Diasporic Womanism: A decolonial framework for engaging the Global South

• In Event: Global and Transnational Sociology Section Open Call Paper Session

Abstract

The paper begins with explaining Diasporic Womanism (of and for the Global South) by breaking it down into its component parts and explaining each. It explores the meanings of the Global South and global south diasporas. Then it moves to conceptualize a decolonial, diasporic consciousness as a critical precondition for those from the Global South to cultivate an empathetic and intellectual return and commitment to the issues that impact the Global South. The chapter then provides a discussion of womanisms of the global south, reaching back to early articulations of womanism, contrasting them with Western feminisms. Then it categorizes and explains four key concerns of womanism: (1) Mothering and (Re)birthing the Extra Colonial; (2) Spirituality and Healing; (3) Resistant and Resilient Life-Death Ecologies; and (4) Communal Complementarity, identifying them as critical to the “(re)humanizing project” of the colonized, an antidote to the dehumanizing project of colonialism and coloniality on humanity. The chapter concludes by presenting a diasporic womanist vocational praxis for global south and global south aligned scholars, offering an alternative to individualistic, impersonal colonial models of how to pursue our careers.

Author

• Sancha Doxilly Medwinter, University of Massachusetts-Amherst