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Archives, libraries, and cultural information institutions influence and contextualize our cultural knowledge. Embedded in these practices are white supremacist, colonial legacies that have excluded crucial cultural knowledges and contexts, particularly for BIPOC and LGBTQ+ communities. While momentum is building to create space for other knowledge frameworks, the scholarship broadly has yet to address how archival professionals and students are taught about these concepts, particularly in relation to archival description. Through a critical discourse analysis, we identify the ways in which white supremacist heteronormative practices are upheld within archival description education and training. To highlight interventions, we look at the ways in which scholars are already engaging with alternative or disruptive practices. By applying these approaches more intentionally within these frameworks allows for a more robust and critical archival practice that provides the ability to support the diverse user needs of these communities to create and perpetuate reparative justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This special section of Contemporary South Asia brings together a curated selection of papers presented at the 2023 British Association for South Asian Studies (BASAS) Annual Conference, held at the University of Leeds. These papers explore enduring themes of memory politics, state power, and socio-spatial exclusion in South Asia, examining how colonial legacies shape contemporary dynamics. Collectively, the studies underscore the persistence of colonial pasts in modern India’s socio-political landscape and illuminate the creative strategies of resistance employed by marginalized groups. This section contributes to critical discussions on South Asia's politics of memory, space, and resistance, offering fresh insights into the ways power is exercised and contested. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, protests have emerged to save Lake Orumiyeh, which has nearly vanished following decades of agricultural development, dam building, and drought. Lake Orumiyeh is located in Iranian Azerbaijan, which sits at the intersection of three former empires: Persian, Ottoman, and Russian. Iranian Azerbaijan is largely comprised of ethno‐linguistic minority communities that are unevenly impacted by environmental hazards stemming from the lake's desiccation, and protests to save the lake are generally characterised as environmental conflict resulting from climate change or as a reflection of ethno‐nationalist tensions in Iran. These readings, however, fail to account for how imperial pasts and colonial presents shape exposure to environmental violence. This article posits that environmental violence functions as a form of coloniality and, using Lake Orumiyeh as an entry point, aims to: (i) examine coloniality in a country that was never formally colonised yet impacted by different formations of empire; (ii) account for subjectivities shaped through non‐Western European forms of imperialism; and (iii) connect racialised difference in Iran to the reproduction of colonial and racial logics vis‐à‐vis European imperialism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Between the second half of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century, the Indian Ocean became a theatre of the global war waged by European imperial states. This article compares how three colonial powers, in French, Danish, and British colonial territories, dealt with interconnected political threats, in a region where the limits of imperial sovereignty and jurisdictions were often blurred and frequently renegotiated. Rather than a formally sanctioned doctrine and legal category, deportation should be understood as a crude tool for solving a variety of problems. Although the forced removal of criminals, religious minorities or political opponents was not a new instrument to the late eighteenth century, it is often ignored that political deportation was also a widely used legal practice in the Indian Ocean during the 'age of revolutions'. In this region, deportation was used by imperial centres to get rid of political enemies, but also by regional authorities, without referring to metropolitan orders. It was usually not a judicial punishment, but an administrative measure justified in the name of political necessity. This article focuses on three small colonial enclaves, French Reunion, Danish Tranquebar, and British Pondicherry, where a siege mentality and fear of political sedition were omnipresent in this period. Contemporaries believed, with some justifications, that a single conspiracy linked these three colonial theatres, involving the same set of protagonists, who redeployed their projects as they were removed from one place to the next. But in these three sites and societies, deportation raises different issues. Dumping radicals on a foreign shore might have been a short-term fix, but it rarely solved problems in the long term: deportees often returned after some time, which was a direct consequence of the colonial authorities' reluctance to take irreparable decisions, and of the entanglement of empires and polities in the Indian Ocean. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In colonial Uruguay black slaves could supervise the work of white creoles and even hold the power to have their wages docked. To most historians this might seem puzzling and almost fictional in the context of the colonial Americas. This article makes sense of the puzzle by examining interactions between the economy and the environment on the Río de la Plata frontier. It argues that the natural world (soils, topography, climate, crops and animals) contributes to explain why this labour system existed, and also why it was efficient, contrary to the historiographical commonplace that enslaved workers would be unable to oversee free labourers effectively. Looking at the experience of both women and men through the lens of gender uncovers the parallels between the authority of these enslaved foremen over free male workers on the open range and their domestic authority over free women, whom they could marry. Their stories invite historians of other places and periods to foreground the environment in the set of structures that can either limit workers' autonomy or give them strength. