Interculturality and Andean Knowledge: Reflections on the Epistemological Monoculture

Abstract

Through colonial and neocolonial processes, the West has been able to impose epistemological hegemony on the whole world, which has repercussions on the academic standards of knowledge, titles, procedures and content. In the present article, the author analyzes this supposed epistemological monoculture critically by means of intercultural deconstruction. European and Latin American universities owe much to the previous ones in China, India and the Arab world. On the other hand, Abya Yala (such is the indigenous name for “America”) already had a rich epistemological tradition with institutions of knowledge before the Conquest. The interculturation of epistemology makes it possible to include very different types of knowledge, including the indigenous knowledge of the Andes.