Enrique Dussel's "Otherness" and the Problem of the Euro-centric Totalized Epistemological System in Academic Theology

Daniel Jara

doi:10.46553/teo.57.133.2020.p159-182

Authors

Daniel Jara Universidad Teológica del Caribe

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.46553/teo.57.133.2020.p159-182

Keywords:

Dussel, Otherness, Modernity, Levinas, Asymmetrical Problem, Post-colonial Turn

Abstract

The article deeps into the thought of Dr. Enrique Dussel (La Paz, Mendoza, Argentina, 1934) in order to demonstrate that modern academic thought in the global north (theological thought included, naturally) is highly euro-centric, cognitive-centric and naive about its self-placed position of authority and superio- rity regarding theological knowledge from the global south, which constitutes its Other. It explores Dussel's thought about Modernity and refers to the totalization of the Euro-centrical model. In order to deal with what Dussel calls «the conquering vocation of the system», inspiration is found on the Levinasian philosophy of the Other and on an approach to the «asymmetrical problem» that stresses the need for a post-colonial turn against the empire of Euro-centric reason, while recognizing the Other as a revelatory epiphany.

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Author Biography

Daniel Jara, Universidad Teológica del Caribe

The article deeps into the thought of Dr. Enrique Dussel (La Paz, Mendoza, Argentina, 1934) in order to demonstrate that modern academic thought in the global north (theological thought included, naturally) is highly euro-centric, cognitive-centric and naive about its self-placed position of authority and superio- rity regarding theological knowledge from the global south, which constitutes its Other. It explores Dussel's thought about Modernity and refers to the totalization of the Euro-centrical model. In order to deal with what Dussel calls «the conquering vocation of the system», inspiration is found on the Levinasian philosophy of the Other and on an approach to the «asymmetrical problem» that stresses the need for a post-colonial turn against the empire of Euro-centric reason, while recognizing the Other as a revelatory epiphany.

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