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the representation of Gypsy/Travellers in Scottish museums using a decolonial perspective. Focusing on a case study of Jamie Macpherson's fiddle and its re-interpretation at the Clan Macpherson Museum in 2021, this article explores the value of using decolonial ideas to frame and interpret Scottish Gypsy/Traveller experience. It argues that, both historically and in the present, Scottish Gypsy/Travellers have been subject to racism and discrimination that are the product of colonialism and its continuing legacies. This theoretical framework of coloniality informed a collaborative project to re-interpret Jamie Macpherson's fiddle at the Clan Macpherson Museum, where the authors worked with activists and members of the Gypsy/Traveller community. The focal point of this re-interpretation was a piece of creative writing by Maggie McPhee, a Scottish Traveller, whose 'Heartbreak Through Her Eyes' re-imagined the story of Jamie Macpherson – hanged at Banff in 1700 for being an 'Egiptian' (Gypsy) – from the perspective of his mother. Centering the experience of both women and Gypsy/Travellers, Maggie McPhee's story demonstrated different ways of knowing the past. Drawing on recent feminist work in South America on the epistemologies of the South, we argue that storytelling such as Maggie's can become an act of decolonial resistance – a form of 'poetic knowledge' that can be an important part of broader efforts to decolonise museums. The enduring coloniality of anti-Gypsy/Traveller racism is challenged by the powerful and beautiful words of Maggie McPhee, centring the Gypsy/Traveller voice in ways that change our understanding of the past and fight racism in the present. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay considers the possibility of what I would call conjunctural translation. While literal translation has accelerated cultural ethnocentrism as well as settler colonial violence, conjunctural translation seeks to glimpse the possibility of solidarity buried beneath the collaborative rule among the empires. This essay first retraces colonial modernity in the British Caribbean and Britain. Reading the selected chapters from Familiar Stranger, I propose that this memoir registers the three phases of colonial modernity: transatlantic slavery, migration to metropolis, and the prison-house of identity politics. In contrast to this, literal translation was at the core of cultural ethnocentrism that underpinned colonial modernity in Korea and Japan. The second part of this essay explicates the relationship between colonialism and modernity in East Asia that is punctuated by the following three phases: settler colonialism, migration to metropolises, and the curtailment of identity and citizenship. In this case, each phase appeared as deprivation of land, migration to Japan and the crises of security, and the loss of nationality during the Cold War era. The last part of the essay concerns unpredictable connections between colonial modernities. Though separately formed in the transatlantic and transpacific regions, these modernities create crosscurrents of thought, struggles, defeats and victories: conjunctures. Published in the early 1950s, the writings of Martin Carter and C. L. R. James differently refer to the Korean War. By comparing their work, this essay concludes that the future of solidarity comes from 'the ability to be exposed'. As Hall unexpectedly encountered the Caribbean migrants in London in the key moments of his memoir, such conjunctural translation was undertaken by the Caribbean intellectuals of the 1950s. To expose oneself to these unexpected encounters is the very momentum that urges us to be vigilant to the dangers of literal translation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing essentially on David Spurr's The Rhetoric of Empire (1993), this article discusses the discursive mechanisms that accompany the practice of torture as described in Henri Alleg's La Question (1958). Examining the relation between these mechanisms and the broader discourses of colonialism and subjection, it shows that the inscription of colonial power on the injured and dehumanised body of the tortured is paralleled by the verbal denigration of these victims, reduced to a state of infantilism or, worse, animality, through verbal reflexes such as animalistic adjectives and tutoiement – a form of speech which consists in the use of the singular form of the second person (you) and which is usually reserved for children and those deemed not worthy of respect. More importantly, it argues that, rejecting both the victim status and the dehumanisation to which his jailers attempt to reduce him, Alleg shapes his own empowering rhetorical strategies, in turn debasing the torturers, ridiculing them, or mocking the colonial myths of chivalry and racial superiority. Instead of the latter, Alleg proposes a discourse of humanism and interracial brotherhood that conquers the violence he endures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article contributes to the debate on coloniality (Quijano 2000a, b) by analysing the case of Libya, an Italian colony from 1911 to 1943. It demonstrates how the triple form of domination – ontological, epistemological and political-military-administrative – to which Libya was subjected during Italian colonisation, has survived its end and persists to this day in the relations between Libya and the Western world. From an ontological perspective, the Italians developed a racist representation of the Libyans, which was both the cause and the consequence of a conscious disregard of its specificities. Today, domination endures in the label attributed to Libya as a 'failed state', along with a general disinterest in the complexity of its history and society. From an epistemological perspective, the production of knowledge about Libya was dominated by Western scholars. This led to a Western perspective in which the agency of the Libyans was often neglected and to the spread of analytical and conceptual frameworks that serve the imperialistic claims of Western powers. Some of these colonialist analytical frameworks still exist in academia today. From a political-military-administrative perspective, the tendency of the Italians to exacerbate internal divisions while simultaneously imposing an inefficient model of a unified state remains relevant. This article makes two contributions: it is a case study and a theoretical one. