Abstract Summary
This presentation explores the decolonization of English language teaching in Canada, and the benefits Indigenous epistemologies can bring to ELT pedagogy. Informed by my situatedness in a Canadian settler community, and an exploration into ESL students’ experiences with indigenous culture, it provides a critical view of English language teaching.
Abstract :
As English language educators explore the uses of English in increasingly pluralistic societies, we should consider the role that indigenous languages and cultures, shaped for centuries by land many of us share, can play in pedagogy and curriculum.
This presentation addresses indigenous epistemologies and English language teaching in Canada, a country that is increasingly multilingual and pluralistic. It is informed by my situatedness within a settler community on the Great Plains of Saskatchewan, and my work to decolonize myself and my academic post-secondary English language teaching.
My presentation explores ways that current English language teaching in Canada reinforces racialized stereotypes inherent in the systemic inequality and social discourse of Canada. ELT pedagogy, including textbooks, perpetuates colonial hegemonies and misrepresents Indigenous peoples, their culture and histories. A significant inquiry into English language students’ experiences with Indigenous culture reveals that when they come to Canada, they often have very scant or very racialized knowledge of Indigenous peoples, which makes them vulnerable to the misrepresentations that surround them. In this presentation, I make the point that ELT should provide alternate discourses that disrupt the current persistent racialized portrayals of Indigenous people and include appropriate representations of Indigenous peoples that respect their culture and languages.
A decolonized ELT classroom can benefit from the teachings of Indigenous Elders, which are founded on humanistic land-based epistemologies that can enhance and revitalize language learning pedagogy.
