A Pedagogy of Reparations

Abstract

This essay mobilizes decolonial theory and praxis, in dialog with other related approaches, to propose the framework of a pedagogy of reparations that aims to bear witness to and address the epistemic violence enacted by the hegemonic Euro-American film and media studies canon and curriculum. Spanning conceptual interrogations of the relationships of capital, white supremacy, and the academy, as well as pedagogical and administrative decisions around course offerings, breadth requirements, selection of “foundational” texts, design of theory and methods courses, the essay calls for a collaborative discussion of strategies for repair that may foster the possibility of a genuinely intersectional, decolonial, global imagination for film and media studies. A reparative pedagogy recognizes the relationship between epistemic violence and state violence, and embraces proliferation, relationality, and mutability as key strategies to keep our curricula from being re-colonized into the logics of canon- and empire-building.