination of not-knowing anything, but deciding about what knowledge is that this book does not want to share nor contribute to and to discuss alternative concepts of knowledge again by alternative ways of defining what science is and what it is not.
Needless to say, one could indeed trace the cognitive procedures of how the concepts of knowledge presented in this book construct social thought andfromthere to see if and how they do this in any other way, different from the ways the European social sciences ways of theorizing do. This ambitious project is not what this book can offer, though it would indeed be worthwhile doing it.
However, without doing this ambitious project, tracing how the alternative concepts of knowledge in this book construct social thought and in which respects these modes of creating knowledge deviate from what it claims being an alternative to—the European social sciences -, this much can be said: All the concepts of knowledge in this book discuss these alternative concepts of knowledge in a tension between presenting them as forms of knowledge which create insights that can be shared with other forms of knowledge creation, and at the same time as knowledge that aims at forms of knowledge, which represent a unique and authentic view on what they think about.
Though a few chapters reflect on the issue of the ambiguity of the debates about alternative concepts of knowledge, in general this book is less ambitious and does not intend to elaborate on such epistemological issues incorporated in the alternative concepts of knowledge it presents.It rather modestly presents a few examples of social thought which consider themselves as alternative concepts of sciences and, by presenting them, this book tries to make a contribution, not the those definitional discourses, but to the question of what the knowledge is saying these alternative concepts of knowledge create and what kind of knowledge they add to the knowledge social sciences have and work with. Therefore, this is already very worthwhile doing, considering the fact that the definitional social sciences throughout their 200 years history boasted not having created any secure knowledge. May be, other alternative approaches to knowledge do.
To do this, contributing to this discourse and not to its definitions, this book consists of two sections: Section I, from chapter 2 to 9 presents and discusses alternative concepts of knowledge. Section 2 contributes three chapters 10, 11 and 12, to the contemporary discourses about alternative concepts of knowledge, alternatives to the"European"social sciences.
In chapter 2 Vazquez Gutierrez and Reyna Esteves discuss the results of an educational and academic experience in Mexico, doubly interested in the dialogue between knowledge systems and the university tasks. They begin by looking into the indigenous world and its challenges in the construction of a dialogue between knowledge systems. In particular, they consider the situation of indigenous peoples in Mexico, the persistence of institutionalized racism and discrimination, and a critique of monocultural thinking. Next they describe the challenges faced by the University system in its attempts to generate dialogue with indigenous peoples, and consider questions around constructing an intercultural dialogue. The authors go deeper into their own experience in the Iberoamerican University, offering a glance from Jesuit Universities, and they briefly revise their projects and initiatives and offer some questions and dilemmas around their practices.
Chapter 3 is certainly a most exciting example of how thinking about alternative concepts of knowledge is caught in the above tension between the underlying aim to create authentic concepts of knowledge deviating from what is mostly coined as"Western"knowledge or rationality and the other intention to present such alternative, authentic concepts of knowledge, representing a unique view on the world of the social, as a concept of thinking that can be shared by what it opposes, the very Western way of thinking and their theories. Njodo argues passionately against the construction of authentic concepts of knowledge in discourses among scholars in Africa advocating that it was the nature of African minds to refuse the concept of rationality the thus rejected concept of the European social sciences imposed on the knowledge scene in Africa, accusing them of ultimately racist ideas, the very racist views colonial thinking created about the"natives", racist ideas these discourses not only accept but now propagate themselves as the real nature of African minds. He then suggests other alternative concepts of knowledge against the European social sciences'concept of knowledge; he discusses theorizing in Africa along historical roots, and he strikingly presents concepts of thinking which coincide with the very roots of thinking that emerged in parallel to the European concept of nation state in the social sciences generated in Europe and that accordingly constructed the concept of rationality, founding the ways social sciences were since then practising thinking.
The project seeking alternative concepts of knowledge to the European social sciences is certainly motivated by some scientific discontent with the knowledge they create and seeks for other ways of theorizing about the social, and is thus mainly a scientifically inspired project. However, in the context of the emergence of a decolonized world it is also obvious that many projects aiming at alternative concepts of knowledge, mainly those discussed under the notion of indigenous knowledge aiming at authentic knowledge are motivated by political considerations. Chapter 4, by Christine Hartnack, reflecting on the nexus between the political developments in India is therefore most worthwhile reading. Unlike in the realm of political science, of economics or of sociology, politically inspired motivations seeking for alternative concepts of knowledge might sound less surprising. Hartnack however discusses the case of Psychology and how the discourse about indigenous concepts of knowledge in psychology are massively affected by very political, to avoid saying nationalistic, motivations. She traces the historical interconnections between indigenous psychology and the psychological theories in the European science world and how they are developing with the changing political rationales and agendas of new nation-state India and its integration into the world of nation states and their"modern"rationales of the project adjusting India to the project of global"neo-liberalism."In this sense, this chapter lectures us about the extent to which a social science discipline, which at first glance might seem to be less infected by political influences and its discourses about indigenous knowledge is a very politically inspired project, ranging from considerations about academic career perspectives towards simply nationalistic motivations, creating alternatives concepts of knowledge as a matter of sheer nationalism.
