International Colloqium
Poznań, Saturday,
January 22, 2022
Poznań,
The Gate
of Poznan
ICHOT (The
Interactive Heritage Centre of Cathedral Island)
note: the discussion of thesis chapters by Taynna, Hugo and Tomasz is based on previously distributed papers)
"Geopolitics of knowledge," or how power and cognition intersect to produce hierarchies between forms of inhabiting and knowing the world, has become a central concept in contemporary humanities. It is not mere coincidence that this is happening in the context of growing awareness within mainstream academic practice of the limits of environmental exploitation and different forms of social and epistemic injustice, such as colonialism, racism, and sexism; there is an ongoing appeal for cooperation with ethnicities, groups, and entire cultures which have for a long time been ignored or excluded from the central-Western mechanisms of knowledge production. However, far from leading to a consensus, this plea for cooperation and mutual understanding brought forth myriad issues that range from dealing with conceptual and linguistic barriers to tackling the marginalization or exclusion of indigenous epistemologies in the apparent Center, i.e. the West, and even within so-called 'world peripheries' themselves. The international colloquium Geopolitics of Knowledge: Histories, Heritages and Futures shall work as a forum wherein possibilities attached to a "double decolonization" project – that of decolonizing both the intellectual peripheries in relation to the centers of knowledge building and the small research centers that are perceived as peripheral in relation to flagship academic centers – might emerge. Therefore, the colloquium welcomes contributions that address concerns including: rethinking the methodology of the humanities regarding the applicability of concepts like 'epistemic justice’; exploring the epistemic potentialities existent in regions like Latin America, East-Central Europe, and; seeking to establish an interchangeable dialogue stemming from these and other places that are considered "epistemic peripheries" vis-à-vis the privileged position of Western knowledge.
Empathy often arises in discussions about possible ways to confront epistemic racism and recognize epistemic plurality. Nonetheless, some controversies around the concept of empathy also arise in the same context. The notions of “epistemic privilege” and “epistemic inferiority” – both present in the structure of epistemic racism – address the asymmetry that places only a few countries of the Global North as the center of knowledge, while the rest seem to be relegated to different peripheral positions. This paper aims to discuss the problem of epistemic racism in the geopolitics of knowledge and the role of empathy in responding adequately or not to the supremacy of Western knowledge and in assisting the production of alternative futures based on the recognition of the diversity of epistemologies, cosmologies, and worldviews and the relationships among them. To do so, it seems necessary to discuss: firstly, what is epistemic racism, what are its bases, and how do they operate; secondly, the uses of empathy as an anti-racist device; thirdly, the potential contribution of empathy to the resolution of epistemic racism from a critical analysis of its controversies; and, finally, to propose a critical balance evaluating if there is a place for empathy in counteracting epistemic racism and building knowledge based on ideas of cooperation and coexistence between Western and non-Western ways of knowing.
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What is lacking in existing Polish scholarship is a holistic approach to water, with the dearth of research that would take into account recent trends in exploring the future of water and its heritage, including natural-cultural heritage, particularly noticeable. My PhD project aims to conceptualize the idea of the water heritage base on a case study of the Warta River. Until the nineteenth century, the Warta remained in a more-or-less natural and unregulated state, meaning that the project’s timeframe (19th-20th century) enables investigation of the river’s anthropogenic transformations. Conceptualizing the idea of the water heritage will involve defining social practices that are indicative of taking responsibility (consciously or unconsciously) for the Warta River.
Since the dawn of comparative studies in the early nineteenth century, many theoretical categories were coined to designate what can generally be described as the unfavorable position in the geopolitics of knowledge and culture: 'minor,' 'peripheral,' 'marginal,' 'third world,' 'subaltern,' 'global south,' 'colonial,' to name just a few. While generally designating the same phenomena, these categories differ from each other and emphasize different aspects of the uneven relationships amongst cultures and intellectual traditions. This presentation will discuss these categories and their implications for comparative and global studies - especially historiography and literary studies. Paying attention to the theoretical foundations of comparative and global studies becomes particularly important in a moment, like ours, in which these trends are steadily becoming more and more popular. Our concern, however, lies mainly in the possibility of producing comparisons that are not 'center-centered,' that is, on establishing comparisons that open up the possibilities of dialogues between the intellectual peripheries of the world.
The aim of this paper is to discuss the postcolonial contexts of postsecular reflection. I argue that the postsecular turn in the humanities and social sciences has a manifold genealogy, and some of its important contexts could be traced to discussions of South Asian (Indian) theorists including Ashis Nandy and Dipesh Chakrabarty. What is interesting is that they had criticized secular politics as well as secular interpretations of history for some time before the “official” emergence of the postsecular turn (which often is ascribed to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks by Al-Qaeda in the United States and following discussions, animated mostly by Jürgen Habermas). Today the number of postsecular scholars from South Asia, who in some way are indebted to postcolonial theory, is even higher (Ananda Abeysekara, Rajeev Bhargava, or Manav Ratti, to name only a few).
I enquire into the meaning of this postcolonial context, its geopolitical conditions and implications, as well as its potential impact on postsecular perspectives, especially in the theory of history. Given that South Asia is considered one of the most prominent “peripheral” and/or “subaltern” geopolitical regions of the world, I enquire into possible parallels with other similar regions. Here I will focus on Central-Eastern Europe, including Poland. While acknowledging its postcolonial situatedness (as well as postcolonial theory’s efficiency in interpreting the problems of the region), there is also a need to highlight the lack of events and processes with a paradigmatic meaning for “indigenous” postsecular reflection. The topics of most discussions and categories used in this region are “imported.” I will therefore discuss examples of such events and processes, and to assess risks and opportunities associated with them (largely political ones).