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between humanity and the soil is an increasingly important topic in social theory. However, conceptualisations of the soil developed by anticolonial thinkers at the high point of the movement for self-determination between the 1940s and the 1970s have remained largely ignored. This is a shame, not least because theorists like Eric Williams, Walter Rodney, Suzanne Césaire and Amílcar Cabral were concerned with the soil. Building on recent work on human-soil relations and decolonial ecology, we argue that these four thinkers conceptualised the connection between soil, empire, and anticolonial revolt. Williams and Rodney ground understanding of soil degradation in global relations of economic power, while Césaire and Cabral reconceptualise postcolonial nationhood in terms of the mutability and diversity of the soil. The article concludes by suggesting that these two anticolonial counterpoints, global connectivity and more-than-human identification, anticipate and deepen contemporary attempts to decolonise ecological thinking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Through the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) relocation program starting in 1952, the United States sought to terminate federal trust restrictions for American Indians and while relocating reservation and rural-residing Indigenous people to cities to be assimilated into the American "mainstream." I analyze the BIA's program as part of the specifically settler colonial structure of the U.S. state. Using primary and secondary sources, I ask what explains the BIA's shifting spatial strategies and imaginaries from the rise of the relocation program to its demise? The BIA's project derided reservations as fiscal burdens, depicted the postwar city as a place of "Indian freedom," engaged in gendered surveillance of Indigenous families, and negated Indigenous peoples' histories in U.S. cities. As the program ended, the BIA shifted rhetoric from assimilation to self-determination to maintain the settler colonial relation while paying lip service to critiques of the colonial tactics of relocation. These different moments of the relocation project articulated a type of dispossessory citizenship as a racial and empire state strategy of enacting and justifying settler colonialism. This work analyzes the settler colonial dimensions of the state and its technologies of violence and territory used when it presents itself as supposedly moving past its colonial past. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study redirects attention from English-speaking African diaspora stand-up productions to French and German language expressions of purposively selected comedians with recent immigration history from Africa performing within mainland Europe. Through a socio-historical interrogation of specific colonial histories and joke themes, the paper comparatively explores the French language stage acts of Fary Lopez, Samia Orosemane (France) and Cécile Djunga (Belgium and France) and the German language works of Dave Davis (Germany), Charles Nguela (Switzerland), and Soso Mugiraneza (Austria). The aim is to show how the individuated colonial histories of the nations in which these comics reside and the chronicles of their relations with Africa(ns) and Black peoples feature in joke formulations and satiric jibes of the jokesters. Through these explorations, this essay studies how stand-up comedy's transformative power challenges societal norms and attitudes using the backdrop of the concurrently heterogeneous and dissimilar colonial histories of the African continent and its diasporas. Moreover, through its focus on non-English expressions, it presents the unique intersections of language, "race," ethnicity and colonial histories, as well as the geographic and linguistic spread of the African diaspora beyond European nations with direct colonial contact with the continent. Thus, the enquiry posits joke performances as platforms for cultural expression and critique as well as a site within which African peoples negotiate their presence in non-African environments. Plain language summary: Examination of African diaspora stand-up comedy in German and French The study explores African diaspora stand-up comedy performances outside the English-speaking areas of the West. It studies the acts of six comedians of African origin performing in Western Europe, with a view to showing how the co-opt the histories of marginalization and discrimination against Black peoples in commenting on present-day racializations going on in the world today. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The research is a qualitative analysis of the names that were given to residential places in Zvishavane during the colonial period. It seeks to examine the politics of naming through an analysis of toponyms of Shabbanie Mashava Mines residential areas in a bid to unmask European Hegemony. The research is inspired by nommo, a tenet of Afrocentricity through the use of discourse analysis and semi-structured interviews with the elderly members of Zvishavane community who were mine employees during the colonial period, the research recognises that colonial residential place names of the then Shabbanie mines show the dichotomies that existed between the white population and the black population. The names were meant to communicate colonial ideologies which were meant to place the African race at the periphery and the European race at the centre. The environment that produced toponyms around Zvishavane town reveals an insatiable appetite for the valorisation of European memory and privileges. The study concludes that naming is not a haphazard endeavor, but rather, a weapon that was used in the colonial period to lampoon and castigate the Black race. Through names, the paper exposes the nature of relations that existed between Blacks and Whites. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The relationship between Chinese Indonesians and native Indonesians (Pribumi) is marred by tensions and violence. The Dutch colonial legacies have positioned Chinese Indonesians as perpetual outsiders, making them constantly question their roles and identity in the process of Indonesian nation-building. Despite their centuries-old presence and Indonesia's almost three decades of reform, prejudice towards Chinese Indonesians persists. This was reflected in the 2017 Indonesia National Survey Project, suggesting native Indonesians still perceive their Chinese Indonesian counterparts as an economically privileged group, greedy, selfish, and exclusive. Using integrated threat theory, this study explores the link between the perception of threats and prejudice towards Chinese Indonesians. Using multiple regression analysis, this study found stereotypes, realistic threats, history of intergroup conflicts, and age are strong predictors of prejudice towards the ethnic Chinese in Indonesia. Theoretical, methodological, and practical implications for integrated threat and prejudice are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the impact of colonialism on environmental disasters in the Caribbean, with a focus on the US Virgin Islands and St Vincent and the Grenadines. The authors argue that colonialism and slavery have influenced the environment and made Black and Indigenous communities more susceptible to disasters. In the US Virgin Islands, hurricanes have exposed the effects of colonialism and white supremacy, resulting in inadequate disaster response and unequal distribution of aid. In St Vincent, the eruption of the La Soufrière volcano highlighted the influence of colonialism on disaster response and the ongoing social inequalities stemming from the colonial past and political state. The authors emphasize that disasters expose and perpetuate layers of inequality in Caribbean islands, regardless of their political status. [Extracted from the article]

For W. E. B. Du Bois and Leslie Silko, ruins are sites of haunting pain and injustice as well as of liberatory hope and renovation. Reflecting on the image of the ruin in their writings against the backdrop of Romanticism, this article depicts two Romantic conceptions of ruins: the picturesque ruin and the Wordsworthian prophetic ruin. Against these contrasting employments of the ruin, the article discusses how Du Bois and Silko subvert the picturesque ruin and radically extend and transform the prophetic ruin. The article then claims that some ruins are so catastrophic, it is not much of an exaggeration to speak of a ruined planet due to such forces as white supremacy, settler colonialism, and climate change. The present article concludes by reflecting on the work of renovation—that is, rebuilding in the shadows of the ruin having learned from its lessons, history, and ghosts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

All children navigate the world by searching for information in their sociocultural contexts (e.g., schools, media, laws) to make sense of their experiences and potential futures. In doing so, Native children, however, must contend with the legacy and ongoing oppression of their Peoples, communities, and ways of being. In this manuscript, we highlight how sociocultural contexts stemming from settler colonialism undermine Native futures. We detail how settler colonialism, specifically its manifestation in acts of omission and misrepresentation, impacts children's self and identity development, and intergroup relations. We close by acknowledging the importance of understanding development in context, and the power that the representational landscape can have for promoting paths toward positive child development and greater equity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines coloniality of research and discusses the theoretical foundations, ethical imperatives, and practical ways for conducting decolonial research for justice. It emphasises the need to shift away from research paradigms and approaches that perpetuate coloniality to a commitment to embracing the complexities and challenges of conducting decolonial research. The article contributes to the broader discourse on decolonising knowledge production. Drawing on the works of scholars addressing disobedient and defiant research, the article advocates for transformative decolonial praxis, suggesting the need to reimagine research and displace the hegemony and dominance of Western knowledge systems, which marginalise and delegitimise other epistemological traditions. Beyond critiquing coloniality embedded within research, the article proposes practical ways to inform anti-colonial, anti-racist and anti-oppressive research practice. It argues that decolonial research requires defiance and resistance against non-relational, hierarchical, and extractive practices, involving critical examination of assumptions and values, centring non-Western voices and perspectives, dismantling coloniality and working towards social and epistemic justice in solidarity with Indigenous and other historically marginalised and oppressed groups. It calls researchers to integrate decolonial principles and frameworks into their research practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In his famous 1543 Treatise on Relics, Jean Calvin complained that if one were to gather all the purported pieces of the True Cross from the churches and cathedrals of Europe, it would ‘form a whole ship's cargo’. This comment not only highlights the questionable authenticity of relics, but also alludes to their inherent mobility. Indeed, as portable religious objects, relics played an essential role in the drive to export Christianity across the globe. Bound as it was to contemporary mercantile and colonial politics, Christian proselytization was imbricated with the circulation of material goods. Objects crafted in far off regions, such as Gujarat and Nagasaki, gained new life in European liturgical contexts. This essay examines imported caskets crafted from mother‐of‐pearl, tortoiseshell, and lacquer that were transformed into reliquaries on the Iberian Peninsula arguing that such reliquaries harnessed the established potency of the itinerant relic, while simultaneously inventing a new visual idiom that spoke to the precarity of the Catholic faith as it traversed great transoceanic distances. In so doing, it demonstrates the active role played by technologies of transit in the shaping of material and devotional culture in the early modern era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 1979 Bob Marley concert in Auckland, Aotearoa (New Zealand), inspired a generation of local musicians to make political reggae music. They articulated resistance to colonial legacies and systemic racism, locally and abroad. I propose that ambiguity in reggae music, manifested in relation to time and place, substantially contributes to its decolonizing potential. Useful ambiguity appears in the coexisting temporality of reggae rhythms and the way past and present are conflated. It also appears in the expression of decoloniality as a struggle without end through the place-related concepts of Tūrangawaewae (your place to stand) and Zion (spiritual homeland). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The fibula appeared in the Levant during the late second millennium bce and gradually replaced the toggle pin as the common accessory to fasten clothing. In this contribution, we trace the dissemination of fibulae in the southern Levant, pinpointing its chronology, the development of local variants and significant locales of consumption. The analysis of site-specific case studies suggests that the fibula was worn first by elites of the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah as part of a new fashion, and became popular among the members of the colonial society under the Assyrian empire. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rural Sociology has failed to incorporate Settler‐colonialism and Indigenous theory in studying rural social relations. This presents a serious gap in the discipline's conceptualization of land as the foundation of social reproduction. Indigenous theory provides rich insights about humans' relations among themselves and with the more‐than‐human that inform our understanding of Settler colonialism as a driver of social formation, and human–environmental interactions more generally. This paper, written by four Indigenous environmental social scientists and one Settler rural sociologist, invites the discipline to engage Indigeneity and Settler colonialism in methodologically, theoretically, and ethically appropriate ways. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the diplomatic and political efforts made by Florence to establish a significant institutional presence in Constantinople. It explores Florence's diplomatic relations with the Byzantine Empire, which are analysed in three distinct phases: the first, from the aftermath of the Fourth Crusade in 1204; the second, from 1421 to 1434, following the arrival of the Medici; and the third, from 1434, including the Ecumenical Council, to the fall of Constantinople in 1453. The research aims to provide an historical narrative and a comprehensive study of the origins and development of political contacts between Florence and the Byzantine Empire, an enquiry into the Florentine privileges granted in 1439, and a critical discussion of the genuine presence of a Florentine colony in the Byzantine capital. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article "An Eye for an Eye: Dickinson’s Vision and Emerson’s Visuality" explores the relationship between Ralph Waldo Emerson's transcendentalist ideas and Emily Dickinson's embodied visual experiences of nature. While Emerson's concept of the transparent eyeball symbolizes a union with nature and individual autonomy, Dickinson's poetry challenges this notion by focusing on personal encounters with nature. The article delves into how gender roles and imperialist ideology influenced their distinct perspectives on nature, highlighting Dickinson's critique of masculine dominance in American Romanticism. Through a comparison of visuality and vision, the article sheds light on the divergent approaches of Emerson and Dickinson towards nature and self-expression. [Extracted from the article]

This article discusses the purpose and development of the journal Ethnic & Racial Studies. The journal was created to provide a dedicated space for publishing discussions about key books and articles in the field of race and ethnic studies. The current issue includes papers on topics such as the changing meanings of race and conviviality, the use of graffiti and murals as a form of resistance in Palestine, and fan racism in sports. The issue also features two book symposia, one on Michèle Lamont's book "Seeing Others" and another on Ali Meghji's book "A Critical Synergy." The journal aims to continue publishing research papers, book symposia, and book reviews in future volumes. [Extracted from the article]

In this article, I propose uncanniness as a defining characteristic of return as I explore the settler colonial context of Palestine/Israel, where return has starkly ethno-nationalistic connotations. For Palestinians, return is associated with the liberation of Palestine, while for Israelis, it is part of Zionist foundational narratives. By explicating academic research and biographical literature, I consider how the concept of uncanny can further our understanding of what it means to return in this context, and beyond. Uncanniness brings attention to feelings of disorientation, strangeness, and not-at-homeness, and by approaching return as uncanny, I suggest, it is possible to tap into the volatility of "being-at-home" and thus unsettle exclusive and essentialist notions of belonging that define settler colonialism. Consequently, the article offers a way to consider return in a manner that gets from nostalgia to a new beginning and, in the settler colonial context of Palestine/Israel, from settler anxiety to decolonization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article "Decolonizing the English literary curriculum" explores the necessity of diversifying and decolonizing the English literary curriculum by moving away from a Eurocentric focus on British authors and colonial perspectives. Drawing on personal experiences in India, the author discusses the challenges of incorporating postcolonial perspectives into the curriculum to promote social justice and counter repressive forces. The text delves into the evolution of English literature curriculum in Indian universities, highlighting the complexities of incorporating diverse languages and cultures, particularly in African and Indigenous contexts. Emphasizing the importance of a culturally sensitive approach, the article calls for a reevaluation of traditional canons and a more inclusive approach to literature education in post-colonial societies. [Extracted from the article]