On the lookout for ethnocentric, false universalisms, Roger Magazine in Chapter 5 is concerned with the possibility that anthropological"theory"reveals the"local-ness", the ethnocentrism and thus the limits of established theory, and in his paper he aims to show how ideas or theories of the people studied can be incorporated into scientific theory in an attempt to move beyond our own conceptualization of the world. Based on his own ethnographic research he proposes that people in Tepetloaxtoc are linked together by their activities, they need each other to be able to act. This is because actions involve two subjects rather than one: the first who motivates and the second who performs the action. This contrasts with the form that this relationship usually takes in the modern world in which individuals are naturally endowed with the ability to act. In Tepetloaxtoc what people create or produce is not a thing, inert, de-subjectified and ready to have its singular objective reality revealed once produced, but rather subjectivity and action, which continue to transform themselves and others after their creation.
Magallanes Blanco and Rodriguez Medina deal in chapter 6 with recent developments around the notion of Indigenous Knowledge and try to illustrate the richness of a local contribution to our understanding of community media as well as the need to in-breed some western(ized) knowledge about societal relations with theoretically sound and empirically relevant ideas coming from the"South". They explore the concept ofcomunalidadas the result of a series of personal and community processes of struggle in the southern state of Oaxaca, Mexico, during the 1970s and 1980s. They argue that Indigenous Knowledge is valuable, not only because of its cultural and geographic roots, its embeddedness in ancient traditions, but also because of its explanatory power and potential usefulness beyond its context of production.
Chapter 7 from Ivan Marques might serve as an example of the above mentioned tensions between the desire to create authentic forms of knowledge and the desire to get these alternative concepts of knowledge after all and in particular acknowledged by those European concepts of knowledge they intend to oppose. In fact, strictly speaking, this chapter does not present any alternative concept of knowledge, but presents thought, somehow representing the struggle between the aim to create an authentic concept of knowledge that must thus deviate from the European concept of science and that, at the same time, is so keen to become a part of the global knowledge scenery the very European social sciences orchestrate, by setting up the scientific standards of this global social science orchestra.
Christie's chapter 8 on Australian Yolnu thinking is about revisiting what he takes, following Viveiros de Castro, as the colonial urge'to explain, interpret, contextualise and rationalise', while proposing'to use indigenous thought, draw out its consequences, and ascertain the effects it may produce on our own way of thinking'. Although he does not engage in either criticizing the former discourse nor in developing the latter alternative, he comments on an initiative to which he was related. In an experience about housing for Aborigines, he was faced with the need of representing the needs of Aboriginal housing that led him to engage in Australian Aboriginal metaphysics, being forced to un-think both time and monologue.
Kumaran Rajagopal resumes in chapter 9 the criticism of the idea of poverty he made in a former contribution (forthcoming). He argues that poverty has come to acquire such naturalness that we no longer treat it as a concept whose constructedness needs to be critically inquired into. Having come to regard poverty as'material resourcelessness'arising out of the alleged lack of imitativeness or development ambition of the so called'poor'nations or'poor'individuals, the resource-rich people have successfully reduced poverty to personal failure of the material-poor. This manner of absolutisation of poverty along simple economistic lines has resulted in emptying the concept of its moral, cultural and collective connotations. The moral universe of the resource-rich has come to encompass all the inhabitants of the planet so much so that evolving a critical analysis has become nearly impossible. He finds the Gandhian framework offers such an alternative moral universe making a critique likely. His article aspires to learn from Gandhian social theory and lists the benefits of deploying it for a liberating understanding of poverty as well as for imagining the possibility of an alternative social knowledge making.
