WISC-IRIIS Exploratory Workshop: Alternative Cosmologies and Knowledge Systems in International Relations

PhISO will join the 2nd exploratory workshop on "Alternative Cosmologies and Knowledge Systems in International Relations" organized by the World International Studies Committee (WISC) and by the Institute for Research on India and International Studies (IRIIS). It will be held on 11-13 January 2016 in New Delhi, India. PhISO will be represented by Nassef whose research proposal was accepted by the review panel. In addition, he will lobby PhISO 's application for membership to WISC before formal discussion takes place in Atlanta, USA on March 2016.

 

 

This Global South workshop will discuss the following points:

 

- Critically interrogates both epistemological and ontological standpoints for knowledge creation in International Relations, with due recognition to the inherent multiplicity of ontologies.

 

- Draws upon the historical pasts of different civilizations including the Indian, the Chinese, the Egyptian, the Aztec, the Maya or the Inca located in the Global South or, those located in the recessive margins of the Global North such as the Aboriginal and Indigenous people of the North and South Americas and Australia, for devising new (alternate?) knowledge practices in International Relations.

 

- Explores ways to expose, unravel and, possibly transform the deeply embedded practices of ‘othering’ in International Relations that work through inscribing a whole range of binaries such as ‘men versus native’, ‘men versus women’, ‘white (wo)man versus black (wo)man’ to ‘reason versus belief’, ‘objective versus subjective’, ‘order versus chaos’, north vs south and ‘primitive’ vs ‘modern’—all of which are cast in an explicit or implicit hierarchy where the ‘self’ or the first category is privileged, most often also de-legitimizing the ‘other’.

See the results of the first exploratory workshop here.