Indigenous Philosophies and Critical Education

An important academic goal is to understand ongoing contestations in knowledge in the search to engage everyday social practice and experiences, as well as the social barriers and approaches to peaceful human coexistence. This reader pulls together ideas concerning Indigenous epistemologies (e.g., worldviews, paradigms, standpoints, and philosophies) as they manifest themselves in the mental lives of persons both from and outside the orbit of the usual Euro-American culture. The book engages Indigenous knowledges as far more than a «contest of the marginals», thereby challenging the way oppositional knowledges are positioned, particularly in the Western academy. Subsequently, this book is a call to recognize and acknowledge Indigenous knowledges as legitimate knowings in their own right, and not necessarily in competition with other sources or forms of knowledge. The project offers an opportunity for the critical thinker to continue on a de-colonial/anti-colonial intellectual journey in ways informed by Indigenous theorizing.

George J. Sefa Dei is Professor of Sociology and Equity Studies, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto (OISE/UT). In 2000 he co-edited Indigenous Knowledges in Global Contexts: Multiple Readings of Our World with Budd Hall and Dorothy Goldin Rosenberg. His most recent books include Teaching Africa: Towards Transgressive Pedagogy; Fanon and Education: Pedagogical Challenges, co-edited with Marlon Simmons (Peter Lang Publishing, 2010); Fanon and the Counterinsurgency of Education; and Learning to Succeed: Improving Educational Achievement for All. In July 2007, he succeeded the occupant of the stool (Odikro) of Asokorekuma and was installed as a traditional chief in Ghana. His stool name is Nana Sefa Atweneboah I, the Adomakwaahene of the town of Asokore, near Koforidua in the New Juaben Traditional Area of Ghana.