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Postcolonial theory, particularly in its poststructuralist variant, presents important challenges to sociology's self-image, and open debate on these attempts to `unsettle' the modernist, Westernized disciplines is both conceptually and politically interesting. However, the postcolonial unsettling of sociology has to be actively extracted and reconstructed from the key texts of postcolonial theory - it is not transparently available as such - and this is the first main goal of the article. Particular attention is paid to the framings of these issues by Stuart Hall, Homi Bhahba and Robert Young. Second, the article offers the elements of a counter-critique, pointing out where the anti-sociological impulses of postcolonialism are exaggerated or unfounded, and also indicating serious internal problems for postcolonial theory when it is pitched as a direct and superior alternative to the modernist sociological `imaginary'. The continuing centrality (and difficulty) of questions on the nature of and purpose of explanatory social theory and postcolonial cultural studies are discussed.

THIS ARTICLE IS A REVISED AND EXPANDED VERSION OF A PAPER PRESENTED AT THE SOCIALIST SCHOLARS CONFERENCE IN APRIL 1989. THE PAPER REPRESENTS A TRANSITION IN SAMIR AMIN'S WORK FROM A CONCENTRATION ON ECONOMIC RELATIONS AND STRUCTURES TO A NEW FOCUS ON CULTURAL, INTELLECTUAL, AND EPISTEMOLOGICAL PROBLEMS. IT OFFERS A REVIEW OF AMIN'S BOOK AND AN EXTENDED ARGUMENT OF MOGHADAM'S ON PROBLEMS ARISING FROM THE INDISCRIMINATE REJECTION OF MODERNITY, SECULARISM, AND MARXISM

"Unthinking Eurocentrism, a seminal and award-winning work in postcolonial studies first published in 1994, explored Eurocentrism as an interlocking network of buried premises, embedded narratives, and submerged tropes that constituted a broadly shared epistemology. Within a transdisciplinary study, the authors argued that the debates about Eurocentrism and post/coloniality must be considered within a broad historical sweep that goes at least as far back as the various 1492s: the Inquisition, the Expulsion of Jews and Muslims, the Conquest of the Americas, and the Transatlantic slave trade; a process which culminates in the post War attempts to radically decolonize global culture. Ranging over multiple geographies, the book deprovincialized media/cultural studies through a polycentric approach, while analysing in depth such issues as postcolonial hybridity, antinomies of Enlightenment, the tropes of empire, gender and rescue fantasies, the racial politics of casting, and the limitations of positive image analysis. The substantial new afterword in this 20th anniversary new edition brings these issues into the present by charting recent transformations of the intellectual debates, as terms such as the transnational, the commons, indigeneity, and the Red Atlantic have come to the fore. The afterword also explores some cinematic trends such as indigenous media and postcolonial adaptations that have gained strength over the past two decades, along with others, such as Nollywood, that have emerged with startling force. Winner of the Katherine Kovacs Singer Best Film Book Award, the book has been translated in full or in its entirety into diverse languages from Spanish to Farsi. This expanded edition of a ground-breaking text proposes analytical grids relevant to a wide variety of fields including postcolonial studies, literary studies, anthropology, media studies, cultural studies, and critical race studies. "--

"This book raises awareness of Eurocentrism's enormous impact and shows how, over the course of five centuries, Eurocentrism has extended its power across the globe. By exploring a vast range of sources including Eurocentric maps and images, historiography, and Rudyard Kipling's White Man's Burden, Wintle uncovers Eurocentrism's gradual evolution and reveals the ways in which it functions at both seen and unseen levels. Due to its multi- and interdisciplinary analysis, this book is an indispensable tool for both scholars and students concerned with modern history, politics, visual culture and political geography"--