{"id":101,"date":"2025-05-06T21:23:50","date_gmt":"2025-05-06T21:23:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/altnow.caps-wa.org\/?p=101"},"modified":"2025-08-21T13:22:16","modified_gmt":"2025-08-21T13:22:16","slug":"personal-reflections-on-decolonization","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/altnow.caps-wa.org\/index.php\/2025\/05\/06\/personal-reflections-on-decolonization\/","title":{"rendered":"Personal Reflections on Decolonization"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Decolonization for me has been a matter of looking back, looking in, looking out, and finally looking ahead. Especially to my childhood years when in elementary school, we would have a horn hung around our little necks if we \u201cbroke English\u201d by mixing it with our ethnic languages. It became a game throughout the day and the horn would get passed around to the next boy or girl.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It never occurred to me that was part of the process by which I got to learn English \u2013 through a process that made little children believe Indigenous languages were inferior. To this day, I still see this struggle reflected even at my place of work with the politicians whenever they rise to give a statement on the Floor of the House, and some of them struggle with English often attracting giggles, even though English is a third language or fourth for many Kenyans.

Today, I am not very good at speaking my ethnic language Dholuo. Neither am I at speaking English. My grandmother used to correct my Dholuo tenses all the time. My mother still does to this very day. For me now, I am undergoing some kind of reverse struggle, trying to (re)learn Dholuo, while also struggling oftentimes, to get a point across in English. It\u2019s the irony of life. As Taiwo notes, \u201cthe schizophrenia-like condition brought about by going to school in one language and leading our non-school lives in another is one that we\u2019ll carry with us forever\u201d (Taiwo, 2022). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHow did we get here?\u201d As a Kenyan, the discourses of Mau Mau and colonialism is something we are familiar with. However, this familiarity is at the surface level. Piecing information together during my doctorate research, I started to discover a pattern in terrorism and security that I had been blind to all these years.

The pattern of coloniality manifested mainly through intellectual imperialism. However, stepping out of my research, it became clear that as much as I write about intellectual imperialism in counterterrorism, I am also a product of the same system, having been trained on the very foundations of Eurocentric knowledge. How can I then be vociferous about indigeneity being part of the process? I am conflicted, almost feeling stuck between the two worlds.

Looking in and confronting my own biases, I discover that just like many others, I am on a decolonization journey especially one that involves decolonization of the mind. Looking out, my journey becomes a process, not a destination. Looking ahead, every day is still a learning process. Decolonization is not an easy process. It is combative in all aspects and requires a lot of humility in accepting to change course, un(learning) and (re)learning that sometimes the solutions we are looking for, or even going abroad to find, are often close to home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

–<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Excerpt borrowed from: \ud835\ude1b\ud835\ude30\ud835\ude38\ud835\ude22\ud835\ude33\ud835\ude25\ud835\ude34 \ud835\ude22\ud835\ude2f \ud835\ude10\ud835\ude2f\ud835\ude25\ud835\ude2a\ud835\ude28\ud835\ude26\ud835\ude2f\ud835\ude30\ud835\ude36\ud835\ude34 \ud835\ude08\ud835\ude27\ud835\ude33\ud835\ude2a\ud835\ude24\ud835\ude22\ud835\ude2f \ud835\ude08\ud835\ude31\ud835\ude31\ud835\ude33\ud835\ude30\ud835\ude22\ud835\ude24\ud835\ude29 \ud835\ude35\ud835\ude30 \ud835\ude0a\ud835\ude30\ud835\ude36\ud835\ude2f\ud835\ude35\ud835\ude26\ud835\ude33\ud835\ude35\ud835\ude26\ud835\ude33\ud835\ude33\ud835\ude30\ud835\ude33\ud835\ude2a\ud835\ude34\ud835\ude2e \ud835\ude2a\ud835\ude2f \ud835\ude12\ud835\ude26\ud835\ude2f\ud835\ude3a\ud835\ude22. pg. 247).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Decolonization for me has been a matter of looking back, looking in, looking out, and finally looking ahead. Especially to my childhood years when in elementary school, we would have a horn hung around our little necks if we \u201cbroke English\u201d by mixing it with our ethnic languages. It became a game throughout the day…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":102,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kad_post_transparent":"","_kad_post_title":"","_kad_post_layout":"","_kad_post_sidebar_id":"","_kad_post_content_style":"","_kad_post_vertical_padding":"","_kad_post_feature":"","_kad_post_feature_position":"","_kad_post_header":false,"_kad_post_footer":false,"_kad_post_classname":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t