Through a narrativization that connects heterogeneous and often undetected social lives in Bogotá, Colombia, this article charts the rhizomatic spatial crossings of continuously mobile urban trajectories, the often-unsettled forms of dwelling that they inhabit, and their capacity to make place despite the dismantling of community cohesion and the necropolitical forms of urbanity operated by racial capitalism and coloniality across Latin America – what the article refers to as relational territories, drawing on a rich scholarship on Black Geographies of the everyday and Latin American ‘territorios’. From there, the article explores how paths are being charted out of the racial-colonial maze of Latin America’s city-making, through multiple forms of ordinary resistance/re-existence that create life in the interstices of ongoing necro-politics . Ultimately, the article shows how this pluralistic repertoire mobilized from the urban margins not only points to the difficulties of emplacement for Afro-descendant dwellers in Latin American cities but also to the possibility of respatialising the urban from the decolonial relationality of Améfrica. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, I illustrate the interplay between infrastructure and racialised differentiation through the case of the Maya Train—a contentious megaproject aimed at constructing 1,554 km of rail tracks across southeast Mexico, led by the López Obrador federal administration. Drawing on an analysis of narratives produced by the state, I argue that the Maya Train sustains and reproduces racial capitalism. The argument is developed by putting Gargi Bhattacharyya's and Nancy Fraser's understanding of the racial capitalism framework in conversation with Mónica Moreno Figueroa's conceptualisation of mestizaje. I show how the Maya Train functions as a project of mestizaje by promising homage, social justice, and development while also acting as a homogenising and oppressive force. The racialising practices embedded in the megaproject reproduce and extend colonial legacies in a heartland of expropriation and are transformed into materiality through the power of the state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focusing on constructions of food security in settler colonial contexts, this article demonstrates how its contemporary conceptualization is heir to long-standing schemes to reform Indigenous peoples and validate state projects. It highlights how discursive regimes of food security in the areas of health, conservation, and economics were conceived within frameworks that instruct Indigenous peoples as to correct behaviour, blame them for their misconduct, and ignore the role of settler states and populations in defining notions of right and wrong and in creating the conditions that promote and sustain those definitions. Ignorance, blame, and indoctrination are thus constitutive features of state interventions aimed at promoting Indigenous peoples’ food security. Using instructional publications directed at Inuit, the article demonstrates how, through the provision of services, and in the exercise of settler nation-building, Indigenous peoples have been subjected to programmes of indoctrination and ideological pacification whilst larger contexts of dispossession are bracketed out. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Underpinned by Romantic wilderness ideals and American settler colonialism, recurring themes of "conquest culture" in outdoor adventure--social privilege, individualism, and exploitation--are carried out on social media. This study explores how an emerging topic, microadventures, may reinforce or resist these dominant discourses in outdoor adventure. Facebook and Instagram posts tagged "#microadventure" were collected and analyzed using a qualitative critical social media content analysis informed by Hall's (1973) Theory of Encoding and Decoding. We found that half of the posts reinforced conquest culture, while the other half resisted. The discussion of our findings, framed as a critique of neoliberalism, seeks to interrogate, from a U.S. perspective, how conquest culture is perpetuated by representations of adventure across the global social media landscape. Our findings suggest the need to deconstruct market-driven, colonial tendencies in outdoor social media by (1) confronting dominant conquest discourses and (2) (re)constructing neoliberal tendencies in the outdoor field. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historical interest in the ideologies behind the 'first' British empire have tended, for very understandable reasons, to look towards the colonies of the eastern seaboard of North America and the Caribbean. By contrast, this study of the imperial vision held by the English philosopher and politician Francis Bacon (1561–1626) emphasises a different geography of empire. In an investigation of what Bacon took to be the implications of the union of the kingdoms of England and Scotland in the person of King James VI & I, and in the pacification of Ireland following the conclusion of the Nine Years' War in 1603 and the Flight of Earls in 1607, it argues that Bacon's own imperial ambitions were ultimately directed towards the annexation of the Low Countries and the founding of a new British imperium in western Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

