Nicolas Nicola

Do oppressors possess an epistemic advantage concerning the workings of oppression? I examine three arguments that answer this question affirmatively. The first contends oppressors incur an epistemic advantage because they do not confront epistemic obstacles that the oppressed face when putting forth knowledge claims. The second argues that oppressors, bombarded with counterevidence to the workings of oppression, are better positioned to identify oppressive ideology. The third claims that oppressors are privileged in affording and receiving recognition in ways that the oppressed are not. All three arguments, I contend, fail. Each argument conflates social power with epistemic privilege while overlooking how oppressors’ perspective generates systematic oversight rather than insight. My analysis advances scholarship by bringing analytic ideology critique and recognition theory into conversation with the epistemic advantage literature. I conclude with two implications: the need for pluralism in ideology critique, and requirements that epistemic advantage theories align with epistemic decolonisation.

Jennifer Lackey has argued that victims of gross violations and injustices are owed epistemic reparations and have the right to be known. This is roughly the right for these victims to have their stories heard and to be givers of knowledge. Recent work in the field has focused on ways we fail to listen to the stories of victims. Less attention has been paid to the ways in which oppressive systems, like colonialism, distort victims’ self-understandings and the narratives they convey. I argue that genuine epistemic reparations within oppressive contexts require conditions that enable victims to come to know themselves on their own terms. I call the process of individual and collective self-recognition made possible by those conditions making oneself known. Drawing on critiques of the colonial politics of recognition, I show why this self-knowledge must precede being known by others. Only by establishing this epistemic foundation can genuine reparative work begin, rather than reproducing the very epistemic violence such reparations are meant to repair.

Sometimes we avoid or minimize criticism for our failings by performing a merely symbolic act aimed at addressing a real or perceived blame allegation. Consider individuals or institutions performing land acknowledgements as a means of box-ticking inclusion without committing to any significant change. Or consider corporations forming advisory committees that lack authoritative power on issues they advise on. Call this performative blame avoidance. How does performatively avoiding blame fall short of appropriately engaging in genuine reparations? And how does this differ from other ways in which we can inadequately engage in reparative work? Drawing on cases from land acknowledgements to governmental reconciliation policies, I show how performative blame avoidance operates as a distinctive mechanism of reparative failure that aims to foreclose accountability by appearing to address it, all the while instrumentalizing the very reparative practices meant to remedy wrongdoing. The framework reveals subtle operations of performative blame avoidance in complex institutional cases and articulates its relations to settler moves to innocence and epistemic exclusion.

This paper puts forth two claims. First, cancel culture accusations of censorship are components of a practice that embodies a flawed ideology. Second, as components of a practice that embodies a flawed ideology, these accusations contribute to cultivating a hostile epistemic environment. I spell out the first claim with the help of Jason Stanley’s research on flawed ideology. I highlight how a characterization of cancellation that the conservative, right-leaning demographic find problematic in terms of amounting to a form of censorship, preserves desirable outcomes for the privileged group. Drawing on the work of C. Thi Nguyen on hostile epistemology, I spell out the second claim by showing how these accusations exploit our epistemic trust mechanism such that they undermine the uptake of epistemic goods. If the flawed ideology constrains the intelligibility of our actions, then the concept of cancellation becomes problematic. I close by offering a suggestive approach inspired by work in non-ideal epistemology to counteract the flawed ideology.

Testimony is of epistemic and practical significance. It is of epistemic significance because majority of what we know and believe comes from being told. It is of practical significance because our agency can be undermined, bypassed, or overridden owing to systemic prejudices sustained by oppressive social or cultural practices and subsequently our routes to knowledge are either hindered or distorted. Things get more complicated when we introduce and examine how groups and other collectives testify and are recipients of testimony. For instance, group speakers are typically said to represent and reflect the view of the group they are speaking on behalf of. But sometimes because of these oppressive practices, a group speaker’s assertion may deprive or impair its members’ ability to perform certain actions through speech. This dissertation examines the intersection between testimony, collective phenomena, and epistemic harms. One aim is to argue for a view on the nature of testimony that can accommodate various ways collectives testify and are recipients of testimony. In particular, I argue and present a view of testimony as a norm-governed joint activity involving individual or collective participants that commit themselves to a common aim of collaboration. Another aim is to present an epistemology of testimony that tracks our ordinary testimonial practices. In this regard, I argue for a norm view where we have reason to believe what we’re told because of the rules or norms that govern our communicative exchanges. A final aim is to explore the mechanism by which collective speech ensues in an epistemic harm driven by social identity prejudices. I argue for a form of silencing that is distinctive of groups insofar as the silencing occurs because of group dynamics. I call the mechanism underlying this form of silencing “representational impairment”. This dissertation, I hope, will motivate and inspire others to pursue philosophical projects at these intersections and in this spirit, I end by offering suggestions on areas of further development and future direction.