I suppose part of me always knew that human knowledge and the way that we as scholars understand that knowledge was the product of decisions that were all too human as opposed to some objective process. When I was still just a military history nerd back in middle school, I was highly aware of the fact that most history of conflict is written by those who emerged victorious from individual conflicts. I also understood that this principle also applied to history more generally, with powerful groups and individuals wielding outsized influence over how we tell the story of the past. Despite this understanding of the role of power and privilege in the creation of history, I had never really applied much critical thought to the nature of knowledge in the social sciences before coming to college. This is likely a result of me sharing the identity of many of the traditional foundational thinkers in the social sciences: white, male, and straight.
Prior to the readings for seminar 7, I did not even know that W.E.B. Du Bois was an academic, let alone that he can credibly claim to be the first American sociologist. I knew he was a prominent writer and civil rights activist, but little else about the man. I was shocked, but not terribly surprised, to learn of the way he was shunned and denied due credit for his work because of his race and radical challenge to the then dominant discourse on race in academia.[1] What I mean by the phrase “shocked but not surprised” is that I was shocked to have never heard this specific story before but was not surprised to learn of its existence. American history is full of stories of the members of marginalized groups having their voices silenced and their accomplishments claimed by others.
The other half of this equation of marginalization is the building up of the historical reputation of certain western scholars to the point where one doesn’t even consider questioning them or their ideas. This half was also protested by students at Soas, with one stating “We’re not trying to exclude European thinkers, we’re trying to desacralize European thinkers, stopping them from being treated as unquestionable.” As I believe that scholars should be in the habit of thinking critically about everything, I agree with this student with the importance of removing the Western greats from their pedestals. If one is truly committed to the spirit of inquiry that dominates academic research, challenging the traditional Western cannon and bringing in formally marginalized voices is absolutely essential.
[1] “The Case for Scholarly Reparations,” Berkeley Journal of Sociology, January 11, 2016, http://berkeleyjournal.org/2016/01/the-case-for-scholarly-reparations/.