Zero-Point Hubris

Santiago Castro-Gómez is professor of philosophy at the University of Santo Tomás and the University Javeriana in Bogotá, Colombia. He has taught as visiting professor at Duke University, Pittsburgh University, and the University of Frankfurt. His book, Critique of Latin American Reason is now a classic text of Latin American philosophy. His many other publications include La hybris del punto cero, Tejidos oníricos, History of Governmentality, Volumes I & II, and Revolutions without Subject.George Ciccariello-Maher is Visiting Associate Professor of Political Science at Vassar College. Don T. Deere is Visiting Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Wesleyan University.

• Translator's Introduction / 1. Places of Enlightenment: Colonial Discourse and Geopolitics of Knowledge in the Century of Enlightenment / 2. Purus ab omnia macula sanguinis: The colonial imaginary of whiteness in New Granada / 3. Imperial Biopolitics: Health and sickness in the framework of Bourbonic reforms / 4. Illegitimate Knowledges: The Enlightenment as mechanism of epistemic expropriation / 5. Striated Spaces: Geography, territorial politics, and population control / Epilogue / Appendix (to the 2nd edition) / Bibliography / Index

With its focus on bio-politics and the creation of an imperial science, Zero-Point Hubris takes decolonial theory to the next level. By focusing on the practices of coloniality in Latin America, Castro-Gómez troubles the rigidity of the binary between center and periphery. He shows how Criollo elites in Latin America fashioned a distinctive form of whiteness, naturalizing inequality and their own privilege. This is a critically important work.