In chapter 10 Qorbani discusses an alternative way of seeing humanities through the view of the Quran. He argues that humanities, in their extensive meaning, concern some significant facts like society, human being, his/her thought and social behaviours. Humanities try to get global laws of society and humans based on the ways of their approaches to humankind, society and their relations, while human restrictions prevent their comprehension by empirical investigation. Onthe contrary, getting universal laws and rules concerning humans and society is achievable through application of religious and metaphysical foundations. Qorbani argues that the Qur'an, as a divine, revealed and infallible book, has some prominent teachings regarding God, human being, society, global humankind and social traditions and laws, which makes it possible to form a kind of efficacy worldview and functional metaphysical thought for"human being"that can be considered as foundations of humanities and social sciences. In his view, by using the Qur'anic teachings, it is possible to build a new anthropology and cosmology in which to reform our philosophical thoughts of the world, societies and the place of human beings towards God.
The book's second section discusses under the headline"Contributions to the discourse about alternative concepts of knowledge"the notion of alternative concepts of knowledge with three contributions.
Leandro Rodriguez Medina engages in chapter 11 in an exploration of new modes of knowledge production in the context of globalization, the so-called knowledge (or information) society and information technologies as mediations that have transformed communication. His main concern is to elaborate the distinction beween foreign and local knowledge and explore its potential usefulness. The category becomes handy for understanding and analysing practices of knowledge production. Management and business are the two areas that have produced the most knowledge on this topic. Rodriguez Medina contends that this literature can provide important insights not only into the nature of foreigness but also into social and organisational aspects of knowledge use and circulation. He then discusses implications of his general argument. First, although foreign knowledge—and perhaps any knowledge—calls for interpretation, one role of peripheral scholars has been to profusely introduce premises to foreign ideas in order to adapt them to local realities. Second, their labels should be problematized, in particular those used to organize knowledge. Due to their peripheral position in the international division of academic labor, those scholars need to create new classificatory systems that connect foreign knowledge to local production.
In his second contribution to this book in chapter 12 Christie attempts to look at the alternatives to the globalising humanities and social sciences,"GHSS". Among his basic assumptions are the following: all knowledge is local, alternatives to the"GHSS"are manifold, knowledge is a cultural, social and political process; the new globalising knowledge practices exist in dynamic tension with their alternative. He then touches on the politics of alternatives to the Globalising HSS, deliberate marginalisation by the governmentalities of globalisation, deliberate dissociation from institutional forms, persistent pre-globalised (including indigenous) practices, alternative practicesand sources created by globalised capital. Finally, he briefly touches on some epistemological features of alternatives to"globalising HSS".
The final chapter 13 by M. Kuhn does not present any alternative concept of knowledge either, but reflects on these discourses, which discuss the various forms and notions under which alternative concepts of knowledge, such as local or indigenous knowledge, or in the case of chapter 10 in this book"foreign"knowledge, are presented as alternative approaches to the European concepts of social thought, the European social sciences. In his chapter he argues that such alternative forms of knowledge are, firstly, no alternatives to the ways the European social science practice thinking about the social, since it is the very European social sciences, which found their way of thinking on thinking with and through constructs of nation-states, that is nationally confined social entities. Secondly, he argues, motivated to create alternative social thought from the views of the new independent states on the world's social, it is themeritof mainly those social sciences from the former colonized world and their contributions to the post-colonial discourses, to question the historical anachronism of social sciences which present nationally confined knowledge as knowledge that applies to all social constructs across the world's social, disregarding whether they are nationally or non-nationally constructed socials. However, as it stands, this critique advocating authentic social thought ends up obliterating the oddity of a global monopole on nationally confined thinking and spreads this very way of European way of thinking under the labels of local or indigenous knowledge as the only thereby finally universalised European way of theorizing about the social. It is the ironic achievement of the critics labelling their opponents as the"Western"social sciences and their"Eurocentrism", to make this very European way of thinking on nationally confined socials the universalized concept of knowledge ruling social science thinking across the world as a multiplicity of globally"provincialized"thought.
[1]Needless to say, that unlike defining what scientific thinking is, what the cognitive operations from describing to concluding etc. are, can be a topic of theorizing about scientific thinking. A commendable reading in this regard might be an old book from Hegel, the"Phenomenology of Spirit."
Section I:Alternative concepts of knowledge
Chapter 2:Towards a dialogue between knowledge systems.Learning experiences in indigenous contexts in Mexico
Juan Pablo Vázquez GutiérrezandPablo Reyna Esteves
Introduction
This paper objective is to submit for discussion the results of an educational and academic experience that takes place in indigenous contexts in the North and Southeast of Mexico. We believe that presenting it may help in the thinking of the dialogue between knowledge systems, as well as about the university's tasks.
Despite the self-critical tone of this paper, the experience to which we refer below is very valuable. It is the resulting effort of many colleagues working with the Interculturality and Indigenous Affairs Program (PIAI, for its acronym in Spanish) of the Iberoamerican University during the past six years.
