“It Feels Fake”: Decolonizing Curriculum and Pedagogy in Predominantly White Institutions

Abstract

This article describes the processes, tensions, questions, conflicts, and celebrations the three authors experienced while creating and implementing decolonizing and/or Indigenous curriculum and pedagogy for predominantly white university classrooms. The theoretical framework engages Indigenous epistemologies and decolonizing pedagogy to disrupt Western schooling rooted in the ways Indigenous scholars see knowledge as fundamentally relational and community as the primary setting for Indigenous and decolonizing education. Western schooling continues to support the dispossession of Indigenous peoples from their/our lands with a “civilizing agenda” that promotes individualization. We seek to re-connect relationships with the land and Indigenous community in our various disciplines. The authors share their reflections through storywork and describe similarities, differences, and insights based on their positionalities.