Beyond the Canon: Epistemic Disobedience and the Pluralization of Rationalities in Philosophy Education in Light of Law 10.639/2003

Abstract

Law 10.639/2003 constitutes one of the most significant milestones in the recent history of Brazilian education by making the teaching of African and Afro-Brazilian history and culture compulsory throughout Basic Education. Its effects, however, extend beyond the legal and administrative sphere, reaching the epistemological, pedagogical, and political foundations of school subjects, particularly Philosophy. This article, developed from the partial results of an ongoing doctoral research project, aims to analyze how Law 10.639/2003 has been reconfiguring the teaching of Philosophy in Brazil, especially with regard to the critical revision of the Eurocentric canon, curricular decolonization and decoloniality, and the incorporation of African and Afro-diasporic epistemologies within the framework of anti-racist education. Methodologically, this is a theoretical-conceptual study grounded in decolonial, postcolonial, and Afro-perspectivist scholarship, drawing on authors such as Frantz Fanon, Achille Mbembe, Sueli Carneiro, Aníbal Quijano, Walter Mignolo, and Ramón Grosfoguel. The findings indicate that the mandatory character established by Law 10.639/2003 produces an epistemic inflection in the teaching of Philosophy by destabilizing the claim of neutrality and universality of the modern philosophical canon and by revealing epistemic racism as a constitutive element of colonial modernity. The study concludes that the challenges posed by Law 10.639/2003 require the field to recognize racism as a philosophical problem, to assume curricular decolonization and decoloniality as a structural pedagogical task, and to adopt epistemic disobedience as a formative horizon for Philosophy teachers and students — a necessary condition for the construction of a pluriversal school philosophy committed to cognitive justice and to the democratization of knowledge.