Buen Vivir and Epistemic Alterity: Narratives of Resistance from Latin America

Language, Discourse & SocietyDecember 2025

Maria Cecilia Zsögön [1]

DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17469425

[1] Institute of Sociology and Philosophy, The Maria Grzegorzewska, Warsaw, Poland, ORCID: 0000-0002-6888-2789, mzsogon@aps.edu.pl 
 
 

Abstract

This article examines the contemporary relevance of the paradigm of Buen Vivir (“Good Living”), a concept rooted in the ancestral knowledge of Indigenous Peoples from South America, that envisions well-being through respect for cultural and environmental diversity, as well as through principles of equality, solidarity, and communal life. Emerging as a decolonial alternative to dominant models of development, Buen Vivir offers a political and pedagogical stance that challenges the prevailing logics of profit, commodification, and environmental exploitation. By foregrounding ecological balance, cultural plurality, and collective well-being, it provides a critical framework for rethinking the relationship between humans, nature, and society. This paper argues that integrating the principles of Buen Vivir into formal education can foster critical consciousness, promote intercultural dialogue, and disrupt patterns of inequality embedded in historical and structural power relations. Education, in this sense, can serve as a vehicle for advancing epistemological diversity and for challenging the homogenizing and colonial legacies that remain pervasive in the region. The paper highlights the potential of Buen Vivir and critical pedagogy as complementary frameworks for constructing more inclusive, sustainable, and just societies.

Keywords: education, postcolonialism, epistemicide, South America, indigenous people

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