Toward a Model of Global Meaning Making

Abstract

Drawing upon tenets of critical theory, cultural capital, global epistemologies, decolonization, Indigenous ways of knowing, mobility and translanguaging, ethics, and global citizenship, this article proposes a model of cross-cultural meaning making and worldly reading as a foundation for global epistemological eclecticism in our research and pedagogical pursuits. The imaginary represents an aspirational model in the interest of decolonizing and supporting “other”—notably confronting western exclusivity and racism and mobilizing epistemologies of southern scholars and Indigenous communities.

Challenging Native Speakerism in Literacy Research and Education

“…The "outof-school" literacy and language experiences of researchers, especially those underrepresented in specific fields, are likewise relevant to academe (Li & Beckett, 2006). A model of global meaning making (Tierney, 2018) in literacy research requires recruiting and sustaining more researchers from multilingual, immigrant, and international backgrounds. Diverse linguistic repertoires of literacy researchers of color in particular are essential for advancing literacy research and education and challenging the racialized monolingualism of academe writ large.…”

Reinventing Our Comparisons

“…In describing the decoloniality of cie, I return to "common sense" as 'normal native intelligence' (Torres, 2011, p. 181) affected by (de)coloniality and globalizations sustaining/countering neocoloniality, and comparative reflectivity. Self-reflection that does not challenge and diversify one's own ways of knowing, especially the epistemologies of the population(s) being studied, merely reproduces, rather than counters, oppressions grounded in one's own epistemologies (Connell, 2007;Santos, 2018;Tierney, 2018). If education is grounded in coloniality, patriarchy, and neoliberalism (i.e., epistemologies of the North), then the education will reproduce these oppressions (Santos, 2018).…”

Mentoring in Transformative Hybrid Spaces: Preservice Teacher Preparation and Literacy Learning in Moçambique

“…While we carry forward with great enthusiasm across the two contexts in which we work, we are conscious of the kinds of challenges raised by Tierney () around global meaning making and how to maintain supportive relationships among international partners. The key for us has been to examine our international work in ways that challenge us to name what we are learning and using in growing our own practices.…”