After the rise of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in 2014 and the fight of both Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga forces as well as the Syrian Kurdish forces of the People's Protection Units (YPG, Yekîneyên Parastina Gel) and the Women's Protection Units (YPJ, Yekîneyên Parastina Jin) against them, Western journalists tried to gather information quickly. Locals were happy to share as much as possible, as ISIS was a great danger. As an often forgotten population under permanent occupation seeking visibility, the Kurds allow Westerners unparalleled access to the field and provide unpaid or underpaid labor, hoping that the world will see their struggle. This deepened the disparity between Kurdish journalists, academics, and writers and their Western counterparts. Using postcolonial theory on the mindset of colonialized peoples, this article shows how the fear of being forgotten, the material disparity between colonizers and colonized, and the coloniality of local political actors are obstacles for Kurdish professionals. Looking at a focus‐group discussion and two interviews with Kurdish journalists, fixers, and translators from Iraq and Syria, the comparison shows that both autonomous regions are projects that sought to end decades of occupation and now face challenges that show similarities and differences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the overlooked dimension of Ottoman colonialism through an analysis of resource extraction in the Keban and Ergani mines during the early modern era. Situated in the Kurdistan province, these mines played a pivotal role in furnishing essential minerals for the Ottoman state's fiscal and military exigencies. Departing from conventional narratives, which often emphasize discursive practices or focus solely on settler colonialism, the study adopts an extractive colonialism framework to reveal the intricate relationship between imperialism, resource exploitation, and i ndigenous resistance. Ultimately, it contributes to the burgeoning literature on the coloniality of Kurdistan by providing empirical evidence of economic exploitation, environmental degradation, and the erosion of local autonomy in the face of heightened state centralization, control, and economic expansion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Christian complicity in colonialism and the need for truth telling and reconciliation with Indigenous peoples have been a central focus of academic theological research shared at the Canadian Theological Society in recent years. Many Canadian churches have offered official apologies and made formal commitments to right relations with Indigenous peoples. This paper considers the experience of "people in the pews." Taking a diffuse visual art installation of white ceramic feathers as a starting point, it traces the contours of how local congregations in the Anglican Diocese of Ottawa are engaged with truth and reconciliation intellectually, emotionally, and actively. It names the need to bridge the gaps between academic theology and lived theology, and official church statements and everyday practices in congregations. It invites academic theologians to consider the questions: To whom are we listening? Who is listening to us? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Far beyond the contributions of African and western thought on the right to freedom of expression, there are now normative developments under international human rights law on how states can protect online expression. However, these developments are not applied in African countries. A reason for this is the extant provisions in various laws that threaten online expression. This article applies postcolonial legal theory to understand why and how these provisions threaten online expression in African countries. It identifies relevant thoughts on the right to freedom of expression, normative developments on the right and a new form of digital colonialism in Africa. It concludes that for African states and other actors to combat this new form of digital colonialism head-on, they must carry out targeted legal reform that repeals and amends these provisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article delves into the historical meeting between Antonio Garra and Juan Antonio Chem'yuleqa Kústakik in 1851, as they sought to form an alliance against United States' settlement in California. It explores the diplomatic relations between the Cahuilla and Kúpangaxwicham nations, emphasizing their sovereignty and coalition-building efforts. The text also examines the impact of Spanish and Mexican colonization on the region, detailing how Indigenous nations navigated alliances and conflicts to maintain autonomy. Leaders like Garra and Kústakik strategically formed alliances with neighboring nations and colonial powers to protect their sovereignty, showcasing their resilience in the face of colonization. [Extracted from the article]

The author index from the journal "Technology & Culture" for Volume 65 (2024) offers a comprehensive list of authors, titles, and reviewers of books and articles on diverse topics such as media, cultural history, and scientific agriculture. The reviews provide insights into global perspectives on technology and culture, covering subjects like gendered labor, global health, energy transition, and regional histories of technology. Each review offers a critical analysis of the content, contributing to a deeper understanding of the complex relationships between technology, society, and culture. [Extracted from the article]

This article discusses an inclusive research program where colleagues and co-researchers (with intellectual disability) guide and inform future research practice to ensure research is targeted to areas of significance and relevance to them. The research program is about sites of former disability institutions. Many people with intellectual disability in Australia were segregated and forced to live in disability institutions until deinstitutionalisation efforts became mainstream in the late 20th Century. We are a team of four people based in New South Wales, Australia. Our team includes disability advocates and researchers who have contributed to a program of research exploring connections between sites of former disability institutions and contemporary disability rights. In this article, we reflect on conversations about our research undertaken so far and where the research goes from here. We explore five pillars of action informing how research relating to disability institutions can progress: 1. Current use: research exploring erasure of experiences of institutionalisation communicated through educational resources and maps about current use of sites of former disability institutions; 2. Reparative planning processes: research developing frameworks for alternative approaches to planning and heritage processes supporting alternative uses of former sites of disability institutions; 3. Official recognition and redress: research exploring perspectives on governments formally recognising and remedying experiences of people with disability who were institutionalised; 4. Community-led repair and remembrance: research identifying practices