Introduction

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Colonization is the process of foreign invaders seizing control of land and enforcing new forms of governance, religion, culture, and resource extraction. It is often accomplished through violence and forceful displacement of Indigenous populations.

Decolonization - the act of reversing the effects of colonization - cannot happen without a clear understanding of the colonial history of European settlers and their global domination. Western colonization created the means by which certain narratives - often anti-Indigenous and discriminatory - discipline our lives. For this reason, Eve Tuck and Wayne Yang assert that decolonization is the process of disrupting our colonial foundations. They argue that decolonization is not a metaphor. Instead, as Sylvia Wynter claims, it is praxis, a means to trouble the colonial frames that pervade our interactions and worldviews while engaging alternative, ancestral, and imaginative possibilities. Relationships are a central aspect of decolonization, and all over the world Indigenous peoples are demanding stronger and healthier relations between humans as well as with land and water. Decolonization is another way of being human, in a world that has centered human subjectivity to specific forms of exploitative power. Ultimately, decolonization is complex, layered, and contextual; but at the center of it all, it is a grounded attempt to be whole in all ways, with all things, and all people.

Explanation of Zine Structure

It is our acknowledgement and understanding that decolonization is not static or fixed, and as part of an institutional university, we wrestle with the tension and incommensurability of enacting decolonial concepts and practices through our work. Nevertheless, this zine is an endeavor to bring better understanding of the historical contexts and actors involved in attempts at decolonial practice within the fields of social impact.

We explore a decolonial lens through the six Pathways of Social Impact, a framework adopted by the UVU Center for Social Impact and developed in 2010 by Stanford University's Haas Center for Public Service. These include: direct service, community engaged learning and research, social entrepreneurship and corporate social responsibility, policy and governance, community organizing and activism, and philanthropy. An article is included for each pathway, and we have chosen to include two additional articles on travel and media, fields that greatly influence social impact practice. Each article is structured in a way that briefly introduces

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the topic, reviews its colonial history, and offers current examples of attempts at decolonial practice.

We define the six Pathways of Social Impact as follows:

1. Direct Service: Working to address the immediate needs of individuals or a community, often involving contact with the people or places being served.

2. Community Engaged Learning and

Research: Connecting coursework and academic research to community identified concerns to enrich knowledge and inform action on social issues.

3. Social Entrepreneurship and Corpo-

rate Social Responsibility: Using ethical private sector approaches to create or expand market-oriented responses to social problems.

4. Policy and Governance: Participating in political processes, policymaking, and public governance.

5. Community Organizing and Activism:

Involving, educating, and mobilizing individual or collective action to influence or persuade others. 6. Philanthropy: Donating or using private funds or charitable contributions from individuals or institutions to contribute to the public good.

We own that these are engagements defined by Western ideologies, but that reality empowers us to utilize decolonial and Indigenous frameworks to both subvert colonial mentalities and (re)center the logics of BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) communities and seek a better relationship with humanity, animals, land, and water.

Graphic Designer’s Note

While designing this zine, I was constantly reminded that the influence of colonization extends even to the field of visual design. It was a struggle to find fonts and graphics by artists of color, and even difficult to find artwork depicting people of color and accurate portrayals of non-Western culture. While not perfect, I have attempted to decolonize my own practice by sourcing visuals from artists of color where possible and utilizing images that portray communities in a dignified light.