Beyond multiculturalism. Intercultural community research in the Indigenous Regional Council of Cauca, Tierradentro, Colombia (1991-2015)

Abstract

In some Latin American countries, indigenous organizations have developed their own lines of research. In this paper I address the research practices undertaken by the organic intellectuals of the Consejo Regional Indígena del Cauca in the Colombian sub-region of Tierradentro. To account for these practices I resort to the category of “intercultural community research”, a term that recovers several categories with which indigenous researchers in this area reflect on their own activity. In this work I argue, on the one hand, that these investigations have allowed to strengthen autonomy and to recreate the territoriality of indigenous communities. On the other hand, I suggest that they constitute a response to the epistemic violence reproduced in the disciplinary frameworks of modern sciences. In this way, such initiatives allow to challenge the dialogue of knowledge that preaches multiculturalism, a dialogue in which modern science retains a position of privileged universality.