On April 15 DIN, Verdragon, Maison de l’Ecologie Populaire and L’Observatoire Terre-Monde (OTM) are organizing an event around the theme of Decolonizing The Mind and ecology. Speakers are Sandew Hira, Malcom Ferdinand of OTM and Fatimah Ouassak of Verdragon.

Sandew Hira recently published his book Decolonizing The Mind – A Guide to Decolonial Theory and Practice. Malcom Ferdinand is the author of the book Decolonial Ecology – Thinking from the Caribbean World. Angela Davis wrote a preface in the book. Fatima Ouassak is a well known activist and writer in France.

The event is held in Paris in Verdragon.

DIN is organizing a reading group on the book Decolonizing The Mind  – A Guide to Decolonial Theory and Practice by Sandew Hira. You can order the book here. For twelve years Sandew Hira has been working on this book. Now there is a 600 page publication with detailed theories and facts that require time and discussion to digest, criticize and develop. Information about Hira’s interaction with academics and activist can be followed here.

Pursuant to the book’s publication, DIN now invites the readers, in progress or completed, and interested readers to come together in a web-based forum to discuss the book’s contents. Our aim is stimulating people as individuals or in groups to further develop the narrative and its specificities worldwide and in their locality, leading to an educational framework for decolonization theory, with its own formalization and course work. Our hope is that this forum will promote critical thinking and literacy giving rise to new ways of thinking about the human condition and society.

For an effective group discussion, we anticipate 5-8 members in each group. Larger enrolments will be accommodated in two or more groups. The groups will meet twice a month (first and last week) and discuss the book’s contents in one segment per each session. Every segment is 50 pages, more or less.  The preliminary segmentation of the book can be arranged as follows, but can also be revised on recommendations

The individual members of the group are invited to select two segments that they will present (20 minutes each) to the group, before group discussion for the remainder of the hour.  The discussion will be facilitated by Raj Mathur. Dr. Raj Mathur is a retired materials scientist & engineer whose career has involved patented innovations in the aerospace, automotive, electronics and chemical industrial sectors. Born in India and a citizen of the USA, he is now retired and lives with his wife in the Netherlands.

Mathur will also post a summary and the highlights of each session online, as well as mailing it to individual members of the group for critical review. Finally, the facilitator will submit the group’s activity and summary to the author and invite the author to interact with the group in a final session. Adding up the sessions, it will be a six-month long commitment and exploration of decolonization.

Click here to register for the reading.

On March 30-31 the Vatican led by the Pope organized a seminar on colonialism, decolonization and neocolonialism. Ramon Grosfoguel, chairman of the board of the Decolonial International Network Foundation, was one of the invited speakers. You can watch the 10 hour conference here. After the conference the Vatican issued a statement repudiating the Doctrine of Discovery,’ which was used to justify colonialism. The doctrine was invoked as a legal and religious standing by Europeans who “discovered” new lands and violently seized it from people who had been living there for generations.

Introduction
On April 22nd and 23rd, 2023, Aralez and Decolonial International Network (DIN) are organizing a decolonial reparations conference in Ru Paré, Amsterdam. During this 2-day meeting, community organizers are invited to formulate demands and actions aimed at repairing colonial damage. The first day is aimed at making an analysis and inventory of the damage caused by 500 years of colonisation. The second day focuses on formulating concrete demands, actions and strategies to bring about reparation. The conference will be the first edition of a yearly returning gathering in april, we specifically aim to inspire coalition building and actions surrounding reparations and global south solidarity.

Practical information

Date: Saturday April 22nd and Sunday April 23rd, 2023
Time: 10am-5pm on April 22 and 11am-5pm on April 23 (with optional dinner afterwards on saturday)
Location: Ru Paré
Address: Chris Lebeaustraat 4, 1062 DC Amsterdam
Entrance: € 15 per day including lunch
Sign up: can be done here via the sign up form.
More information: the program time-table can be found here. More information and details about the speakers and content wil follow soon!

Why this conference?
This conference has two intended outcomes. The first is a collective manifesto with concrete demands that can be introduced into the public debate when it comes to reparation and repairing colonial damage. The second is concept plans for concrete campaigns to achieve the reparation demands that have been formulated. The conference focuses on grassroots organizations and individuals who want to contribute to the decolonial movement and/or have concrete initiatives aimed at repairing colonial damage in the Netherlands and/or in solidarity with initiatives from the Global South.

The conference will take place on April 22nd and 23rd, 2023. These dates were intentionally chosen in the spirit of the Bandung conference, which took place from April 18-24, 1955 in Bandung, Indonesia. It was the first conference that united former colonized countries from Africa and Asia to develop a strategy and vision for a new decolonial world civilization.

With the HERSTEL decolonial reparations conference, Aralez and DIN aim to organize an annual conference to continue to monitor and further develop the reparation initiatives that will be formulated in 2023.

Sandew Hira has completed the first phase of his international book tour. On March 15 he was in London. On March 18 and 19 was in Scotland, in Edinburgh and Glasgow respectively. On 27 March he was in Birmingham. Information about all meetings can be found here.

The meeting in Birmingham led to a new invitation. The Business School of the University of Birmingham will host a one-day conference on July 29 to mark the publication of Hira’s book. He will give a keynote speech, after which various working groups will discuss the various topics in the book in more detail.

On April 15, he will be in Paris where his book will be presented with two environmental organizations: L’Observatoire Terre-Monde en Verdragon, Maison de l’Ecologie Populaire.

From 1 to 27 May he is traveling in Africa, in particular South Africa and Zambia.