Nagre, Kulvinder Kamau; (2023) Who controls the past, controls the present? Eurocentrism and the cycle of knowledge in the British historical worldview. Doctoral thesis (Ph.D), UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

This project has sought to investigate the continued perpetuation of Eurocentric archaeologies within popular discourse in the UK, and the extent to which these are fed-back into the academic research infrastructure. Whilst Eurocentrism (here defined as the dominant ideological crutch of European coloniality, rooted in totalistic worldviews, oppositional and denigratory perspectives on Others, and relying on teleological grand narrative histories) has been robustly challenged within archaeology (and the academy more broadly), the same cannot be said for the historical narratives disseminated throughout those outside of the academic community. This project has thus sought to provide a ‘cradle to grave’ appraisal of knowledge on the past throughout British society, focussing on its (i) production, in universities; dissemination, in schools and the media; and (iii) consumption, by non-academic members of the public. It has utilised a range of methods and approaches, including quantitative surveying and ethnographic interviews with a range of participants, critical discourse analysis of teaching resources and media outputs, and analyses of research funding structures. Results demonstrate a disjuncture between recent scholarly work and popular understandings of the past. Quantitative and qualitative issues were uncovered with the content delivered to both school pupils, and the general public, via popular media. The extent of mis- and under-representation of groups from the Global South is wholly out-of-step with the current British research landscape, which is shown to be highly diverse, although there are some parallels with recent Research Excellence Framework returns, which are significantly narrower in scope. Questionnaire data suggests that a significant minority of adults, and large number of current Year 9 pupils, subscribe to historically Eurocentric discourses, potentially as a reflection of the sources of information presented to them. Results thus call into question the (mis)uses of ‘the past’ in public discourse, and the responsibility of colleagues to challenge them.

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