Epistemic Agency Under Oppression

• Published in: Philosophical papers (Grahamstown) Vol. 49; no. 2; pp. 233 - 251
• Main Author: Pohlhaus, Gaile
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Routledge 03.05.2020
• ISSN: 0556-8641; 1996-8523
• DOI: 10.1080/05568641.2020.1780149

The literature on epistemic injustice has been helpful for highlighting some of the epistemic harms that have long troubled those working in area studies that concern oppressed populations. Nonetheless, a good deal of this literature is oriented toward those in a position to perpetrate injustices, rather than those who historically have been harmed by them. This orientation, I argue, is ill-suited to the work of epistemic decolonization. In this essay, I call and hold attention to the epistemic interests of those who are epistemically marginalized on account of relations of dominance and oppression. To do so, I draw on Kristie Dotson's work, which uses a systems approach focused on epistemic agency. I develop Dotson's insights further to argue that epistemic inclusions may be just as pernicious as epistemic exclusions Specifically, I highlight some of the ways in which epistemic agents can be included in epistemic systems in a manner that is epistemically exploitative-extracting epistemic labor coercively or in ways that are distinctly non-reciprocal. I then turn to María Lugones' distinction between horizontal and vertical practices to discuss avenues of resisting both exclusions and inclusions that thwart the epistemic agency of marginalized knowers.