The paper is divided in four parts. In the first section we describe the difficulties of Mexican indigenous peoples and in the second section we discuss the challenges towards an education open to the dialogue between knowledges. In the third section we present our work experience highlighting its major accomplishments. Finally, we consider the limits of this experience and raise some relevant questions to reflect upon.
I. The indigenous world and the challenges in the construction of a dialogue betweenknowledge systems
I.1.The situation of indigenous peoples in Mexico
Mexico is one of the most culturally diverse countries in Latin America. According to the Catalogue of National Indigenous Languagesproduced by the National Institute of Indigenous Languages(INALI for its acronym in Spanish) there are 68 native linguistic groups in our country. These 68 groups belong to eleven linguistic families, in which 364 dialects (INALI, 2008:38) are spoken. Each of these languagesreflects a unique worldview, with elements that allow it to establish specific relationships with its surroundings. This linguistic diversity brings about enormous cultural wealth, as much for the combination of knowledge practices it contains, as for the different approaches to reality that become possible.
Indigenous cultural diversity in Mexico is legally aknowledged in the Constitution, in its 2nd Article. There, the multicultural composition of our country is recognized.[1]However, this recognition is denied in practice due to the policies developed by the Mexican government.
Currently Mexico is still a deeply unequal country. Here the faces of poverty have a clear geographic location, and a precise allocation of gender and ethnicity. In terms of income, access to goods and quality of life rates, indigenous peoples invariably occupy the lowest positions on the scale.[2]
This situation has become critical in recent years. Asymmetric effects of globalization have weakened the economy of indigenous peoples. Given this situation, the choices of these groups are reduced to resisting in precarious subsistence, if not toaccept forced migration. The rise in violence and insecurity has become an additional factor that threatens possibilities of development of these peoples. Territorial dispossession to exploit the natural resources of the lands historically inhabited by indigenous peoples has intensified in the last 30 years.[3]The presence of all these issues challenge social cohesion. The indigenous armed uprising of 1994, which originated in Chiapas, is an example that highlights the relevance of conflicts in the Mexican context. This movement embodies a reaction, among others, from the effects of an economic and social model that reproduces conditions of dispossession, inequality and exclusion.
I.2.Institutionalized racism and discrimination
Despite the efforts to promote more tolerant and inclusive customs, Mexico is still a profoundly discriminatory country. Compared with the overall national population, indigenous groups suffer the effects of exclusion in two ways. They are the poorest as well as the most discriminated against (Vázquez, 2012a: 217).[4]
Mexican society gives indigenous status a very poor consideration. Negative connotations associated with the word "Indian" are part of an ideology born in our colonial past, that has been strengthened throughout history.
The role of schooling has been key in this story. Education has helped shape a national identity that exalts Mexico's indigenous heritage. However, this acknowledgement is only formal and has notachieved much for the Indigenous people. Rarely are our indigenous roots considered as an active factor of our present condition. So we are taught to admire the ancestral indigenous peoples, while the present indigenous people are ignored and discriminated against, thus denying them a chance for a viable future.(Vázquez, 2012b: 49).
Behindthis concealed rejection of the indigenous condition is a profound ignorance and a tendency to simplify things. The indigenous world is usually seen as auniformreality—veiling its enormous diversity—whilst situating it as a realityseparatefrom the rest of Mexican society.
This division would seem to lead to a confrontation between two visions of our country. Onthe one hand, theurban-mestizo Mexicois pictured as the "present ideal" of a nation integrated into the global order. On the other isthe "deep Mexico", with its indigenous influence that has shaped us and is part of us, but whose presence we strive to erase. In this way a culture of discrimination prevails in our country, which is not, however, viewed as racist and ethnocentric.[5]
I.3Critique of the monocultural thinking
In Mexico there are many expressions of ethnocentrism and discrimination based on ethnic origin. Recognition and discussion of these issues become increasingly necessary, as this type of violence is exerted systematically in different spaces of everyday life. In this situation, how should we think about the possibilities of development of indigenous peoples and their participation in the national context?
The following frameworks show the main ways in which this question has been answered.
a)A model of an assimilationist cultural relation, or one based on the integration of an alleged minority, subordinated to a supposed national majority(Etxeberria, 2004:23–24).
According to this model, the recognition of multiculturalism has been generally understood in Mexico from parameters where the differences are recognized, regulated and apparently tolerated. However, this apparent acceptance is always performed within the boundaries of a limited liberal scheme. Under this scheme, indigenous communities are forced to comply with participation models beyond their cosmovision[6]and traditions. In this way their supposed inclusion in the nation's development and the recognition of their rights are always conditional upon the acceptance of regulations that deny the cultural specificities of their indigenous worlds (Vázquez, 2012a: 220).
b)A model of colonial relations and welfare assistance, based on the original plunder and destruction of the indigenous world.In this model, native groups are offered a conditional incorporation into a clientelistic—quid pro quo—participation in social assistance schemes provided by the State(Etxeberria, 2004:23–24).
