No description available.

No description available.

No description available.

Post-colonial feminisms have questioned the concept of a universal sisterhood for decades. One of its critics is Chandra Talpade Mohanty (1955–), an Indian-American, post-colonial feminist theorist. In her work, Mohanty suggests that the concept of a universal sisterhood occludes variations in women’s experiences of oppression and ways of life. She criticizes western feminism for casting third world women as objects in their own lives rather than subjects. Instead, Mohanty suggests an international solidarity between groups of women from different circumstances, where women’s various experiences are taken into account. The present study aims to examine the possibility of a trans-contextual feminist ethic based on the questions posed by Mohanty’s work in her book Feminism Without Borders. Since Mohanty is no ethicist, the study will also use resources from the work of Seyla Benhabib (1950–), a Turkish-American philosopher. She places herself in the Kantian tradition and in close relation to Habermas discursive ethics, but she also takes a feminist approach to ethics. This study first evaluates the resources found in Mohanty’s work, which are not enough to construct a basis for a trans-contextual feminist ethics. Thereafter, resources are sought in Benhabib’s works Situating the Self and The Claims of Culture and in her discursive ethics, her views on universalism, her concepts of “the concrete other” and “the generalized other”, and her views on cultures. This examination shows that the resources in the material under scrutiny are not enough to build a basis for a trans-contextual feminist ethic. Questions still remain which might be answered in the wider work of Benhabib or Mohanty, but the material at hand leaves questions about how Mohanty’s vision could be realized in spite of several practical and theoretical problems related to who is associated with which group and the tension between particular experiences and a trans-cultural ethic, none of which are satisfactorily addressed in either Mohanty or Benhabib. In discussing Benhabib, there is also a problem with the two principles of her ethics (i.e. universal respect and egalitarian reciprocity) and their justification. Benhabib herself claims them to be self-explanatory, but this study suggests, with support from other ethicists, that this is not sufficient justification.

This study investigates two central research problems. These are: What are the healing practices of Aeta women? What are the implications of the healing practices of Aeta women in the academic discourse? This inquiry is important for the following reasons: (a) it focuses a reconsidered gaze and empirical lens on the healing practices of Aeta women healers as well as the lessons, insights and perspectives which may have been previously missed; (b) my research attempts not to be 'neutral' but instead be an exercise in participatory action research and as such hopefully brings a new space of decolonization by documenting Aeta women healers’ contributions in the political and academic arena; and (c) it is an original contribution to postcolonial, anti-colonial and Indigenous feminist theories particularly through its demonstration the utility of these theories in understanding the health of Indigenous peoples and global health. There are 12 Aeta women healers who participated in the Talking Circle. This study is significant in grounding both the theory and the methodology while comparatively evaluating claims calibrated against the benchmark of the actual narratives of Aeta women healers. These evaluations subsequently categorized my findings into three themes: namely, identity, agency and representation. This work is also important in illustrating the Indigenous communities’ commonalities on resistance, accommodation, evolution and devolution of social institutions and leadership through empirical example. The work also sheds light on how the members of our Circle and their communities’ experiences with outsider intrusion and imposed changes intentionally structured to dominate them as Indigenous people altered our participants and their communities. Though the reactions of the Aeta were and are unique in this adaptive process they join a growing comparative scholarly discussion on how contexts for colonization were the same or different. This thesis therefore joins a growing comparative educational literature on the contextual variations among global experiences with colonization. This is important since Indigenous Peoples' experiences are almost always portrayed as unique or “exotic”. I can now understand through comparison that many of the processes from military to pedagogical impositions bore striking similarities across various colonial, geographical and cultural locations.

This study investigates two central research problems. These are: What are the healing practices of Aeta women? What are the implications of the healing practices of Aeta women in the academic discourse? This inquiry is important for the following reasons: (a) it focuses a reconsidered gaze and empirical lens on the healing practices of Aeta women healers as well as the lessons, insights and perspectives which may have been previously missed; (b) my research attempts not to be 'neutral' but instead be an exercise in participatory action research and as such hopefully brings a new space of decolonization by documenting Aeta women healers’ contributions in the political and academic arena; and (c) it is an original contribution to postcolonial, anti-colonial and Indigenous feminist theories particularly through its demonstration the utility of these theories in understanding the health of Indigenous peoples and global health. There are 12 Aeta women healers who participated in the Talking Circle. This study is significant in grounding both the theory and the methodology while comparatively evaluating claims calibrated against the benchmark of the actual narratives of Aeta women healers. These evaluations subsequently categorized my findings into three themes: namely, identity, agency and representation. This work is also important in illustrating the Indigenous communities’ commonalities on resistance, accommodation, evolution and devolution of social institutions and leadership through empirical example. The work also sheds light on how the members of our Circle and their communities’ experiences with outsider intrusion and imposed changes intentionally structured to dominate them as Indigenous people altered our participants and their communities. Though the reactions of the Aeta were and are unique in this adaptive process they join a growing comparative scholarly discussion on how contexts for colonization were the same or different. This thesis therefore joins a growing comparative educational literature on the contextual variations among global experiences with colonization. This is important since Indigenous Peoples' experiences are almost always portrayed as unique or “exotic”. I can now understand through comparison that many of the processes from military to pedagogical impositions bore striking similarities across various colonial, geographical and cultural locations.