Patricia Marinho Aranha is a post-doctoral fellow in Latin American History at the Freie Universität Berlin with a grant from Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. In addition, She worked as a researcher at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan, Poland, on the Core Concepts of Historical Thinking project, funded by the Polish Science Foundation, FNP; and at the Faculty of Philosophy, Literature and Human Sciences of the Universidade de São Paulo with funding from FAPESP. Ph.D. in History from Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro (2017), Master in History of Sciences from Fundação Oswaldo Cruz (2011), and graduated in History from the Universidade Federal Fluminense (2008). Patricia is also a researcher at the Ibero-Americanisches Institut, Berlin; the State University of New York; Fundação Getúlio Vargas; and Casa de Oswaldo Cruz.
Marcelo Durão Rodrigues da Cunha is professor of history at Instituto Federal do Espírito Santo in Brazil and is affiliated as a postdoctoral researcher to the Faculty of Modern Languages and Literatures at Adam Mickiewicz University. His research interests revolve mainly around the fields of historical theory, conceptual history, and global history. His current work centers on Latin-American thought and the comparative possibilities associated with non-Eurocentric ideas relating to historical thinking and global historiography.
Michał Kępski is a PhD student in History at the Doctoral School of Humanities at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, Poland, and a curator and producer of exhibitions in Poznań Heritage Centre in Ostrów Tumski, Poznań, Poland. His interests include the perception of space, heritage interpretation, and the history of museology. His doctoral dissertation explores the concept of “water heritage” based on environmental history of Warta River in Poznań, Poland.
Taynna Mendonça Marino is a PhD student in History at the Doctoral School of Humanities at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, Poland. She holds a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in History from Federal University of Espírito Santo, Brazil. Her main research interests are the theory of history, philosophy of history, history of concepts, indigenous knowledge/cosmologies, and non-Eurocentric and non-anthropocentric approaches to the past. Her doctoral dissertation explores the role of empathy in contemporary historical thinking by a post-/non-anthropocentric and post-/non-Western humanities theoretical framework.
Hugo Merlo is a PhD student in Literary Studies at Adam Mickiewicz University, Poland. He holds a MA (2017) and a BA (2013) in History at the Federal University of Espírito Santo, Brazil, where he also worked as a substitute professor from 2017 to 2019. Hugo is a member of the Laboratory for the Study of Theory and History of Historiography (Lethis-Ufes), Interdisciplinary Group of Theoretical Studies (Niet), and of the group Peripheral historiographies in a global perspective (Unicamp). He is the author of one book (“Um Alerta de Tempestade,” Milfontes, 2018) and co-organizer of two YouTube series (“Crisis and Historicity,” and “Philosophies of History in Brazil”).
Moira Pérez, PhD, is an assistant researcher at the Argentine National Council of Scientific and Technical Research, and assistant professor at the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Her work brings together practical philosophy (with a focus on philosophy of history, epistemology, and politics) and queer and anti-colonial perspectives, in order to analyze various dimensions of the relationship between violence and identity. She is currently a Fellow at the Forschungsinstitut für Philosophie Hannover, Germany, with a project that explores the global movement to tear down monuments.
Julia Freire Perini completed her PhD at Universidade Federal do Espírito Santo in 2019 and specialized in Brazil's nineteenth-century cultural history. Her current research interests are related to the experience of modernity in peripheral territories and their impacts on the formation of historical thinking. In addition, she has published articles that address changes in the perception of time and the impacts of modernity on the ways of living of subaltern groups and segregated individuals.
Mikołaj Smykowski is an assistant professor at the Institute of Anthropology and Ethnology, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, Poland. He is also a graduate of the international doctoral seminar Global Education Outreach Program at the Museum of the History of Polish Jews POLIN. In 2020, his PhD thesis titled “Ecologies of the Shoah” was awarded first prize by the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw, Poland. He is a member of the transdisciplinary academic group working within the subdiscipline called environmental history of the Holocaust, presented in the special issue of Journal of Genocide Research (2020/2). His teaching and research interests focus on ecological humanities, multispecies ethnography, phytoanthropology. .
Monika Stobiecka is an art historian and archaeologist, an assistant professor at the Faculty of Liberal Arts, University of Warsaw. A fellow of the Lanckoroński from Brzeź Foundation (2016), the Kościuszko Foundation (2018), and the Foundation for Polish Science (2019). She has collaborated with several Polish museums, including the Museum of Modern Art and the National Gallery Zachęta in Warsaw and the Museum of Architecture in Wrocław. Her recent works have been published in the Journal of Contemporary Archaeology (2018), Journal of Social Archaeology (2020), and Archaeological Dialogues (2020). In a series of articles she has discussed critical approaches to digital heritage and coined the term “digital escapism” (2018). She is interested in critical museum and heritage studies, archaeological theory, and methodology.
Tomasz Wiśniewski is a PhD student in the Faculty of History, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań, Poland. He is currently completing his dissertation on “Postsecular History” (primary adviser: Ewa Domańska). His project is an attempt at introducing the postsecular turn into the theory of history to study the cryptotheological elements of historical discourse, thereby proposing new categories of analysis. He is interested in intellectual history and the philosophy of history. His recent publications include: “Towards the Postsecular Historical Consciousness” (Prace Kulturoznawcze, vol. 21, no. 1, 2017: 79-94), “Dominick LaCapra’s Postsecular Reflection: A Critical Reading” (Historyka. Studia Metodologiczne, vol. 50, 2020: 255-280, in Polish), and “Hayden White: A Postsecular Perspective” (Rethinking History, vol. 24, no 3-4, 2020: 388-416).
