By looking for alternative ways to live language teacher education otherwise, we have found in decolonial thinking possibilities for the resignification of our praxis. In this paper, we will present three praxes, which represent our efforts to fight coloniality, and we conclude by arguing for a decolonial language teacher education.
With Lander (2005), we consider that the university is an institution that contributes significantly to the maintenance of the coloniality of knowledge, according to which scientific knowledge is privileged and other forms of knowing are invisibilized. As university teachers directly involved in language teacher education, we are aware that this area clearly reproduces this logic of coloniality, for the university is seen as the natural producer of knowledge and the school is perceived as the consumer of this knowledge. By looking for alternative ways to live language teacher education otherwise, our research group, composed of (English) language teachers and language teacher educators from different educational contexts in Brazil, has found in decolonial thinking (CASTRO-GÓMEZ; GROSFOGUEL, 2007; MALDONADO-TORRES, 2010; MIGNOLO, 2012, 2017; MIGNOLO; WALSH, 2018, QUIJANO, 2010) possibilities for the resignification of our praxis. In this paper, we will present three praxes, undertaken by each of the authors, which are efforts to fight coloniality: 1) a research conducted with university teachers, schoolteachers and student teachers in which they problematize the teaching practicum; 2) the research findings regarding the concept of spaces of speech in a collaborative language teacher education experience; 3) a work in the English lessons at an undergraduate teacher education program focusing on students’ subjectivities. We conclude by arguing for a decolonial language teacher education.
