The African Studies Global Virtual Forum 2023– 24, led by Sinfree Makoni, seeks to decenter hegemonic epistemologies and to decolonize the Western canon to facilitate other ways/waves of knowing. Through a series of online conversations, participants in the forum will challenge the notion of the “universal truth” and discuss how the only truth that is universal is the truth of complexity. To decolonize knowledge, epistemic perspectives need to be pluralistic in ontologies, cosmologies, and insights, and the emergence of Epistemologies of the South is one such response to the decolonial turn.

Joining us from around the world, our speakers will discuss the multiple approaches taken in the humanities and social science scholarship to decolonize knowledges by paying attention to complexities and heterogeneities in disciplinary formations.