The book's focus is the hegemonic role of so-called modernist, Western epistemology that spread in the wake of colonialism and the capitalist economic system, and its exclusion and othering of other epistemologies. Through a series of case studies the book discusses how the domination of Western epistemology has had a major impact on the epistemological foundation of the education systems across the globe. The book queries the sustainability of hegemonic epistemology both in the classrooms in the global South as well as in the face of the imminent ecological challenges of our common earth, and discusses whether indigenous knowledge systems would better serve the pupils in the global South and help promote sustainable development.
This open access book presents a strong philosophical, theoretical and practical argument for the mainstreaming of indigenous knowledge in curricula development, and in teaching and learning across the African continent. Since the dawn of political independence in Africa, there has been an ongoing search for the kind of education that will create a class of principled and innovative citizens who are sensitive to and committed to the needs of the continent. When indigenous or environment-generated knowledge forms the basis of learning in classrooms, learners are able to immediately connect their education with their lived reality. The result is much introspection, creativity and innovation across fields, sectors and disciplines, leading to societal transformation. Drawing on several theoretical assertions, examples from a wide range of disciplines, and experiences gathered from different continents at different points in history, the book establishes that for education to trigger the necessary transformation in Africa, it should be constructed on a strong foundation of learners’ indigenous knowledge. The book presents a distinct and uncharted pathway for Africa to advance sustainably through home-grown and grassroots based ideas, leading to advances in science and technology, growth of indigenous African business and the transformation of Africans into conscious and active participants in the continent’s progress. Indigenous Knowledge and Education in Africa is of interest to educators, entrepreneurs, policymakers, researchers and individuals engaged in finding sustainable and strategic solutions to regional and global advancement.
This book discusses the vital importance of including indigenous knowledges in the sustainable development agenda. In the wake of colonialism and imperialism, dialogue between indigenous knowledges and Western epistemology has broken down time and again. However, in recent decades the broader indigenous struggle for rights and recognition has led to a better understanding of indigenous knowledges, and in 2015 the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) outlined the importance of indigenous engagement in contributing to the implementation of the agenda. Drawing on experiences and field work from Africa, Asia, Latin America and Europe, Indigenous Knowledges and the Sustainable Development Agenda brings together authors who explore social, educational, institutional and ecological sustainability in relation to indigenous knowledges. In doing so, this book provides a comprehensive understanding of the concept of "sustainability", at both national and international levels, from a range of diverse perspectives. As the decolonizing debate gathers pace within mainstream academic discourse, this book offers an important contribution to scholars across development studies, environmental studies, education, and political ecology.
This handbook explores the evolution of African education in historical perspectives as well as the development within its three systems–Indigenous, Islamic, and Western education models—and how African societies have maintained and changed their approaches to education within and across these systems. African education continues to find itself at once preserving its knowledge, while integrating Islamic and Western aspects in order to compete within this global reality. Contributors take up issues and themes of the positioning, resistance, accommodation, and transformations of indigenous education in relationship to the introduction of Islamic and later Western education. Issues and themes raised acknowledge the contemporary development and positioning of indigenous education within African societies and provide understanding of how indigenous education works within individual societies and national frameworks as an essential part of African contemporary society.
Indigenous knowledges are the subject of much discussion and debate in many contemporary academic fields. This is no less true in the fields of education and development studies—two fields with long histories of interaction with indigenous knowledges and peoples. Yet, despite this similar level of interest and interaction, there has yet to emerge a book that draws together the two fields as they interact with and learn from indigenous epistemologies.
African social development is often explained from outsider perspectives that are mainly European and Euro-American, leaving African indigenous discourses and ways of knowing and doing absent from discussions and debates on knowledge and development. This book is intended to present Africanist indigenous voices in current debates on economic, educational, political and social development in Africa. The authors and contributors to the volume present bold and timely ideas and scholarship for defining Africa through its challenges, possible policy formations, planning and implementation at the local, regional, and national levels. The book also reveals insightful examinations of the hype, the myths and the realities of many topics of concern with respect to dominant development discourses, and challenges the misconceptions and misrepresentations of indigenous perspectives on knowledge productions and overall social well-being or lack thereof. The volume brings together researchers who are concerned with comparative education, international development, and African development, research and practice in particular. Policy makers, institutional planners, education specialists, governmental and non-governmental managers and the wider public should all benefit from the contents and analyses of this book.
