Academic imperialism

Last updated

Academic imperialism is a form of imperialism where there is an unequal relation between academics, where one group dominates and the other is dominated or ignored. Early theories of academic imperialism date to the 1960s. [1]

Contents

Definitions

Academic imperialism has been defined either in the context of certain disciplines or subdisciplines as oppressing others [2] or (more often) as part of political imperialism that has resulted in inequality between academia in the First World (the West) and Third World. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]

Within disciplines

In the intradisciplinary context, an example of imperialistic behavior was the dismissive attitude of the 1920s-1930s adherents of behavioral psychology in the United States towards non-behavioral psychologists. [2]

Internationally

In the international context, academic imperialism began in the colonial period when the colonial powers designed and implemented a system of academia in their colonial territories. [6] [3] [4] C. K. Raju claims academic imperialism emerged thanks to racism among native colonial elites. [7] Academic imperialism is blamed for "tutelage, conformity, secondary role of dominated intellectuals and scholars, rationalization of the civilizing mission, and the inferior talent of scholars from the home country specializing in studies of the colony." [6] [3] In the modern postcolonial era, academic imperialism has transformed itself into a more indirect form of control, based on Western monopoly on the flow of information in the world of academia. [8] Syed Farid Alatas calls this "academic neo-colonialism". [8]

Relation to academic dependency

International academic imperialism generates academic dependency, or the dependency of non-Western scholars on Western academia. [9] In non-Western countries, science is still dependent on institutions and ideas of Western science, which are often transplanted from Western countries. [9]

Syed Farid Alatas lists the following six aspects of academic dependency: [10]

Specific examples of academic dependency include the fact that most major journals are based in the Western countries and carry works by scholars located at Western universities; and that scholars in the Western countries study the entire world, whereas scholars in the non-Western countries focus on their own societies. [11] Another example is the dominance of English language in the world of international academia. [4]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cultural imperialism</span> Cultural aspects of imperialism

Cultural imperialism comprises the cultural dimensions of imperialism. The word "imperialism" often describes practices in which a social entity engages culture to create and maintain unequal relationships between social groups. Cultural Imperialism often uses violence as a method of implementation, and the system is often part of the legitimization process of conquest.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Colonialism</span> Creation and maintenance of colonies by people from another area

Colonialism is a practice or policy of control by one people or power over other people or areas, often by establishing colonies and generally with the aim of economic dominance. In the process of colonisation, colonisers may impose their religion, language, economics, and other cultural practices. The foreign administrators rule the territory in pursuit of their interests, seeking to benefit from the colonised region's people and resources. It is associated with but distinct from imperialism.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Imperialism</span> Policy or ideology of extending a nations rule over foreign nations

Imperialism is the state policy, practice, or advocacy of extending power and dominion, especially by direct territorial acquisition or by gaining political and economic control of other areas, often through employing hard power, but also soft power. While related to the concepts of colonialism and empire, imperialism is a distinct concept that can apply to other forms of expansion and many forms of government.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Research</span> Systematic study undertaken to increase knowledge

Research is "creative and systematic work undertaken to increase the stock of knowledge". It involves the collection, organization and analysis of evidence to increase understanding of a topic, characterized by a particular attentiveness to controlling sources of bias and error. These activities are characterized by a to accounting and controlling for biases in t. A research project may be an expansion on past work in the field. To test the validity of instruments, procedures, or experiments, research may replicate elements of prior projects or the project as a whole.

Neocolonialism is the continuation or reimposition of imperialist rule by a state over another nominally independent state. Neocolonialism takes the form of economic imperialism, globalization, cultural imperialism and conditional aid to influence or control a developing country instead of the previous colonial methods of direct military control or indirect political control (hegemony).

Eurocentrism is a worldview that is centered on Western civilization or a biased view that favors it over non-Western civilizations. The exact scope of Eurocentrism varies from the entire Western world to just the continent of Europe or even more narrowly, to Western Europe. When the term is applied historically, it may be used in reference to an apologetic stance toward European colonialism and other forms of imperialism.

