Western science and technology are the motors that drive social progress; no other knowledge system comes anywhere close. It's a widely held view, an example of Western exceptionalism and triumphalism -- but is it correct? The philosopher of science Sandra Harding talks about knowledge appropriation, the failure of "development," and the value and sophistication of non-Western ways of thinking.

Colonialism in both its traditional and contemporary versions is not just about power and coercion: it's about how the "other" is thought and talked about. Aimé Césaire took a radical anticolonial stance inflected with surrealist and Marxist notions. Robin D. G. Kelley discusses Césaire's ideas and their relevance today.

Was Thomas Paine anti-government? What did he mean when he argued that the US should be a republic? Historian Alan Taylor talks about Paine's life, his political convictions, and Common Sense, which Taylor calls the most powerful and pivotal pamphlet in US history. Also, Leon Rosselson and Robb Johnson have created an audio celebration of Paine's life and words.

Must this nation's founding narrative be premised on white European superiority and their "civilizing" mission? Cari Carpenter finds in Sarah Winnemucca's book Life Among the Piutes both an alternative origin story of the US and a direct challenge to the myth of the vanishing Indian. Also, Andrea Smith talks about the role of indigenous ideas in anti-violence movement theorizing.

It's not just a story about the Indian diaspora. It's about empire, about the movement of labor, about the use and abuse of race, about global historical forces that created expatriate communities in far-flung places. Minal Hajratwala explains how and why her extended family moved to and settled in nine different countries.

Too many wars in the twentieth century, and in this one. Nelson Maldonado-Torres draws upon thinkers like Frantz Fanon and Aime Cesaire to argue for a project of decolonization, one that directly confronts the Western paradigm of racist war. In his book Against War, Maldonado-Torres also analyzes the work of Emmanuel Levinas and Enrique Dussel. (Encore presentation.)