Alternative Modes of Being - Incite at Columbia University

Alternative Modes of Being is a working group that unites scholars focusing on Asia and Africa to bring premodern knowledge traditions into dialogue with social and natural scientists focused on the interlocking crises of capitalism, colonialism, and climate chaos.

Underpinning this group's collaboration is an understanding that colonialization did not, and cannot, end with political independence—it requires a conceptual regeneration.

This group pursues such regeneration by reconnecting with earlier modes of knowledge to critically reengage lost ideas that can potentially contribute to current issues. Temporal, disciplinary, and institutional divides often stymie rich debates of scholars engaged in analysis of the present from trickling into the purview of premodernists.

By the same token, scholars engaged with the present rarely engage in any systematic way with the premodern worlds. Ultimately, we cannot fully rethink substance, however, without also rethinking academic form, why it is essential that artists, photographers, and creative writers join the conversation.

This working group's three main themes are around questions of growth and prosperity, self and social world, and beauty and ethics.