Thinking against empire: Anticolonial thought as social theory

2023/01/15 by Julian Go · 81 citations
Social Sciences · #Aesthetics #Anthropological Studies and Insights #Anthropology #Contemporary Sociological Theory and Practice #Empire #Epistemology #Gender studies #Historical sociology #Indigenous #Law #Philosophy #Political science #Politics #Social and Cultural Dynamics #Social science #Social thought #Sociology #Solidarity #Vision

paper · pdf · doi:10.1111/1468-4446.12993

published in British Journal of Sociology 74(3), 279-293 (Wiley)

openalex publication_date 2023/01/15 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01

Abstract

Sociology was born in the late 19th and early 20th centuries as a project in, of, and for empire. This essay excavates a tradition of social thought that grew alongside metropolitan sociology but has been marginalized by it: anticolonial thought. Emerging from anticolonial movements, writers and thinkers, anticolonial thought in 19th and 20th centuries emerged from a variety of thinkers (from indigenous activists in the Americas to educated elites in the American, Francophone and British colonies). I argue that this body of thought offers distinct visions of society, social relations, and social structure, along with generative analytic approaches to the social self, social solidarity and global relations-among other themes. Anticolonial thought offers the basis for an alternative canon and corpus of sociological thinking to which we might turn as we seek to revitalize and decolonize sociology.

Cited by

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• Reverberations of Empire: How the Colonial Past Shapes the Present
• A Turn Against Empire: Benito Juárez’s Liberal Rejoinder to the French Intervention in Mexico
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• Expanding Possibilities for Inclusive Research: Learning from People with Profound Intellectual and Multiple Disabilities and Decolonising Research
• Normativity is not a replacement for theory
• Does India need saving from psychotherapy?
• Anti-colonial thought and global social theory. [europepmc]
• Ida B. Wells-Barnett as an anticolonial theorist on crime and punishment. [europepmc]
• The Outsider Within. Anticolonial Critiques of Humanity and the Cosmopolitan Vision. [europepmc]
• Decolonizing the Global: Contested Cosmopolitanisms in Global Queer Activism. [europepmc]

Related

• Anticolonialism and Social Thought
• The Outsider Within. Anticolonial Critiques of Humanity and the Cosmopolitan Vision
• ON DECOLONIZING THE SOCIAL SCIENCES
• Bringing imperialism back in: for an anthropology against empire in the twenty-first century
• Syed Hussein Alatas and decolonising social theory: From the lazy native to the captive mind