ABSTRACT
Examining everyday life in postcolonial contexts is a complex undertaking. We live in societies characterized by vast differences in access to resources, where competition and conflict are pervasive and palpable. Economic poverty, health concerns such as HIV/AIDS and Ebola outbreaks, gender-based violence, xenophobia, and racism are all manifestations of the power dynamics that have given rise to social inequalities and that have created the contexts for poverty, discrimination, and violence to flourish. In the midst of such hardship, people are also driven to change their circumstances, engage in various forms of resistance, and claim access to resources and social justice. In this chapter, we explore the social psychological factors that contribute to this situation and the ideas and actions toward resistance and social change that emerge from communities in these contexts. Specifically, we ask about the kinds of theories and methods relevant to postcolonial contexts and how these might provide a challenge to mainstream psychology with a tendency to dehumanize and objectify its ‘subjects’.
