A Global De-colonial Praxis of Sustainability — Undoing Epistemic Violences between Indigenous peoples and those no longer Indigenous to Place

Abstract

Addressing our growing planetary crisis and attendant symptoms of human and human-ecological disconnect, requires a profound epistemological reorientation regarding how societal structures are conceived and articulated; named here as the collective work of decolonisation. While global dynamics are giving rise to vital transnational solidarities between Indigenous peoples, these same processes have also resulted in complex and often contradictory locations and histories of peoples at local levels which unsettle the Indigenous–non-Indigenous binary, providing new and necessary possibilities for the development of epistemological and relational solidarities aimed at increasing social–ecological resilience. The International Resilience Network is an emerging community of practice comprised of Indigenous and settler–migrant peoples aimed at increasing social–ecological resilience. This article narrates the story of the Network's inaugural summit, and provides an overview of contextual issues and analysis of particular pedagogical aspects of our approach; foregrounding ruptures between ontology and epistemology that inevitably occur when culturally and generationally diverse groups who are grounded in different daily realities and related agency imperatives come to share overlapping worldviews through learning ‘in place’ together. Developing pedagogical practices for naming and negotiating associated tensions within the collective work of decolonisation is, we argue, a critical step in enabling practices conducive towards the shared goal of increased human–ecological resilience.

Ko tēnei te wā…. Te Tiriti o Waitangi education, teacher education, and early childhood care and education

“…In the past year, an international youth-led "school strikes for climate" movement initiated by Greta Thunberg has called attention to these concerns (Binnie, 2019). There is now growing recognition that the climate emergency is a crisis in relation to the rights of children to stable, secure futures (Harvey, 2019) and that Indigenous and traditional ecological knowledges (TEK) are sources of sustainability practices that can inform our future transition to living sustainably within the finite constraints of our planet (Skerrett & Ritchie, 2018;Williams, Bunda, Claxton, & MacKinnon, 2018). Providing young people with understandings and strategies for facing the climate emergency and managing a just transition is clearly a priority:…”

Reshaping Colonial Subjectivities Through the Language of the Land

“…The first (recollectivist dimension) is the remapping of ontology and epistemology in an embodied sense upon the human psyche through ceremony, stories, arts-based approaches, and simply being one with country. The second (critical dimension) is the remapping of sociohistorical narratives that involves the disruption of dominant settler narratives of the ecology of culture and place through resurfacing and repositioning Indigenous narratives of country, culture, and kin (Williams et al, 2017).…”

“…There is also, however, a critical distinction to be made between participatory and Indigenous worldviews. While both share the view of a deeply interconnected and mutually constituted reality, Indigenous worldviews, ways of being and languages, arise from specific places and therefore convey unique sets of human-ecological understandings and relationships (Williams et al, 2017). As will become apparent later in this paper, this distinction is important for understanding both ecopsychology's potential and limitations in elucidating the relationship between Indigenous languages and stronger human-earth connectedness.…”

“…First, probably our greatest capability in supporting reindigenization is the innate human capacity for deep empathic connection to the earth as a living being (Ausubel, 2008;O'Hara, 2006;Williams, 2012b). Second, disrupted by historical and contemporary forms of colonialism, this capacity is threatened by the dissonance between our often fleeting experiences of interconnectedness, and everyday priorities and actions, as anchored in and influenced by our everyday contexts and political ecologies (Williams, Bunda, Claxton, & MacKinnon, 2017). Third, a key means of addressing the dissonance between ontology (the nature of reality) and epistemology (how we come to know, or our everyday actions) is through the resurgence of Indigenous languages.…”

Ȼentol Tŧe Teṉew̱ (Together With the Land)

“…They described how policies of genocide, reserve systems, segregation, forced land appropriation, and residential schools, and numerous child apprehension policiesamong many other forms of colonial violencewere deliberately imposed on their sovereign Nations. In the process, Indigenous peoples were disconnected from their homelands, and thus from their land-and water-based ways of teaching and learning (Archibald, 2008;Simpson, 2017;Williams et al, 2018). To counter the colonial harms held in these sacred places, our institute recentred land-and water-based pedagogical practices of working in circle, harvesting, ceremony, speaking the language, and sharing oral histories.…”