Indigenous Knowledge Systems: contestation, rhetorics and space

Abstract

The article explores the contested area of indigenous knowledge rhetoric in South Africa, in particular with reference to the Western science-Indigenous Knowledge antithesis and the input Indigenous Knowledge may have on development. The validity of differences is not questioned, but rather the simplification with which the antithesis and its treatise are handled without due respect for the epistemes underlying the two positions. A postcolonial critical perspective is introduced to indicate the absolutisms on both sides and the tendency towards cultural and historical fixities. An attempt is also made to locate the border space of Indigenous Knowledge inquiry amidst present realities without becoming prone to new imbued epistemological fixities.

Indilinga: African Journal of Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IAJIKS) Vol. 4(1) 2005: 2-14