Linguistic imperialism or language imperialism is occasionally defined as "the transfer of a dominant language to other people". This language "transfer" comes about because of imperialism. The transfer is considered to be a sign of power; traditionally military power but also, in the modern world, economic power. Aspects of the dominant culture are usually transferred along with the language. In spatial terms, indigenous languages are employed in the function of official (state) languages in Eurasia, while only non-indigenous imperial (European) languages in the "Rest of the World". In the modern world, linguistic imperialism may also be considered in the context of international development, affecting the standard by which organizations like the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank evaluate the trustworthiness and value of structural adjustment loans.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Global North and Global South</span> Neologism to describe groupings of countries as per socioeconomic and political characteristics

The concept of Global North and Global South is used to describe a grouping of countries along socio-economic and political characteristics. The Global South is a term often used to identify regions within Latin America, Asia, Africa, and Oceania. It is one of a family of terms, including "Third World" and "Periphery", that denote regions outside Europe and North America. Most, though not all, of these countries are low-income and often politically or culturally marginalized on one side of the divide, while on the other side are the countries of the Global North. As such, the term does not inherently refer to a geographical south; for example, most of the Global South is geographically within the Northern Hemisphere.

Dependency theory is the notion that resources flow from a "periphery" of poor and underdeveloped states to a "core" of wealthy states, enriching the latter at the expense of the former. A central contention of dependency theory is that poor states are impoverished and rich ones enriched by the way poor states are integrated into the "world system". This theory was officially developed in the late 1960s following World War II, as scholars searched for the root issue in the lack of development in Latin America.

Transnational feminism refers to both a contemporary feminist paradigm and the corresponding activist movement. Both the theories and activist practices are concerned with how globalization and capitalism affect people across nations, races, genders, classes, and sexualities. This movement asks to critique the ideologies of traditional white, classist, western models of feminist practices from an intersectional approach and how these connect with labor, theoretical applications, and analytical practice on a geopolitical scale.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Subaltern (postcolonialism)</span> Concept from critical theory and post-colonial studies

In postcolonial studies and in critical theory, the term subaltern designates and identifies the colonial populations who are socially, politically, and geographically excluded from the hierarchy of power of an imperial colony and from the metropolitan homeland of an empire. Antonio Gramsci coined the term subaltern to identify the cultural hegemony that excludes and displaces specific people and social groups from the socio-economic institutions of society, in order to deny their agency and voices in colonial politics. The terms subaltern and subaltern studies entered the vocabulary of post-colonial studies through the works of the Subaltern Studies Group of historians who explored the political-actor role of the common people who constitute the mass population, rather than re-explore the political-actor roles of the social and economic elites in the history of India.

<i>Orientalism</i> (book) 1978 book by Edward W. Said

Orientalism is a 1978 book by Edward W. Said, in which the author establishes the term "Orientalism" as a critical concept to describe the West's commonly contemptuous depiction and portrayal of The East, i.e. the Orient. Societies and peoples of the Orient are those who inhabit the places of Asia, North Africa, and the Middle East. Said argues that Orientalism, in the sense of the Western scholarship about the Eastern World, is inextricably tied to the imperialist societies who produced it, which makes much Orientalist work inherently political and servile to power.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Syed Hussein Alatas</span> Malaysian politician

Professor Dato' Dr. Syed Hussein Alatas was a Malaysian academic, sociologist, politician, and founder of social science organisations. He was Vice-Chancellor of the University of Malaya in the 1980s and formed the Parti Gerakan Rakyat Malaysia (Gerakan). Syed Hussein wrote several books on corruption, multi-racialism, imperialism, and intellectual captivity as part of the colonial, and postcolonial, project, the most famous being The Myth of the Lazy Native.

<i>Culture and Imperialism</i> Book by Edward Said

Culture and Imperialism (1993), by Edward Said, is a collection of thematically related essays that trace the connection between imperialism and culture throughout the 18th, 19th, and 20th centuries. The essays expand the arguments of Orientalism to describe general patterns of relation, between the modern metropolitan Western world and their overseas colonial territories."

