The discipline of psychology grew out of European philosophy into a unique discipline that retained reductionist assumptions regarding knowledge production and ways-of-being. Born out of dissatisfaction with the dominance and ineffectiveness of Anglo-European/American assumptions in psychology, and how the discipline obscured culturally unique ways-of-being and producing knowledge, Indigenous scholars are working to decolonize psychology. This article contributes to this Indigenous project by exploring the ways in which dominant reductionist philosophies in psychology today theorize away Indigenous peoples’ understanding of being. Drawing on the continental and existential philosophical tradition, and Māori (Indigenous peoples of New Zealand) knowledge of being, we provide a critique of how the self has been recast in psychology through a reductionist perspective. We set dominant theorizing and knowledge production regarding the self in psychology against the backdrop of processes of colonization, industrialization, urbanization, and the need for the development of Indigenous psychologies to meet the needs of Indigenous peoples.
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