Decoloniality and the Politics of History

Decolonization is the historical struggle for national sovereignty against colonialism. By contrast, decoloniality is an epistemological category that takes colonialism as constitutive of modernity. It seeks to dismantle colonialist frameworks of thinking and sensing, delinking from colonialism's habits, forms of life, and subjectivities. As an analytic, decoloniality concerns the reconstruction and restitution of histories excluded from the universalist frameworks of modernity. As a programmatic, it establishes a pluriversal epistemology. This series of panels placed the frameworks by which we produce historical knowledge at its center.

Conference hosted by the Department of Art History & Archaeology and the Institute of Latin American Studies at Columbia University with support from the Institute for Studies on Latin American Art (ISLAA) and the Society of Fellows at Columbia University. Organized by Alex Alberro and Pujan Karambeigi. Poster by the artist Andreas Siekmann.

PROGRAM

APRIL 29: KEYNOTE
11 AM–12:30 PM
Walter D. Mignolo, Duke University, Literature
Moderator: Alex Alberro, Columbia University, Art History

APRIL 30: PANEL 1
11 am – 1 pm
Mediating the Vernacular
Julia Bryan-Wilson, University of California, Berkeley, Art History
Rosalind C. Morris, Columbia University, Anthropology
Moderator: Anooradha Iyer Siddiqi, Barnard College, Architecture History

MAY 7: PANEL 2
11 AM–1 PM
Indigenous Cultural Production
Elvira Espejo Ayca, Former Director, Museum of Ethnography and Folklore, La Paz
Max Jorge Hinderer Cruz, Former Director, Museo Nacional de Arte de La Paz
Pablo Lafuente, Artistic Director, Museo de Arte Moderna do Rio de Janeiro
Moderator: Alessandra Russo, Columbia University, LAIC

MAY 14: PANEL 3
11 AM–1 PM
Politics of Hybridity
María Josefina Saldaña-Portillo, New York University, Social and Cultural Analysis
Allison Bigelow, University of Virginia, Spanish
Moderator: Pujan Karambeigi, Columbia University, Art History

MAY 21: PANEL 4
11 AM–1 PM
A Hemispheric Lens
Alice Creischer, Artist, Berlin
Silvia Federici, Hofstra University, Social Science
María Galindo, Artist, La Paz
Moderator: Naeem Mohaiemen, Columbia University, Society of Fellows

MAY 28: PANEL 5
11 AM–1 PM
Threads of Labor
Verónica Gago, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Sociology
Ana María León, University of Michigan, Art History
Moderator: Reinhold Martin, Columbia University, GSAPP