From Absences to the Ecologies of Knowledges: Colonial and Decolonial Aspirations in the Scholarly Communication System

The mechanisms of a scholarly communication system based on monocultural logics discourages plurality, reproduces epistemological absences, asymmetries, and hierarchical mechanisms of knowledge generation and dissemination. Considering the diversity of the fields of knowledge, practices, communities, research emphases, languages, infrastructures, and regional, local and disciplinary particularities, a monocultural publication system tends to promote homogenisation by marginalising or negating the existence of everything not conforming to the one logic. The Open Access field of discussion raises several these issues and impulses initiatives working on alternative approaches to them. Setting up plural and equitable conditions in the generation, dissemination and dialogue of diverse forms of knowledge is the central feature of a perspective based on generating and strengthening ecologies, involving diverse actors previously absent from these discussions while considering the conditions of inequality. Strengthening existing initiatives which are already working on the construction of more plural and equitable forms of scientific and academic communication is fundamental.