Insurrections of indigenous knowledges: Debating ‘critical’ in indigenous psychologies

Abstract

Indigenous Psychologies is an approach/movement premised on cultural constitution of psychological functioning. Its most significant concept is ‘culture’ as it aims to be rooted in the culturally relevant and derived categories and theories of the participants whom it intends to study. However, the concept of ‘culture’ in Indigenous Psychologies is replete with several problematic assumptions that limit its potential to recover local knowledges and move beyond Western taxonomies. The paper takes a critical psychological lens to focus on these assumptions and critique them. It also attempts to draw the contours of Critical Indigenous Psychologies as a dispersed, disjointed field by addressing points of productive tension and predicaments that animate it. It suggests that indigenizing the ‘critical’ discourse and developing a ‘critique’ of indigenous discourse is the unending dialogue that Critical Indigenous Psychologies have to engage with.