for both celebrating advocates with disability and reckoning with and repairing familial and social bonds broken through institutionalisation; 5. Community-inclusive practices: research exploring endurance of institutional practices in disability accommodation in community settings. These five pillars are underpinned by three foundational layers: advancing disability human rights; reckoning with intersections between disability institutions and settler colonialism, other dynamics of oppression, and eugenics; and using inclusive practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the current global landscape, characterized by religious fervour, social and political unrest, economic instability, and environmental challenges, spiritual leaders stand as pivotal agents of change. Their role is especially crucial in contexts marred by ingrained injustices and persistent conflicts, such as the Palestinian–Israeli settler colonial context—a reality I have been intimately involved with over three decades of reconciliation work. This paper contextualizes scholarship on spiritual leadership within the Palestinian–Israeli context by integrating it with settler colonial theory. By applying insights about spiritual leadership to this context, three key traits of spiritual leaders—(1) spiritual authority, (2) discernment, and (3) the ethical use of power—are identified as essential for envisioning an alternative future. By embodying these traits, spiritual leaders can effectively guide their communities through the multifaceted realities, advocating a transformative approach to leadership and interreligious work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sense of place has become relevant in Latin America in recent decades. Although many scholars have looked at people‐place relationships there, language barriers have limited the international exposure of these studies. By assembling a collection of works mainly published in Spanish and Portuguese, we trace the fields of research where the concept has taken root and reflect upon the regional characteristics of sense of place. Overall, this review provides empirical insights into the human experience of place in a culturally diverse region marked by historical injustices, inequalities, and instability. These structures have created specific, often ambivalent senses of place, organized around resistance and adaptation. A more nuanced understanding of sense of place, which emphasizes the richness and complexities of people‐place connections, will help avoid oversimplification and idealization in future theories. To frame our analysis, we investigate sense of place from the perspective of humanistic geography. Overlapping with other non‐representational inquiries, the humanistic lens focuses on human‐environment relationships—encompassing experiences, behaviors, ideas, and feelings—to deepen our understanding of the intricate and multifaceted human condition and the essential role of place in human life. Our review shows that sense of place has proven helpful in shedding light on critical Latin American socio‐spatial phenomena such as mobilities, territorialities, and fear. Regionally, researchers center on marginalized and oppressed senses of place framed by longstanding structural inequalities stemming from a colonial legacy, capitalism, and neoliberalism. We highlight "geographies of terror," "diabolic places," and "necroplaces" as powerful categories that address the grim reality in the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article "After rights? Politics, ethics, aesthetics: an introduction" published in the International Journal of Human Rights explores the complexities of human rights in the aftermath of disposability and abandonment. The authors and contributors critically examine the limitations of liberal rights frameworks and question the effectiveness of human rights in addressing issues of abandonment, precarity, and debility. Through interdisciplinary perspectives, the article delves into the implications of thinking 'after rights' and calls for a radical reimagining of human rights beyond traditional frameworks. The contributors highlight the need to reconfigure the understanding of rights, engage in reparative practices, and envision alternative futures that go 'after rights' while acknowledging the ongoing struggles and complexities of the present. [Extracted from the article]

This article focuses on the concept of refusal, particularly as it has been developed within critical Black studies and critical Indigenous studies within anthropology and beyond. It argues that while both Foucauldian and Gramscian frames have generated often exquisite analyses of the animations and counter-animations of power, they have not, in a general sense, sufficiently attended to the foundational processes that charted the possibilities of modern personhood and political life not only in the West but globally. Nor did they tend to acknowledge the genealogies of Black and Indigenous radical thought that were informing approaches to political life within these communities, locally and transnationally. I contend that any significant reformulation of the discipline of anthropology must deliberate anew about the logics and mechanisms of political struggle in a way that recognizes and foregrounds—in nuanced and dynamic ways—the ongoing coloniality and racism that constitute the afterlives (and still lives) of conquest. Refusal provides inroads to this project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses the relevance of the journal Lotus: Afro-Asian Writings, a trilingual (Arabic, English, French) quarterly published by the Afro-Asian Writers Association from 1968 to 1991, for the development of critical and anticolonial pedagogies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This teaching tool is based on Savera (Dawn), a left-wing literary periodical published quarterly on the Indian subcontinent from 1946 onward under the leadership of the Progressive Writers' Movement. The tool foregrounds the genealogy of "critical realism," a revolutionary form of Urdu realism that perpetuated the movement's aim of bringing about social transformation in a former colony by critiquing India's indigenous conceptions of class, gender, nationalism, language, and religion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]