Portuguese global expansion was initiated by the capture of Cueta in 1415. Voyages of discovery along the West African coast ensued, resulting in the conquest and colonisation of the N’Dongo Kingdom. This dissertation comprises an archaeological survey of the Lusitanian Empire in the Republic of Angola. The Portuguese first established a settlement at Luanda in 1576, after which they set forth into the interior, following the Kwanza River upstream. The strategy for conquest was to take possession of the river with the objective to control the indigenous population, subjugate the N’gola, and, ultimately, to reach the silver mines at Cambambe. Various settlements developed along the margins of the river with associated forts and churches. Fortifications dominated the landscape while the churches expressed religious idealism. Social contact between the Mbundu people and the Portuguese at the colonial frontier is discussed. Post-colonial theory is used as the research methodology. / Anthropology and Archaeology / M. A. (Archaeology)

This dissertation examines the scope and limitations of the re-appropriation of the term barbarism by modern Jewish intellectuals in conversation with Third World social movements. Emmanuel Lévinas is my paradigmatic example of this re-appropriation, as his Talmudic interpretations illuminate this process, and his work is located on the axis of the encounter between Jewish and decolonial thinking. I contend that Lévinas follows a classic line of modern European interpreters who expressed their discomfort with the description of the Jewish people as barbaric. While this discomfort can be traced within this orthodox interpretation of Lévinas, I argue that his particular solution for the problem can only be explained by a more heterodox exploration. Lévinas’ positive re-appropriation of the term is part of contextual conversations that he sustained with other peoples characterized as barbarians (i.e. Third World decolonial theorists). While this re-appropriation was originally conceived in order to establish an East-East revolutionary conversation between Eastern European rabbinical interpreters and other radical Eastern projects (i.e. Maghrebi Marxism) it became an East-South decolonial conversation between Jewish and Afro-Caribbean/Latino-American intellectuals. This conversation, however, ultimately challenges the apologetic Jewish re-appropriation of exteriority in the concert of multiple barbarians. I explore the limitations of Jewish thought to engage with this community and cross from an apologetic to a critical barbarism. This dissertation, in conclusion, seeks to make an original contribution in the interrelation between Jewish and post-colonial studies. I aim to do so by first, demonstrating that the Jewish return to classical sources is historically and conceptually a decolonial counter-narrative that was influenced by (and in turn influenced) Third World discourses; second, explaining the reasons and consequences of the persistence of Jewish imagery and influences in Third World decolonial theory; third, exploring the limits of Jewish thinking and the benefits of the expansion of Jewish apologetical dialogues into barbaric critical conversations. And finally, challenging most contemporary scholarship in modern Jewish philosophy, which holds that Jewish thought and the modern re-reading of its sources can only be understood in the context of Western consciousness.

This dissertation examines the scope and limitations of the re-appropriation of the term barbarism by modern Jewish intellectuals in conversation with Third World social movements. Emmanuel Lévinas is my paradigmatic example of this re-appropriation, as his Talmudic interpretations illuminate this process, and his work is located on the axis of the encounter between Jewish and decolonial thinking. I contend that Lévinas follows a classic line of modern European interpreters who expressed their discomfort with the description of the Jewish people as barbaric. While this discomfort can be traced within this orthodox interpretation of Lévinas, I argue that his particular solution for the problem can only be explained by a more heterodox exploration. Lévinas’ positive re-appropriation of the term is part of contextual conversations that he sustained with other peoples characterized as barbarians (i.e. Third World decolonial theorists). While this re-appropriation was originally conceived in order to establish an East-East revolutionary conversation between Eastern European rabbinical interpreters and other radical Eastern projects (i.e. Maghrebi Marxism) it became an East-South decolonial conversation between Jewish and Afro-Caribbean/Latino-American intellectuals. This conversation, however, ultimately challenges the apologetic Jewish re-appropriation of exteriority in the concert of multiple barbarians. I explore the limitations of Jewish thought to engage with this community and cross from an apologetic to a critical barbarism. This dissertation, in conclusion, seeks to make an original contribution in the interrelation between Jewish and post-colonial studies. I aim to do so by first, demonstrating that the Jewish return to classical sources is historically and conceptually a decolonial counter-narrative that was influenced by (and in turn influenced) Third World discourses; second, explaining the reasons and consequences of the persistence of Jewish imagery and influences in Third World decolonial theory; third, exploring the limits of Jewish thinking and the benefits of the expansion of Jewish apologetical dialogues into barbaric critical conversations. And finally, challenging most contemporary scholarship in modern Jewish philosophy, which holds that Jewish thought and the modern re-reading of its sources can only be understood in the context of Western consciousness.

Portuguese global expansion was initiated by the capture of Cueta in 1415. Voyages of discovery along the West African coast ensued, resulting in the conquest and colonisation of the N’Dongo Kingdom. This dissertation comprises an archaeological survey of the Lusitanian Empire in the Republic of Angola. The Portuguese first established a settlement at Luanda in 1576, after which they set forth into the interior, following the Kwanza River upstream. The strategy for conquest was to take possession of the river with the objective to control the indigenous population, subjugate the N’gola, and, ultimately, to reach the silver mines at Cambambe. Various settlements developed along the margins of the river with associated forts and churches. Fortifications dominated the landscape while the churches expressed religious idealism. Social contact between the Mbundu people and the Portuguese at the colonial frontier is discussed. Post-colonial theory is used as the research methodology. / Anthropology and Archaeology / M. A. (Archaeology)