SJE3912H: Race and Knowledge Production: Research Methods

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As a qualitative research course for masters and doctoral students who already possess some familiarity with postmodern, feminist and critical race theories, the course will consist of readings that explore the following question: how is knowledge production racialized? A related question is: how can we understand the operation of multiple systems of domination in the production of racialized knowledge? How can intellectuals challenge imperialist and racist systems through their research and writing? This course is built around the idea that responsible research and writing begins with a critical examination of how relations of power shape knowledge production. What explanatory frameworks do we as scholars rely on when we undertake research? How do we go about critically examining our own explanations and others when the issue is race? To examine these themes in depth, historically as well as in the present, the course will focus on colonialism, imperialism, racism and knowledge production. Specifically, the course explores three defining imperial constructs: indianism, orientalism and africanism. We consider how the legacy of imperial ideas shaped racial knowledge and the disciplines, positioning us as scholars as active participants in the imperial enterprise. In part two of the course, we explore interlocking systems of oppression: how imperial knowledge simultaneously upholds and is upheld by capitalism and patriarchy. For the third part of the course, we examine how we understand the immigrant's body, the citizen, the migrant and what it means to produce knowledge as a post-colonial scholar.

Social Justice Education