Decolonizing Educational Leadership

This book offers new ways of engagement for leaders seeking to connect theory to practice in decolonizing education. In the current climate where xenophobia, anti-immigrant sentiments, and other forms of exclusion make up much of the discourse, educational leaders need to seek ways to foreground other forms of knowledge and transfer them into their daily leadership practices. Lopez contributes to other critical leadership approaches while foregrounding a decolonizing approach that unsettles the coloniality manifested in education and school practices. Chapters provide school leaders with examples of ways they can challenge coloniality, white supremacy, and other forms of oppression in schooling that negatively impact some students and their educational outcomes.

This book introduces a term for our times, ‘Global Majority,’ as conceptualised within the context of school leadership. It examines the processes and impact over time of racially-minoritising up to eighty-five percent of the world’s population. The chapters illustrate how a decolonised cognitive reset from a minority to majority orientation moves practice from a place of subordination to one of agency and efficacy. By reconnecting the people of the Global Majority with their narratives and the social and historical linkages that they have always had, the book potentially contributes to a different globality; where interdependence is not driven by the economic greed of the minority, but the social and very human needs of the majority.

Drawing on treaties, international law, the work of other Indigenous scholars, and especially personal experiences, Marie Battiste documents the nature of Eurocentric models of education, and their devastating impacts on Indigenous knowledge. Chronicling the negative consequences of forced assimilation, racism inherent to colonial systems of education, and the failure of current educational policies for Aboriginal populations, Battiste proposes a new model of education, arguing the preservation of Aboriginal knowledge is an Aboriginal right. Central to this process is the repositioning of Indigenous humanities, sciences, and languages as vital fields of knowledge, revitalizing a knowledge system which incorporates both Indigenous and Eurocentric thinking.

This volume explores theories and practices of decolonizing education, drawing on international perspectives from scholars across the globe to engage new knowledges and build solidarities across different spaces. Decolonization is an ongoing process in which educators, community members, and practitioners alike have a stake in challenging Eurocentric paradigms and ways of knowing. The book showcases the contributions of praxis-oriented scholars and practitioners who seek to engage in decolonizing praxis that unsettles educational norms, forging new ways of thinking about teaching, learning, and leadership.

Decolonizing and Indigenizing Education in Canada thinks boldly about how to make space for Indigenous knowledges and have an honest discourse on truth and reconciliation. By engaging with Indigenous epistemologies and strategies, the contributors navigate the complexities of the decolonization and indigenization of post-secondary institutions. What is needed in this field is less theorizing and more action: the contributors offer practical steps on how one might positively transform the Canadian academy. Through this lens of action-based solutions, each of the fifteen chapters advances critical scholarship on issues of pedagogy, curriculum, shifting power dynamics, and challenging Eurocentric perspectives in higher education. With contributions from both Indigenous and non-Indigenous academics from across Canada and in varying academic positions, Decolonizing and Indigenizing Education in Canada provides a unique perspective specific to the Canadian education system. Featuring discussion questions, further reading lists, and practical examples of how to engage in decolonization work within the academy, this text is an essential resource for students and scholars studying Indigenous knowledges, education and pedagogies, and curriculum studies.

This edited collection centres the reclamation of global counter and Indigenous knowledges, epistemologies, ontologies, axiologies, and cosmovisions that have the capacity to create new educational leadership frameworks that chart courses to visions beyond the current oppressive systems of education.

Decolonizing Data yields valuable insights into the decolonization of research methods by addressing and examining health inequalities from an anti-racist and anti-oppressive standpoint.

Decolonizing Wealth is a provocative analysis of the dysfunctional colonial dynamics at play in philanthropy and finance. Award-winning philanthropy executive Edgar Villanueva draws from the traditions from the Native way to prescribe the medicine for restoring balance and healing our divides. Though it seems counterintuitive, the philanthropic industry has evolved to mirror colonial structures and reproduces hierarchy, ultimately doing more harm than good. After 14 years in philanthropy, Edgar Villanueva has seen past the field's glamorous, altruistic façade, and into its shadows: the old boy networks, the savior complexes, and the internalized oppression among the “house slaves,” and those select few people of color who gain access. All these funders reflect and perpetuate the same underlying dynamics that divide Us from Them and the haves from have-nots. In equal measure, he denounces the reproduction of systems of oppression while also advocating for an orientation towards justice to open the floodgates for a rising tide that lifts all boats. In the third and final section, Villanueva offers radical provocations to funders and outlines his Seven Steps for Healing. With great compassion—because the Native way is to bring the oppressor into the circle of healing—Villanueva is able to both diagnose the fatal flaws in philanthropy and provide thoughtful solutions to these systemic imbalances. Decolonizing Wealth is a timely and critical book that preaches for mutually assured liberation in which we are all inter-connected.