According to this perspective, indigenous people are considered marginalized individuals. This situation places them asobjects of attentionof the state's social programs. The contribution of indigenous peoples to the country is considered void, and they are seen as a "problem". In that sense, the transformation of their worldviews, forms of organization and lifestyles is considereda priority in order to make them compatible with the guidelines required by "development".
Although the two models described are significantly different, they share relevant components. In both visions, the indigenous peoples are denied their identity and their potential assubjects of law. Such denial is transferred to other basic dimensions that refer to their exclusion, as individualscapable of dialogueandpolitical skillsto effectively participate in the construction of a pluricultural nation.[7]
These models are also based on a shared support that originates from a monocultural thinking[8]practice (Santos, 2009:110).
Monocultural thinking functions, according to Santos, is a dominant form of interpretation of reality. A central feature of these ways of thinking or "monocultures" of knowledge is that they set themselves up to be the only form of understanding, denying other possibilities of knowledge. This imposition leads to the construction of a one-dimensional worldview and to the imposition of knowledge systems assumed and presented as universal (Santos, 2009:111–112). Also, the empire of monocultural knowledge leads to a fiction that becomes fact, of the existence ofonly one reality and present time. Faced with this one-dimensional world image, other forms of knowledge or rationality are seen as different, strange, inefficient and unproductive (Santos, 2009:113).
In the monocultural discourse, the conflicts that arise from the relationships between different groups and different rationalities are silenced, or incorporated in a subordinate way to the dominant logic of the global system. The monocultural understanding showcases a world aimed towards "progress". In this imagined world, the most diverse worldviews merge and articulate amongst themselves without complication. The result of this idealized image is one of a technological world, with articulated uniform meanings, which in its apparent integration produces universal and undifferentiated meanings and references.
Based on this monocultural thinking, most of the dominant interpretations of multicultural coexistence are established. Under this way of thinking, multicultural coexistence is understood as a peaceful and distant relationship between different cultures. Therefore, a dominant version of multiculturality and multiculturalism is strengthened, where the world is seen as a diverse place without conflict; a world united in a single voice through globalized messages and icons. Beyond their outreach and consumption with ideological goals, this homogenized image of cultural diversity does not require nor encourage genuine communication and mutual understanding between the "culturally distinct"[9].
II. Challenges faced by the University system in its attempts to generate dialogue withIndigenous peoples
I.4.Questions and challenges around constructing an intercultural dialogue
Having considered the previous arguments, several questions arise:
In a world with undeniable cultural differences, is mutual understanding possible? How can it be achieved? Which elements can foster intercultural dialogue? Moreover, how can horizontal dialogue between cultures in a global framework emerge?
From our own experience, we consider it necessary to establish our approach to the concept of "intercultural dialogue".
First, it should be noted that the claim for intercultural communication is, as of today, only afuture projectand not a reality. Nonetheless, this should not be a disincentive from the work to attain it. Interculturality is an aspiration visible on the horizon, even in the context of a globalized society, precisely because reality poses it as a challenge, a question, and a necessity.
As an aspiration, intercultural dialogue assumes as its first requisite the establishment of horizontal relationships open to the possibility of another "culturally distinct".
In this sense, it is impossible to establish an intercultural dialogue that is based only on a certain type of content, assumed as universal and necessary.
Behind this consideration are the power relations that emerge when trying to build agreements between different parties, each one having their own idea of reality.
Faced with the challenges arising from the huge social and cultural diversity of Mexico, finding less violent, unjust and homogenizing ways to relate becomes an imperative.
In this sense, the intercultural approach seeks to open dialogue, encounter and mutual learning processes among different cultures. Interculturality is an ethical and political approach, since it demands working to put an end to the lacerating conditions of economic and social inequality predominant in our country.
At the same time the development of interculturality entails a self-critical reflection of us as individuals, of our institutions, as well as of our societies as a whole.
Finally, an effective intercultural dialogue demands more from civil society and State institutions than mere consciousness about the value of diversity. Concrete actions that modify the logic of dominant relations are needed, in order to produce more horizontal and inclusive policies, customs and coexistence models. Moving forward to acknowledge cultural differences and strengthen historically marginalized groups is also needed, as well as constructing spaces that favor communication and agreements between "cultural distincts".
