from Part I - Seeking Synergies for Decolonial Futures in Higher Education
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 October 2026
This chapter rejects the false opposition between intersectionality and decoloniality by demonstrating how coloniality produces intersectional stratifications of race, class, gender, sexuality, ability, and migration status within contemporary higher education. It advances an integrated analytic that links epistemic injustice to material and institutional conditions, including labor precarity, student debt, language hierarchies, and border regimes. By foregrounding the coloniality of power and knowledge, the chapter critiques Eurocentric academic norms while advocating transformative practices that affirm diverse epistemologies and the lived experiences of marginalized communities. Conceptualizing intersectionality as inherently decolonial, and decolonization as an intersectional process, it shows how colonial legacies and intersecting forms of oppression co-constitute academic inequities. Through illustrative examples and concrete recommendations, the chapter highlights the potential of a decolonial-intersectional lens to foster epistemic resistance and reimagine universities as sites for dismantling colonial structures and advancing more just and equitable academic futures.
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