Mohan Dutta: Culture-Centered Approach

As noted in ths history of colonial Empires, the language and methodology of "science" have often been used to systematically turn human beings into populations to be studied and scripted, into subjects of interventions, as passive objects to be examined through the methodology of the scientist. The collection of systematic processes has in such instances been set in motion in order to precisely carry out the colonial project through the generation of knowledge. The ways in which knowledge has been produced have been intrinsically connected with the uses of such knowledge to perpetuate the oppression and exploitation of the subaltern classes, simultaneously keeping the subaltern sectors of the globe out of the discursive spaces of the mainstream. It is in this very backdrop that the native is once again silenced because she is told that she can't participate unless she trains with the masters, uses their tools, and speaks their language. The legitimacy of science is used ...

Just heard of one of these social scientists (who is known for making blanket statements) making some claim in a class that "there is no such thing as culture." This bright young mind (who truly believes he is a scientist in a lab coat and can measure things like skin color to predict social behavior) noted that culture doesn't exist because it can't be defined. In terms of epistemology, this raises a vital question regarding how social scientists think of the legitimacy of the science they do: To the extent they can define something, lay it out (they call it operationalization), and come to an agreement about it (which is mostly some privileged white men and women sitting around a table/journal/conference panel/review panel), the thing comes to existence. So from this standpoint, having some privilege and then using the privilege to come to an agreement is what constitutes the valdity of a concept. What I find insightful in this logic is the agenda of neocolonial...