Postcolonialism is the critical academic study of the cultural, political and economic legacy of colonialism and imperialism, focusing on the impact of human control and exploitation of colonized people and their lands. More specifically, it is a critical theory analysis of the history, culture, literature, and discourse of imperial power.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Postcolonial international relations</span> Critical theory approach to international relations

Postcolonial international relations is a branch of scholarship that approaches the study of international relations (IR) using the critical lens of postcolonialism. This critique of IR theory suggests that mainstream IR scholarship does not adequately address the impacts of colonialism and imperialism on current day world politics. Despite using the language of post-, scholars of Postcolonial IR argue that the legacies of colonialism are ongoing, and that critiquing International Relations with this lens allows scholars to contextualize global events. By bridging postcolonialism and International Relations, scholars point to the process of globalization as a crucial point in both fields, due to the increases in global interactions and integration. Postcolonial IR focuses on the re-narrativization of global politics to create a balanced transnational understanding of colonial histories, and attempts to tie non-Western sources of thought into political praxis.

Cultural homogenization is an aspect of cultural globalization, listed as one of its main characteristics, and refers to the reduction in cultural diversity through the popularization and diffusion of a wide array of cultural symbols—not only physical objects but customs, ideas and values. David E. O'Connor defines it as "the process by which local cultures are transformed or absorbed by a dominant outside culture". Cultural homogenization has been called "perhaps the most widely discussed hallmark of global culture". In theory, homogenization could work in the breakdown of cultural barriers and the global assimilation of a single culture.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anti-imperialism</span> Political stance in opposition to interventionist or expansionist policies

Anti-imperialism in political science and international relations is a term used in a variety of contexts, usually by nationalist movements who want to secede from a larger polity or as a specific theory opposed to capitalism in Leninist discourse, derived from Vladimir Lenin's work Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism. Less common usage refers to opponents of an interventionist foreign policy.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Decolonization of knowledge</span> Process of undoing colonial influences on knowledge

Decolonization of knowledge is a concept advanced in decolonial scholarship that critiques the perceived hegemony of Western knowledge systems. It seeks to construct and legitimize other knowledge systems by exploring alternative epistemologies, ontologies and methodologies. It is also an intellectual project that aims to "disinfect" academic activities that are believed to have little connection with the objective pursuit of knowledge and truth. The presumption is that if curricula, theories, and knowledge are colonized, it means they have been partly influenced by political, economic, social and cultural considerations. The decolonial knowledge perspective covers a wide variety of subjects including philosophy, science, history of science, and other fundamental categories in social science.

Imperial feminism, also known as imperialist feminism, colonial feminism or intersectional imperialism refers to instances where, critics argue, feminist rhetoric is used to justify empire-building or imperialism. The term has come into greater usage in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, with one scholar declaring it as something which "privileges inequality through gender bending that masquerades as gendered equality... Imperial feminism privileges empire building through war." The related term intersectional imperialism has applied to the foreign policy of Western nations which are perceived as engaging in, or supporting, imperialistic policies while at the same time promoting inclusive and progressive rhetoric at home.

References

Notes

  1. 1 2 Balihar Sanghera; Sarah Amsler; Tatiana Yarkova (2007). Theorising Social Change in Post-Soviet Countries: Critical Approaches. Peter Lang. pp. 178–179. ISBN   978-3-03910-329-4.
  2. 1 2 3 Bagele Chilisa (12 July 2011). Indigenous Research Methodologies. SAGE Publications. p. 54. ISBN   978-1-4129-5882-0.
  3. 1 2 3 Alatas (2003), p.601
  4. 1 2 3 Ulrich Ammon (1 January 1989). Status and Function of Languages and Language Varieties. Walter de Gruyter. p. 459. ISBN   978-3-11-086025-2.
  5. Srilata Ravi; Mario Rutten; Beng-Lan Goh (2004). Asia in Europe, Europe in Asia. Institute of Southeast Asian Studies. p. 61. ISBN   978-981-230-208-3.
  6. 1 2 Sabrin, Mohammed (2013). "EXPLORING THE INTELLECTUAL FOUNDATIONS OF EGYPTIAN NATIONAL EDUCATION" (PDF).
  7. Raju, C. K. (2010), "Ending Academic Imperialism: a Beginning", International Conference on Academic Imperialism (PDF)
  8. 1 2 Alatas (2003), pp. 601602
  9. 1 2 Alatas (2003), pp. 602603
  10. Alatas (2003), p. 604
  11. Alatas (2003), p. 607

Bibliography