Anti-Essay: The Politics of Knowledge & Queering Colonial Academic Form

Abstract

This research-creation 'article' critiques the entrenched colonial characteristics of academic knowledge and literacy, which prioritize logic, reason, and the traditional essay form, thereby marginalizing queer, decolonial, and artistic ways of knowing. Arguing for "epistemic equity," this work employs a research-creation framework to demonstrate how a "queer literacy"—a mixing of multiple knowledge forms—can open up more accessible and creative avenues in research, writing, reading, and pedagogy. By challenging the masculinization of thought and research, and embracing the "unprofessional", messy, and disruptive, this piece invites a re-orientation of academic form to destabilize ableism, homo/transphobia, and colonial capitalism, ultimately calling for an expansive and inclusive understanding of what constitutes knowledge and how it can be meaningfully disseminated, circulated, and lived out in new ways.