Epistemic Justice and Digital Technologies: Decolonizing Anthropological Education in the Amazonian Periphery

Abstract (English)

This paper proposes a critical reflection on the possibilities and challenges of epistemic justice in anthropological education, based on experiences of students from the Research Center in Education and Cyberculture (NUPEC) at the Federal Institute of Pará (IFPA), Brazil. The involved students conduct interdisciplinary research examining the use and impact of digital technologies in their daily lives (Koole et al., 2024; Horst & Miller, 2020). The aim is to explore to what extent these students perceive themselves as protagonists in knowledge production, capable of challenging and transforming cultural and epistemic policies frequently characterized by technological colonization (Khoo et al., 2020).

The primary goal is to discuss how educational practices developed through teaching, research, and extension projects—including academic event organization and collaborative translations of international texts on cyberculture and mediatization (Rueda Ortiz & Uribe Zapata, 2021)—can contribute to breaking dominant epistemic paradigms centered in the Global North. Furthermore, the research seeks to problematize how discourses on technology, emerging from a specific socio-technical epistemology, impact peripheral societies, particularly in the Amazonian context, where institutional resistance to interdisciplinary practices persists (Rifiotis, Máximo & Segata, 2024).

The academic relevance of this study lies in its contribution to the debate on epistemic justice by proposing the valorization of local knowledge and the decolonization of pedagogical practices, especially in peripheral and marginalized contexts. Moreover, the research addresses a crucial issue for contemporary anthropological sciences: the need for intercultural and interdisciplinary dialogue to confront epistemological asymmetries. By presenting the case of IFPA, Belém campus, this paper aims to generate insights applicable not only to the Amazonian context but also to other Brazilian and international academic settings facing similar challenges at the intersection of anthropology, education, and digital technologies (Horst & Miller, 2020).