Knowledge hegemonies and autonomous knowledge

Abstract

With the emergence of the modern social sciences in the nineteenth century came recognition of the problem of knowledge imperialism both in the imperial centres and in the colonised world, understood to be inseparably tied up with the dominant orientation in knowledge production, Eurocentrism. This orientation is still held to dominate the various disciplines in the humanities and social sciences. While there is much consensus over this characterisation of the problem, the assumption that the central ideological problem in knowledge production is that of Eurocentrism is not sound. There are several other hegemonic orientations that affect knowledge production in the Third World, many of which predate the colonial period by centuries and have little to do with the colonial experience. These include androcentrism, traditionalism, culturalism, ethnonationalism and sectarianism. If this is true, then the task of decolonising knowledge is far from sufficient. For this reason, scholars in the Malay world speak of the need to generate autonomous knowledge – that is, knowledge that is autonomous from not only Eurocentric but also other hegemonic orientations. This article discusses the dominant hegemonic orientation in knowledge production in our times and the response to these in terms of the idea of autonomous knowledge.

Keywords:

• Autonomous knowledge
• hegemonic orientations
• Eurocentrism
• androcentrism
• traditionalism
• ethnonationalism

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 For some exceptions see Maznah Mohamad and Wong (1994) and Norhayati Ab Rahman (2016).

2 It is not the aim of this paper to discuss how social scientific knowledge is produced and why certain orientations are more dominant as opposed to others, or how these relate to power. These questions have been dealt with in the literature, particularly in the sociology of knowledge and the history of ideas. See Mannheim (1936), Foucault (1980) and S. F. Alatas (2006, ch. 7).

3 For an exception see Ahmad (1979).

4 See also N. A. A. Rahman (2009, 111).

5 Noor Aisha Abdul Rahman, personal communication, Singapore, 18 July 2018.

6 See also the chapters by Sinha on Harriet Martineau, Pandita Ramabai and Florence Nightingale in S. F. Alatas and Sinha (2017).

7 The Alatas referred to in the third person in this article is not the author, but the author’s father, the late Syed Hussein Alatas (1928–2007).

8 For Alatas’ biography see M. Alatas (2010).

9 Noor Aisha Abdul Rahman, personal communication, 28 July 2018.

10 Ibid.

11 For more on this see S. F. Alatas (2010).

12 See also Nery (2012). For more on the Alatas tradition as decolonial, see Mignolo (2014).

13 It is true that not only knowledge but the structures within which knowledge is produced – that is, universities, research institutes and schools of thought – may be defined as Eurocentric and need to be critiqued. For example, given the colonial origins and uses of anthropology and ­sociology, it may be insufficient to set these up as decolonised disciplines. It may be argued that we should abolish the distinction between the two and set up departments of say, the science of human society (Ibn Khaldun’s designation of the science he discovered). The same critique can be levelled at the idea of a school of thought. The assumption in this section is that there is a dimension to the idea of a school of thought that is not Eurocentric or culture-bound but universal.

14 For another discussion on Alatas’ views on autonomous knowledge see Maia (2014).

15 See also Wright (2002a, 2002b).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Syed Farid Alatas

Syed Farid Alatas is Professor of Sociology at the National University of Singapore, and Visiting Professor in the Department of Anthropology & Sociology, University of Malaya. He headed the Department of Malay Studies at NUS from 2007 until 2013. He lectured at the University of Malaya in the Department of Southeast Asian Studies prior to joining NUS. He has authored numerous books and articles, including Ibn Khaldun (Oxford University Press, 2013); Applying Ibn Khaldun: The Recovery of a Lost Tradition in Sociology (Routledge, 2014); and (with Vineeta Sinha) Sociological Theory Beyond the Canon (Palgrave, 2017). His areas of interest are the sociology of Islam, social theory, religion and reform, intra- and inter-religious dialogue, and the study of Eurocentrism.