Simone Bignall

Simone Bignall is an Australian political philosopher whose academic work primarily focuses on "excolonialism" (or "exit from colonialism") as a philosophy of collaborative transformation. She is currently a senior researcher in the Jumbunna Indigenous Nations and Collaborative Futures Hub at the University of Technology Sydney. Bignall's research interests lie within postcolonial political philosophy, with a particular emphasis on her work with Indigenous peoples engaged in sovereign Nation-building for self-determination and treaty. Her publications often aim to establish connections between Indigenous Australian and contemporary European philosophies, seeking common conceptual ground. Her academic pursuits are guided by an interest in the philosophical lineage from Spinoza to Deleuze and encompass critical posthumanism, continental philosophy, anarchism, colonial and postcolonial politics and culture, theories of embodiment and agency, feminism, and ethics. Bignall holds a PhD in philosophy from the University of Sydney, where her doctoral studies were supervised by Moira Gatens. She also holds a BA from the University of Adelaide. In addition to her research and teaching, Bignall is a co-editor of the book series Indigenous Nations and Collaborative Futures and the series on Continental Philosophy in Austral-Asia, both published by Rowman and Littlefield International. She previously served as Chair of the Australasian Society for Continental Philosophy from 2016 to 2018. Bignall is recognized for her research on system transformations, especially concerning the politics of Decolonisation and Postcolonialism. She frequently contributes as a curator and lecturer to Professor Rosi Braidotti's annual Summer School on Posthumanism at the University of Utrecht and participates in international research projects funded by organizations in Canada, Australia, and the United Kingdom. She co-edited "Posthuman Ecologies" with Rosi Braidotti in 2019, a work reviewed as a "necessary and timely intervention" in French Studies.