Theory of Knowledge - Course Companion for Students Marija Uzunova Dang Arvin Singh Uzunov Dang

became clear only decades
preservation
The Students Educational and Cultural
later.
of Ladakh (SECMOL) was founded
Movement
address this problem in a forward-looking
to
culturally resonant way that respected
but
Knowledge, with the criteria for
Traditional
being that a student had to have
admission
exams elsewhere. SECMOL as a case
failed
informs how and why we educate, or
study
education, and how far the implications of
seek
decisions go. It also explores the tensions
those
innovation and tradition as ways to
between
second case study, presented in the film
A
from Ladakh” concerns traditional
“Learning
knowledge and the role of food
ecological
The film tells the story of an ill-
subsidies.
system of wheat and rice subsidies
conceived
began in the 1970s that led to the collapse
that
local food systems. The entire region
of
then enrolled into the cash and market
was
dependent on and reinforced by the
economy,
knowledge economy of education.
modern
terms: Ancient futures
Search
from Ladakh Vimeo
Learning
consequences of this included new forms
The
labour relations and rising inequality,
of
dysfunction, plastic and other nonbiodegradable
communal
waste, water pollution, and the
of cardiovascular and metabolic
prevalence
of which existed until very
diseases—none
Ladakhis are exceptionally aware and
recently.
lament is audible and profound, and yet
their
is good practice, and in this case important,
It
clarify what the words “decolonize”
to
“indigenize”—sometimes used
and
in relation to knowledge.
interchangeably—mean
coming, consuming and leaving. What
keep
we learn from this case and from local
can
of response and resistance? How do
forms
balance individual, communal and ekistic
we
in rapidly modernizing and globalizing
needs
cultures?
Indigenous
Ladakhis there is a robust discourse
Among
ways forward and optimism in the face of
on
Local agents of change champion
challenges.
for change aligned with or against the
visions
and international aid system. Local
national
and change-making are necessarily
politics
in Traditional Knowledge, identity
entangled
culture. This includes Ladakh’s identity
and
“Little Tibet”, the generations of Tibetan
as
that call it home, and the nomads
refugees
move through the plains and rely on trade
who
the militarized borders between India,
across
and Pakistan. Religion in this context
China
Buddhists and Muslims side-by-side
includes
centuries, Christian missionaries, and the
for
influx of Hindus as high-paying tourists
steady
as cheap labour for Ladakhi landlords.
or
Buddhist monasteries house priceless,
Many
works of art and yet lack the
centuries-old
to preserve them in the way of
resources
museums. Some of those monasteries
modern
caches of ancient weapons, though
house
Buddhism has a reputation for peace.
Tibetan
has this narrative been shaped by one
How
the 14th Dalai Lama, in his political
man,
existential struggle? Ladakh sits at the
and
top of India, incongruously into
geographic
national identity, and sandwiched between
the
Tibet and Pakistan, with
Chinese-occupied
India has fought fivewars.
whom
5II. Perspectives
recover from a failed modernism.
to outsiders Ladakh appears pristine, tourists
II.1.1 Decolonizing knowledge, indigenizing
Decoloniziation, in the context of knowledge:
the curriculum
“involves valuing and revitalizing Indigenous
knowledge and approaches and weeding out
settler biases or assumptions that have impacted
Indigenous ways of being. Decolonization
necessitates shifting our frames of reference
with regard to the knowledge we hold; examining
how we have arrived at such knowledge; and
considering what we need to do to change
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