Colonialism Archives - Public Seminar

Colonization

The US Should Only Support a Multiethnic, Nonsectarian Israel

If Israel chooses to continue its current course, it should do it alone, without our funding

February 13, 2024 • by Stephen Zacks

Whether or not it sways Netanyahu, we should certainly withhold military funding now and make our support contingent on clearly stated humanitarian objectives and an ultimate governing framework that conforms to our ideas of justice....

The US Should Only Support a Multiethnic, Nonsectarian Israel

Colonization

Beyond Colonialism in a Sentimental Mood

Éric Vuillard’s new book punctures the curious French nostalgia for Indochina

December 4, 2023 • by Albert Nguyen

Empires tend to create a rosy picture of the past, conveniently ignoring the atrocities they inflicted. Vuillard avoids this trap, in a witty manner. ...

Beyond Colonialism in a Sentimental Mood

Climate & Ecology

A Globe, Clothing Itself with Ears

Stories of speaking with animals are as old as human history

November 3, 2022 • by Karen Bakker

Human ambivalence about animal language persists and is linked with our uncertainty about human status: Are we one animal among others, or does something truly set us apart? Debates over animal language are a touchstone for human uncertainties about our role in the cosmos....

Announcements

Decolonizing Psychology: Applications in Research & Clinical Practice

A three-session online conference presented by the department of psychology at The New School for Social Research

October 23, 2020 • by Andre Broussard

Mainstream psychology continues to privilege and promote the interests of the majority, in particular those in Western, Educated, Industrial, Rich, and Democratic (WEIRD) countries. The call for a decolonial turn in psychology has gathered momentum over recent years, along with greater reflection on how the field reproduces and reinforces systems ...

Decolonizing Psychology: Applications in Research & Clinical Practice

History

When Empires Implode

Does the collapse of the Inca empire teach a lesson about the contemporary United States?

September 10, 2020 • by Stefania de Kenessey

The Inca empire has long fascinated me: young, brash and stunningly successful, this mighty South American kingdom vanished virtually overnight. Recent developments make me wonder whether the United States empire faces a similar implosion. Some of the parallels — admittedly far from perfect — are nonetheless remarkable. The Inca empire rose up ...

Activism

Protestors Aren’t Destroying History, They Are Recasting It

When monuments to racism, slavery, and empire come down, new possibilities rise up

June 25, 2020 • by Durba Ghosh and Kelly King-O’Brien

In the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder at the hands of police, the movement to remove Confederate monuments has accelerated rapidly as part of a new wave of Black Lives Matter demonstrations. Protestors argue these monuments represent institutional racism and should be removed immediately. Many governors and local politicians readily ...

Protestors Aren’t Destroying History, They Are Recasting It

Race

black on Black

The digital future of color bias and racism

June 15, 2020 • by Asha Hassan Nooli

Asha Hassan Nooli is a rising sophomore at Lang College, and a first-generation American coming from a Somali background. She is interested in stimulating social reform on a global scale. The essay that follows was Hassan Nooli’s contribution to the New School Dean’s Honor Symposium, an annual celebration of the ...

Reviews

Whose Home? Whose Rule?

Nandita Sharma’s Home Rule and the politics of autochthony

May 21, 2020 • by Mat Cusick

Nandita Sharma, Home Rule: National Sovereignty and the Separation of Natives and Migrants (Duke University Press: 2020) In February 2002, five months after Narendra Modi became chief minister of Gujarat, an anti-Muslim pogrom erupted in his state. In three months of violence, Hindu nationalist rioters raped and murdered hundreds of Muslim ...

Feature

Learning to Hate Shakespeare

What are the implications of being engaged with Shakespeare at the expense of what could otherwise be regarded as a black or African authenticity?

June 17, 2019 • by Jordan Mubako

Looking at Literature syllabi across former British colonies, Shakespeare has persisted to this day. The recent syllabus from the West African Examinations Council (including countries like Ghana, Nigeria, and Sierra Leone) has Othello as a compulsory text, with Shakespeare granted equal status as “Non-African Drama” and “African Drama.” Paper 3 of the ...

Feature

Stolen Land, Standing Ground, and the Viral Spectacle of White Entitlement

“Land gets stolen, that’s how it works”

April 4, 2019 • by Alyosha Goldstein

This article is part of a series of texts published on Public Seminar in the lead-up to the Digital/Debt/Empire symposium in Vancouver in late April 2019, convened by Benjamin Anderson, Enda Brophy and Max Haiven. The graphic convergence of anti-Black and anti-Indigenous violence in the name of self-defense emerges with unmistakable clarity in the recent ...

Stolen Land, Standing Ground, and the Viral Spectacle of White Entitlement

Feature

Art, Research and Action Against Debt’s Digital Empire

An introduction

April 4, 2019 • by Max Haiven, Enda Brophy and Benjamin Anderson

This article is the introduction to a series of texts published on Public Seminar in the lead-up to the Digital/Debt/Empire symposium in Vancouver in late April 2019, convened by Benjamin Anderson, Enda Brophy and Max Haiven. Throughout the history of capitalism, debt has been a key weapon of colonialism and imperialism. Examples include the ruinous ...

Art, Research and Action Against Debt’s Digital Empire

Feature

Dope Peddlers at the Museum

What does a family of wealthy philanthropists have to do with a gang of drug traffickers?

December 2, 2018 • by Johan Matthew

What does a family of wealthy philanthropists have to do with a gang of drug traffickers? At first glance it seems absurd that the low-profile yet spectacularly generous Sackler family would have any connection to the egregiously violent drug gang MS-13. The Sacklers have contributed to just about every major museum in London ...