In short, new forms of institutionalism are needed, to exercise differentiated rights and pluricultural forms of political participation. In universities' particular contexts all this leads to a radical questioning of the social responsibility of our institutions, in face of the difficulties of indigenous peoples in the country. All this leads to a reassessment of our most important tasks, in order to offer strategic support to the development proposals that these actors define.
·Educational projects within indigenous contexts, undertaking an intercultural approach, are difficult, and complex, especially when you are working inside a traditional university with its own institutional conditions. Among other things, you take the risk of reproducing work schemes and knowledge that deny horizontality and dialogue, imposing ethnocentric or hierarchical ways of thinking.
·Building an intercultural relationship between the university and indigenous communities and processes requires constant revision of silenced assumptions and everyday teaching practices.
·The processes accompanied throughout the years of the PIAI's work, have many times gone beyond the boundaries of its own program rules, opening new possibilities of construction.
·The university's institutional conditions are a constant challenge for building processes with potential for interculturality. The University's order of action and knowledge is inherently disciplinary. The disciplinary approaches to reality frequently operate as monocultural ways of thinking.
·The university's disciplinary discourses are sometimes contrary to a horizontal dialogue with other kinds of knowledge. Their structure and modes of operation (as heirs of modern Western thought), generate a closed discourse, with undisputed assumptions, which are often assumed as valid in a universal sense. When confronted by indigenous knowledges, the university's disciplinary discourse is not able to question its own presuppositions. The University's monodisciplinarity is limited, and it should gradually transform itself, starting from the relationship with other practices and knowledge.
More than once, we have been mistaken in taking the word of one indigenous person (as well as his political views and cultural perspectives) as representative of a whole cultural group. This faulty generalization is caused by the widespread ignorance that universities have in relation to the reality of indigenous societies and by the urgency in which we work, in order to generate the results that our institutions require. A constant dialogue, limited to our counterparts and key informants, is often the only possible way we can carry out our work. If we do not explore and make explicit these limitations over time, we could be led to confuse our relationship with a limited group of individuals as if it was a relationship with a community as a whole. Without minimizing the perspective of these members, an unintended consequence of this style of communication could be producing a "relationship of elites" not very representative of the communitarian processes that we try to develop.
Due to the long process of conquest, pillage and discrimination they have suffered, indigenous communities and organizations are suspicious of the processes promoted by external actors. As a result, the first goal in the building of relationships with the communities is the creation of a bond of trust. This point might seem trivial, but it is very important. This trust can only be constructed when all the participants are related in an open way and assume their respective limitations and ignorance. Working from the recognition of mutual ignorance, allows the university to question its own learning capabilities.
III. Our own experience from theIberoamerican University
II.1Higher Education, multiculturalism and indigenous peoples.A glance from Jesuit Universities
For years in Mexico, universities and colleges have assumed the task of bringing education to students from historically excluded populations. Such is the case of indigenous people, which have become present in diverse scholarly and academic spaces.
As the inclusion of indigenous children and youth to the national educational system—from kindergarten to college—has become a rising trend, the intercultural approach has become widespread in the system's curricula, including that of the Jesuit Colleges and Universities associated in the Jesuit University System (henceforth SUJ). The SUJ is formed by eight higher education institutions trusted or associated with the Mexican Province of the Society of Jesus. The SUJ's main purpose is to transform society into a fair one, where solidarity for the poor and excluded is privileged. (SUJ, 2013).[10]
In this institutional framework, the Interculturality and Indigenous Affairs Program (PIAI), created in 2006 within the Iberoamerican University, tries to articulate the University's social and educational projects with indigenous peoples'needs and conflicts.
II.2Our Projects and initiatives
The PIAI's mission is "create the spaces where the University members can contribute, based on their own knowledge fields, to the understanding of multicultural Mexico and to the transformation of the nation's social and cultural inequalities"(PIAI-UIA, 2011:1).[11]PIAI promotes the integration of working groups with academics, social organizations and institutions concerned with promoting the intercultural debate and the development of indigenous peoples in Mexico. This work has mainly focused on learning and research processes in three indigenous regions:
a)Northern region. State of Chihuahua. Developing projects withRaramuriindigenous peoples. Project coordinated with the Jesuit Mission based on theSierra Tarahumara,the Instituto Tecnológico de Estudios Superiores de Occidente (a university that belongs to SUJ) andÉmuri Integrated Services,a civil society group (SINE).
b)South-East. State of Chiapas.Tseltalindigenous area. Collaborative work with the Jesuit Mission based in Bachajón, Chiapas.
c)South-East. State of Oaxaca. Ayuuk indigenous area. Collaborative projects with the Intercultural Ayuuk Institute (ISIA), an indigenous intercultural higher education institute associated to the SUJ.
