Lecture | Global Histories of Knowledge Seminar
When science meets practice: knowledge production and the Indonesian leftist scientists in times of decolonization
- Date
- Friday 13 December 2024
- Time
- Series
- Global Histories of Knowledge 2024 - 2025
- Location
-
Johan Huizinga
Doelensteeg 16
2311 VL Leiden - Room
- 2.60
Abstract
This paper aims to provide an examination on the role of science in Indonesian social movement in the period of decolonization (1945-1960s). Taking the case study of Indonesian Peasants’ Front (Barisan Tani Indonesia-BTI), I follow the history of BTI’s amateur scientists - those who did not have any professional titles but were solving agrarian problems in the field through their innovations. By examining these scientists’ profiles, innovations, and relation to political power, I conclude that agricultural science became part of Indonesia’s peasants’ movement in its early independence period, pushing the claim that knowledge production should also be in the hands of peasants.
Speaker
Grace Leksana is an assistant professor in History & Art History Department, Utrecht University. She is the author of Memory culture of the anti Leftist violence in Indonesia: Embedded Remembering (2023).