Through a series of case studies, this book explores the question of whether Western educational discourse - still the dominant discourse in many countries in the global South - benefits the majority of pupils and helps promote sustainable development in these countries, or whether pedagogies rooted in more indigenous ideologies and discourses would better serve this aim.
Through a multi-sited qualitative study of three Kenyan secondary schools in rural Taita Hills and urban Nairobi, the volume explores the ways the dichotomy between “Western” and “indigenous” knowledge operates in Kenyan education. In particular, it examines views on natural sciences expressed by the students, teachers, the state’s curricula documents, and schools’ exam-oriented pedagogical approaches. O’Hern and Nozaki question state and local education policies and practices as they relate to natural science subjects such as agriculture, biology, and geography and their dismissal of indigenous knowledge about environment, nature, and sustainable development. They suggest the need to develop critical postcolonial curriculum policies and practices of science education to overcome knowledge-oriented binaries, emphasize sustainable development, and address the problems of inequality, the center and periphery divide, and social, cultural, and environmental injustices in Kenya and, by implication, elsewhere. “In an era of environmental crisis and devastation, education that supports sustainability and survival of our planet is needed. Within a broader sociopolitical context of post-colonialism and globalization, this volume points out possibilities and challenges to achieve such an education. The authors propose a critical, postcolonial approach that acknowledges the contextual and situational production of all knowledge, and that de-dichotomizes indigenous from ‘Western’ scientific knowledge.” Eric (Rico) Gutstein, Professor, Curriculum and Instruction, University of Illinois at Chicago (USA)
This collection makes a unique contribution towards the amplification of indigenous knowledge and learning by adopting an inter/trans-disciplinary approach to the subject that considers a variety of spaces of engagement around knowledge in Asia and Africa.
This interdisciplinary collection of readings pertaining to schooling, higher education, adult and community development education, indigenous education and social movement learning in the African and Asian regions is a contribution to anti/critical colonial scholarship in comparative/international education and the sociology of education. The political and analytical standpoint that weaves through the text considers the imbrications of the colonial and imperial projects currently referenced as neoliberal globalization (globalization of capitalism) and development (compulsory Eurocentric-modernization) and their attendant and mutual implications for education, social reproduction and hegemony. Counter/anti-hegemonic and indigenous education projects and pre/existing alternatives are registered in the critique. At last, a remarkable collection of essays written by a range of scholars, mostly originating from Asia and Africa, demonstrating with admirable clarity how policies and practices of neo-liberal globalization in those regions cannot be adequately understood without appreciating how they are a product of the exploitative histories of colonialism. Written with conceptual sophistication, personal knowledge and deep conviction, these essays represent a major scholarly intervention in contemporary debates about globalization and education.??Fazal Rizvi, Professor, Graduate School of Education, University of Melbourne, Australia & Professor-Emeritus, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA. This intriguing and provocative volume deals with crucial intersections between global forces and national initiatives with respect to the most crucial agency of transformation: education. The cumulative efforts of this assembly of committed intellectuals reveal the forces that retard progress in the two largest continents and offers compelling suggestions on how to redefine the boundaries of power, the contents of knowledge, and the use of critical thinking to create alternative spaces of autonomy, freedom, liberation and empowerment. Toyin Falola, University Distinguished Professor & Frances Higginbotham Nalle Centennial Professor, University of Texas at Austin. This volume, well crafted by Dip Kapoor, one of the finest scholars in the postcolonial education field, brings together writers who examine processes of learning and education more broadly within the context of the dominant discourses of globalisation and 'development’. They unveil the underlying neocolonial, neoliberal tenets of these processes strongly echoing what Hardt and Negri would call 'Empire.’ In short, another important reading resource provided by Dip Kapoor and colleagues. Peter Mayo, Professor & Chair, Educational Studies, University of Malta. Finally, a much awaited intervention on neoliberal globalization from Asian and African perspectives! This book makes a compelling case for a historically grounded, regionally specific analysis of globalization. The contributions are extraordinary for their textured and embedded analysis of neoliberal globalization. One of those rare books that deserve to be read across the social sciences. Sangeeta Kamat, Associate Professor, International Education, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, USA.