The PIAI conceives its role as team work collaborator, not as a lead, in the processes developed and manifested by indigenous groups and communities. In this regard, PIAI considers that the knowledge produced by the university should be re-thought within a non-hierarchichal framework with other kinds of knowledge. PIAI promotes the formation of interdisciplinary, interinstitutional and intercultural working groups that focus on the generation and application of socially relevantknowledge. The intercultural approach respects diversity and is committed to dialogues between knowledges.
We briefly describe the main projects developed in the regions named above.
II.3.1Collaborations in the Sierra Tarahumara[12]
a)"Raramuri culture and the curricula of elementary education. Analysis and integration proposals."The project collaboration group was formed of elementary education teachers from Raramuri schools, academics and students from the Education Department of the Iberoamerican University, academics from ITESO, the Jesuit Mission in Sierra Tarahumara, and the civil organization Émuri Integrated Services (SINE).Elementary school teachers from two schools in the Sierra Tarahumara have accompanied the process through participatory research and self-reflection. Along with the participating teachers, a methodology was designed, to develop the curricula, which considered the social and cultural environment thereby helping to improve the cultural relevance of education in the region.
b)As a result of these collective experiences, we have started to work on the creation of a Tarahumara Intercultural Studies Center. Its main tasks will include the gathering and systematization of the region's relevant data, such as a natural resources observatory. The aim of this process is to articulate a long-term strategic partnership with the social and educational works of the Jesuit Mission in the Tarahumara region.
c)The Jesuit Mission in Sierra Tarahumara, SINE, ITESO, and UIA have launched a Masters in Knowledge Managementand Education designed for teachers who work in indigenous communities. As part of the academic programme, SINE guides the students on their field work and in their research projects.
II.3.2Collaborations with the Jesuit Mission in Bachajón, Chiapas[13]
Main projects:
a)The recovery of traditional knowledge in Tseltal communities of Chiapas was promoted, as a result of the research project entitled "Concerningcosmovisionaland sociopolitical organization in Latin American indigenous communities" (2008–2011). Such recovery entailed the development of systematization workshops.
b)As a result of the systematization of traditional Tseltal knowledge,three certified courses,desgined for community members and young Tseltal people were developed and delivered, within these themes:
·Tseltal indigenous law and legal system.
·Jcanan qu'inal lum(Caretakers of Mother Earth).
·Jpoxtaywanej(Health Promotion).
These diploma courses were carried out during two years and were attended by more than 150 students in the three programs. The results were published in the book "Indigenous Peoples, State and Human Rights. Nasa at Colombia and the Tseltal at Mexico"published by the UIA and the University of Deusto in 2012 (cf.. Etxeberria, Muñoz and Vázquez, 2012).
II.3.3Collaborations with the InterculturalAyuuk Institute (ISIA)[14]
Main processes:
a)In this section, a research project linked to the ISIA is discussed:"Analysis of the working environment in the Ayuuk region of Oaxaca. Identification of the capacities and limitations for work integration of graduates from ISIA". The main results of these projects are: i) The creation of an updated graduate's data base. ii) Identification of the main problems faced in employment in the region. iii) The construction of linking strategies and social entrepreneurship facing the challenges of employment.
b)Teaching practices at the ISIA: interinstitutional collaboration as an intercultural space and the role of entities that support teaching.Throughout the development of this project different gatherings between students and professors have been generated to recollect and systematize successful teaching practices from an intercultural perspective that contribute to improve the students' academic training.
Both projects aim to advance interinstitutional strengthening and knowledge exchange, as well as to strengthen the ISIA as a relevant educational offering, consistent, and of quality to the indigenous youth of the region.
It is essential for the PIAI to link knowledge and university practices with knowledge and practices of indigenous communities. The goal behind this is to build intercultural alternatives in education and development, which are linked to the needs of communities and indigenous organizations in the country. That is why one of its main tasks is to promote collaboration between the departments and service areas of the UIA with the aforementioned projects. The forms of collaboration are very diverse. Here we will mention only the chore teaching collaboration and support to the management at the ISIA, where the scope of our participation as a university is greatest.
·PIAI participated in the design and development of ISIA, as well as the educational principles and curriculm design.
·UIA has been responsible of more than 120 courses in the three undergraduate programs offered in ISIA (Communication and Social Development; Administration and Sustainable Development; Intercultural Education). More than 80 UIA teachers have taught at ISIA. On average, 10 courses are delivered each semester.
