Deconstructing Eurocentric narratives in non-fiction literature

This chapter posits the need for reading between the lines of Western epistemology production by grasping how literature plays a central role in propagating these constructions.

Through the framework of Critical Whiteness Studies, it is argued that literature oppression plays a central role in the proliferation of racist theories that scaffolded Western societies towards dominance of much of the epistemological narratives today.

In this chapter, we analyze the book Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness. This chapter will reinterpret and scrutinize the author’s narratives by disentangling the author’s positions. We attempt to resignify the way we approach Western literature. By dissecting the text, it allows a pointing out literature as an intrinsic part of the deep-rooted ways European imperialism and colonialism work. In the first part of the chapter, a light is shone on the historical and epistemological basis for the argument. By approaching this question with a broader viewpoint, this chapter proposes to alter how we engage in critical thinking by decentralizing the ways to build epistemology. Thus, positing that alteration in engagement with the text can produce applicable and enduring transformations in teaching and learning. The bias we scrutinize in this chapter is centering racism. The aim here is to further criticize language biases which, this chapter posits, can significantly impact the (re)building of a more diverse, inclusive, and productive human epistemology.