There has been a recent growth in calls and arguments for decolonizing frameworks of knowledge, and the concomitant “coloniality of power” by which social and cultural systems reinforce Eurocentric hierarchies that presume “others” as inferior and less valuable. This global condition has also produced anti-colonial and emancipatory epistemologies which have contributed to decolonizing possibilities for governance, education, social movements, international relations, environmental practices, the media, for race and sexualities, and more.
Our 2022 IRT will create the space to discuss decolonization efforts and also ask critical questions: Who can decolonize? What has worked as decolonial praxis and what are the limits? Can decolonization ever be attained? Can decolonizing approaches decenter power? What are some of the fissures and fractures within decolonial practices? What tensions, solidarities, and collectivities can emerge from encounters with intersectionality, critical race theory, Indigenous ontologies and pluriverse thinking, ecology, feminism, and queer theory just to name a few? How does decolonization work across space, geopolitics and borders? Can the global South and the "West" ever achieve "having a discussion of equals?"