Rescuing the Enlightenment from the Europeans critical theories of decolonization Nikita Dhawan

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Dhawan, Nikita, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Decolonization.

Postcolonialism.

Enlightenment--Europe.

Enlightenment.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (372 pages)

Contained In:

e-Duke Books Scholarly Collection 2026

Place of Publication:

Durham Duke University Press 2026

Summary:

"Rescuing the Enlightenment from the Europeans examines key theoretical conflicts between postcolonial studies and interlocutors of the Enlightenment, from Kant to the present. While postcolonialism has regularly been accused of rejecting Enlightenment norms like cosmopolitanism, tolerance, and equality, Nikita Dhawan shows how these accusations rely on a convenient amnesia about the effects of European colonialism on the postcolonial world. Dhawan argues for the urgent task of putting postcolonial and holocaust studies in conversation with each other to reveal the relative shallowness of Europe's self-critique for its historical crimes. In the first half of the book, Dhawan takes up Enlightenment thought on colonialism from the eighteenth century through the Frankfurt school to the present. In the second half of the book, Dhawan examines how the colonial legacies of the Enlightenment play out in different sites of decolonial struggle around the globe from Gaza to South Africa to Germany. In doing so, Dhawan expansively and persuasively argues that the postcolonial challenge ultimately lies in salvaging Enlightenment goals in a non-Western world"-- Provided by publisher

Contents:

Who financed the Enlightenment? Colonialism and the Age of Reason

The self-barbarization of Europe : Enlightenment and Nazism

Europe : what can it teach us?

The non-performativity of critique : protest politics, state phobia, and the erotics of resistance

Critique of violence-violence of critique

Aesthetic enlightenment and the art of decolonization

Notes:

Description based on print version record

Includes bibliographical references and index

Other Format:

Print version Dhawan, Nikita. Rescuing the Enlightenment from the Europeans

ISBN:

9781478061663

1478061669

Access Restriction:

Restricted for use by site license