Science as White Epistemology

A bold reexamination of the colonial foundations of modern science and the case for a decolonized history of knowledge.

intellectual achievements as universal milestones while treating other ways of knowing as secondary, local, or peripheral. Science as White Epistemology challenges that framework and argues that the history of science itself must be fundamentally recast.

Pratik Chakrabarti examines how modern scientific disciplines—from natural history and geology to anthropology, genomics, and environmental science—developed alongside European colonial expansion. He argues that the concepts used to understand nature, race, gender, indigeneity, and the past were shaped by an epistemological tradition rooted in colonialism, empire, and racial hierarchy. Moving from the seventeenth century to the present, Chakrabarti traces how these ideas became embedded within what he calls "white epistemology": a dominant framework that positioned European modes of knowledge as objective, universal, and authoritative. This concept continues to influence contemporary debates over environmental justice, human remains, museums, genetics, and Indigenous rights.

Rather than calling simply for a broader or more inclusive history of science, Science as White Epistemology offers a new framework for understanding what it means to decolonize scientific knowledge itself. Timely, provocative, and deeply informed, this book will reshape conversations across the history of science, science and technology studies, postcolonial studies, and the environmental humanities while inviting readers to imagine new, decolonial ways of understanding science and its place in the world.