Geographies of the Pluriverse: Decolonial Thinking and Ontological Conflict on Colombia’s Pacific Coast

Abstract

Recent debates in decolonial thinking have engaged the notion of the pluriverse to question the concept of universality at the heart of Western epistemology and hermeneutics that has historically underpinned processes of colonial domination and exploitation. The idea of the pluriverse calls for a coexistence of many worlds as an acknowledgment of the entanglements of diverse cosmologies. These entanglements are often of a conflictual nature, in that different ways of being in the world are intricately linked through the colonial matrix of power, leading to what has been termed ontological conflicts. Although much of this literature on decoloniality is highly sophisticated on a conceptual level, it often displays a dearth of ethnographic evidence, which would strengthen its theoretical claims. In this article I attend to this critique by first reviewing the principal arguments regarding the pluriverse and ontological conflicts to then offer an in-depth examination of what such a pluriverse might actually look like in particular places. For this I examine the world in the Pacific coast region of Colombia that is constituted through what I call the aquatic space—an assemblage of relations resulting from human entanglements with an aquatic environment characterized by intricate river networks, significant tidal ranges, and labyrinthine mangrove swamps. This aquatic space, I argue, has informed the political organization of Afro-Colombian communities in the region in a conflict with capitalist modernity, which, crucially, is not merely about land rights and resource extraction but an ontological conflict over ways of being in the world. I finish by suggesting that the pluriverse constitutes a third space, challenging our accustomed ways of thinking spatially and ontologically. Key Words: Afro-Colombia, aquatic space, coloniality of power, modernity, third space.

去殖民思想中的晚近辩论, 涉入“多元世界（pluriverse）”的概念, 质问位于西方认识论与诠释学核心的普适性概念, 该概念在历史上支持了殖民支配与剥削的过程。多元世界的概念, 召唤诸多世界的共存, 作为承认多样的宇宙论的纠葛。此般纠葛经常具有冲突的本质, 其中存在于世的不同方式, 在本质上通过殖民的权力母体相互连结, 导致所谓的本体论冲突。尽管此般去殖民性的文献在概念上高度复杂, 但其经常显示出民族志证据的不足, 而后者则能够强化其理论宣称。我于本文中, 首先通过回顾有关多元世界与本体论冲突的主要主张, 接着提供此般多元世界在特定地方中实际上是什麽模样的深度检视, 以此关照上述批判。为此, 我检视哥伦比亚的太平洋沿岸地区的世界, 该世界通过我所谓的水空间构成——一个由人类和以错综復杂的河流网络、显着的潮间带, 以及万花筒般的红树林沼泽为特徵的水环境的纠葛所造成的关系凑组。我主张, 此一水空间告知了该区域非裔哥伦比亚社群的政治组织, 该社群与资本主义现代性有所冲突, 而该冲突之关键不仅只是关乎土地权利与资源榨取, 更是关乎存在于世的本体论冲突。我于结论中提出多元世界构成了第三空间, 并挑战了我们习以为常的空间和本体论思考方式。关键词：非裔哥伦比亚, 水空间, 权力的殖民性, 现代性, 第三空间。

Recientes debates sobre pensamiento descolonial han enfrentado la noción del pluriverso para cuestionar el concepto de universalidad en el corazón de la epistemología y la hermenéutica occidentales que históricamente han apoyado los procesos de dominación y explotación colonial. La idea del pluriverso propende por una coexistencia de muchos mundos como un reconocimiento de los enredos de diversas cosmologías. Estos líos a menudo son de naturaleza conflictiva, en cuanto diferentes maneras de estar en el mundo están intrincadamente ligadas a través de la matriz del poder colonial, conduciendo a lo que se ha denominado conflictos ontológicos. Si bien mucha de esta literatura sobre descolonialidad es altamente sofisticada a nivel conceptual, despliega a menudo una pobreza de evidencia etnográfica, que podría fortalecer sus reclamos teóricos. En este artículo me ocupo de esta crítica primero revisando los principales argumentos con relación al pluriverso y los conflictos ontológicos, para luego ofrecer un examen a profundidad sobre la apariencia que el tal pluriverso podría realmente exhibir en lugares particulares. Para esto examino el mundo de la región costera del Pacífico de Colombia, constituida a través de lo que denomino espacio acuático—un ensamblaje de relaciones que resultan de los enredos humanos con un entorno acuático caracterizado por intrincadas redes fluviales, rangos de marea significativos y el laberinto de los pantanos de manglar. Este espacio acuático, sostengo, ha influido la organización política de las comunidades afrocolombianas de la región en conflicto con la modernidad capitalista, que, crucialmente, no es apenas sobre derechos a la tierra y la extracción de recursos, sino un conflicto ontológico sobre las maneras de ser en el mundo. Termino sugiriendo que el pluriverso constituye un tercer espacio, desafiando nuestras maneras de pensar espacial y ontológicamente.

Palabras clave:

• afro-Colombia
• espacio acuático
• colonialidad de poder
• modernidad
• tercer espacio

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

Notes

1 Although I mostly reference work here that appears in the English language, it should be noted that many of these conversations take place in Latin America in the original Spanish language and have not been translated into English, a notable exception being a special issue of Cultural Studies (Vol. 21, No. 2–3, 2007) that is dedicated to globalization and the decolonial option. The Colombian journal Tabula Rasa has become an important publication vehicle for ideas on decoloniality coming from Latin American scholars (see http://www.revistatabularasa.org/).

2 Figures quoted are generally accepted estimates, because Colombia’s census data are far from reliable. The latest census of 2005, for example, claims that Afro-Colombians make up 10.5 percent of the national population, a considerable jump in recognition compared to the 1.5 percent reportedly found twelve years earlier. Most observers today, however, estimate this figure to be closer to 26 percent (Wade 2002, 6; Ng’weno 2007, 102).

3 The New York Times published a beautiful video filmed in the Iscuandé area of the southern Pacific coastline that shows the process of shellfish picking in the mangroves, available at https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/18/opinion/colombia-swimming-lesson-mangroves-dulce.html.

4 In addition to the tide, rainfall patterns have a significant impact on the ability to travel, particularly in locations further upstream, where otherwise dry or low-depth riverbeds are only navigable during and immediately after intense bouts of rainfall. I thank one of the three reviewers of this article for pointing out this nuance.

5 Comadre literally means godmother. Among Afro-Colombians the expression is also used to establish a strong mutual relation of trust and friendship, which was the case between Doña Celia and me when we came to address each other as compadre and comadre.

6 For a recent account of the region’s conflict as seen through the traveling eye of one of Colombia’s most respected sociologists and journalists, see Molano’s (2017) De Río en Río: Vistazo a los Territorios Negros.

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Notes on contributors

Ulrich Oslender

ULRICH OSLENDER is an Associate Professor of Geography in the Department of Global & Sociocultural Studies at Florida International University, Miami, FL 33199. E-mail: [email protected]. His research interests include critical geopolitics; the geographies of social movements—with an emphasis on Latin America, particularly Colombia—geopolitical discourses on development, displacement, terror, and the connections between them; and the cultural politics of blackness in Latin America.