Javier Franzé
javier.franze@cps.ucm.es
Universidad Complutense de Madrid, España
Abstract:
This paper aims to show the essentialism of Walter Mignolo’s reflection in The Idea of Latin America. One such essentialism does not consist of considering subaltern communities as pure or uncontaminated, nor all of its members (the damné) as endowed with some definite and ahistorical traits, but rather in conceiving the existence of memory and experience, as characterising the damné and that its bearers can only arise from among the members of such communities. This type of essentialism is a consequence of the aim to build a theory able to reach both epistemological and political objectives at the same time and with the same efficacy, and brings the relation between identity and narration into question.
Keywords: Decolonial, essentialism, identity, narration, epistemology.
