Un/Doing Epistemic Violence while Tryin...

In the preface to his book The End of the Cognitive Empire, Boaventura de Sousa Santos states that 200 years after Marx’s 11^th thesis on Feuerbach, Western-centric critical thinking has failed with regard to its agenda of changing the world of capitalism, colonialism and patriarchy. It is therefore imperative, he argues, that we return to interpretation, before trying to change it (Santos 2018: ?). That said, we must not take for granted already existing terminologies and methods, concepts and theories, if we (re-)interpret the world. Returning to interpretation necessarily includes the reformulation of the intellectual tools and resources we dispose of. We need to contextualize them in time and space, to un- and rethink them.  This is especially relevant for intellectual and political debates about ‘violence’.