Our branch campus in Quito presented the book "¿Qué es la teoría? Enfoques, usos y debates en torno al pensamiento teórico", written by Jose Juncosa Blasco, professor and director of humanities; and Fernando Garcés Velásquez, professor of anthropology. 

This book aims to question theory as a given and homogeneous reality, to problematize its use and to account for some contemporary debates. To solve this problem, the authors suggest two questions: what is a theory? and what is theorizing? In the search for answers, they go through, in detail, the most significant contributions from the philosophy of science and epistemology as well as from cultural studies and the dialogue of knowledge.

María Sol Villagómez, vice president in our branch campus in Quito, said the book has a practical virtue and is an educational and useful resource for research. Garcés stated that the authors have presented conceptual resources that contribute to overcome some forms of automatism or uses that distort or minimize the scope of the theories, frequent in learning and research.

The comments were made by Alejandra Ramírez, coordinator of the doctorate studies in Social Studies at Universidad Mayor San Simón in Bolivia, and Fernando Vergara, philosopher and vice president of Universidad Católica Silva Henríquez in Chile.

Ramírez stressed that the book invites us to approach reality, not from predetermined categories, but from new ways and strategies to construct and deconstruct reality. "Above all, it calls us to rethink the role of a researcher, to encourage young people in investigative processes". 

Juncosa, one of the authors, contextualized the book and said that the ability to theorize is learned by doing, "A well-done theory disputes meanings and sharpens our action and resignifies our situations, it is to open spaces for teachers, students, to open up other possibilities and that happens through concepts".

The book was published by Abya Yala - UPS and is hosted on the university's digital repository.