IV. Some questions and dilemmas around our own practice
We have described the main iniciatives carried out in this work. As a conclusion, we consider it necessary to present some of the limits and some self-critical considerations emerging from our experience. These reflections are presented in short statements, with the intention to reveal topics and questions for further analysis.
·On the way we have faced different kinds of obstacle. One of them regards to the operating conditions of our projects. Despite the interest of the university to stay close to the processes that itsupports, the geographical remoteness and the existence of different work conditions and practices from our counterparts in each region, has occasionally led to communication problems and undesired results. Some of these have resulted, for example, in the adoption of arbitrary, bureaucratic actions, which have been outside the interests and worldview of the participants. When this happens we have distanced ourselves from the goal of promoting culturally relevant learning processes.
·Originally the PIAI was not designed to be a program aimed for the education of students or the creation of research projects. Initially, its mission was to participate as a space of connection and support in the development of intervention projects. Over the years and due to its own practice, the PIAI has had to expand its profile and fields of action. In the everyday work we have learned to develop new tools and concepts of work.
·The PIAI has assumed as a working principle, the ongoing modification of its own work, adapting itself to the times, logic and demands of practice itself, accepting the inevitable existence of gaps and blind spots. Therefore, the PIAI has no choice but to reconsider, on the basis of its real world experience, its own assumptions, limited by the conditions of a university that belongs to the Jesuit University System.
·One of our key lessons involves the certainty that the university cannot deal alone with the problems of the Mexican indigenous context. In this regard, it has been necessary that the PIAI learns to promote interdisciplinary and interinstitutional collaborations in each project that it supports. Those who work at the university do not have employment conditions which would allow them to remain for extended periods in the remote indigenous regions in which we work; so because of this restriction, collaboration with our local partners (civil society and community representatives) is fundamental to the development of each project.
·Being compelled to work in collaborative and co-responsible ways, universities must recognize and accept their limitations, their ignorance and their arrogance in pretending to be the only of the most significant holder of knowledge. Humility and openness, essential features for the construction of an intercultural dialogue, are not intrinsic features of the university, used to consider itself as the institutional carrier of truth. According to what we have said here, we explicitly abandon the idea of the university's knowledge as an expert and infallible one. However, this does not mean we give up the rigor and supervision required by our own epistemological traditions.
·Relationships with other actors and institutions are, also, subject to constant revision. The characteristics of our labor require us to establish a dialogue with indigenous colleagues in the regions in which we participate.
·Universities, even with all their limitations, can and should be a privileged space to promote the social and political processes that lead to interculturality. In this sense, PIAI assume its ethical and political responsibility to build a university from the margins, from the frontiers with indigenous communities. Our labor is not that of an intellectual avant-garde, but the one of a reflexive rearguard. One that, placed always behind the processes and communities, contributes to the process with analysis and feedbacks.
To assume an ethical and political commitment to the promotion of interculturality implies the need to change the timing of a university's practice. The university should adapt its structures and processes in order to effectively respond to emerging and urgent needs that indigenous communities face every day.
·The university can and should become a space for the widespread acknowledgement of the status of indigenous peoples and communities. Due to its nature and condition, the university can serve as a resonance chamber around relevant social issues. For this, it can use its social, political and economic capital. The university may become also an important interlocutor that allows the communities to rethink themselves and face their own contradictions and oppressions. Primarily, those issues associated with gender relations, identity changes and cultural changes in the emerging forms of family and community violence. All of these complexities and contradictions are involved in the huge challenge of thinking and seriously addressing the construction of more just social relations, in a context of respect for diversity, be it of any kind.
·Intercultural dialogue demands that dialogue partners acknowledge the blind spots of their own culture (and its different forms of ethnocentrism) and demonstrate the will to "open" to the understanding of other ways of interpreting reality. The possibility of horizontal communication between"cultural distincts" implies mutual recognition of differences, as the starting point for progress towards strategies and meeting points that promote understanding. In this sense, the adoption of an open mind towards intercultural dialogue means not merely formal learning content, but the development of practices that involves a personal change not only of therational order, but also in terms of valuesand orientations towards the world. The intention is to produce a deep, structural change in our own cultural devices and our most natural orientations. The acquisition of skills for intercultural dialogue is,therefore, not a result of a traditional teaching practice, but rather the outcome of participation in significant and crucial experiences that move us, as they pose significant practical challenges arising from the specific relationship with the other "cultural distinct". Developing an intercultural communication actually means something more than mere awareness of diversity; it assumes a "movement of place" beyond our own spaces of comfort, supported by what our culture appears to us as the most obvious and natural. In this sense the encounter with different cultures promotes changes in our own preconceptions of the world.
·
