Toward an interstitial global critical theory

Abstract

ABSTRACT By building on calls for a global critical theory, the article argues for a combination between the canon of critical theory, and the rich fields of post-, de-, and settler-colonial studies. It argues that an umbrella for such a project is to develop an interstitial global critical theory. By focusing on interstices, ‘heuristic interstitialism’ invites us to see and thus study the globe by looking simultaneously at the supra-, inter- and even infra-individual levels. As such, it avoids both methodological nationalism and a potentially Eurocentric methodological civilizationalism, that is, the idea that large cultural blocks exist and can be studied in separation from other units, and their components. Heuristic interstitialism is a practice that brings to the fore new creative concepts, revives marginalized and silenced acts of resistance, and thus incorporates gender, ecological, racial, indigenous and postcolonial critiques without retreating into mere particularism and the consequent loss of attention to the global sources of exploitation, inequalities, and alienation.