Decolonizing Community Psychology by Supporting Indigenous Knowledge, Projects, and Students: Lessons from Aotearoa New Zealand and Canada.

Abstract

Community psychology has long stood as a social justice agitator that encouraged reformation both within and outside of the academy, while keeping a firm goal of building greater well-being for people in communities. However, community psychology's historically Euro-centric orientation and applied, interventionist focus may inadvertently promote colonial agendas. In this paper, we focus on the example of Indigenous Pacific peoples, drawing upon experience working among Indigenous iTaukei Fijian communities and with Indigenous frameworks for promoting student success in Aotearoa New Zealand and Canada. We outline how community psychology curricula can strive toward decolonization by (a) teaching students to respectfully navigate complexities of Indigenous knowledge and traditions that contest colonial ways of being and doing, (b) act as facilitators who build toward collaborative community projects and model this research practice to students, and (c) boost Indigenous student success by fostering relationships with instructors and fellow students that are embedded within the relational model of self that is often absent in individualistic-oriented Western academic settings.