Being Allies: Exploring Indigeneity and Difference in Decolonized Anti-oppressive Spaces by ...

190 Pages·2010·4.72 MB·English

by  Sue Lang

Being Allies:
Exploring Indigeneity and Difference in Decolonized Anti-oppressive Spaces

by

Susan Lang
B.A., University of Victoria, 1997

A Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment
of the Requirements for the Degree of

MASTER OF ARTS

in the Department of Educational Psychology & Leadership Studies

 Susan Lang, 2010
University of Victoria

All rights reserved. This thesis may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by photocopy
or other means, without the permission of the author.
ii
Supervisory Committee

Being Allies:
Exploring Indigeneity and Difference in Decolonized Anti-oppressive Spaces

by

Susan Lang
B.A., University of Victoria, 1997

Supervisory Committee

Dr. Catherine McGregor, Educational Psychology & Leadership Studies
Supervisor

Dr. Darlene Clover, Educational Psychology & Leadership Studies
Departmental Member

Dr. Jason Price, Curriculum & Instruction
Outside Member
iii
Abstract

Supervisory Committee

Dr. Catherine McGregor, Educational Psychology & Leadership Studies
Supervisor

Dr. Darlene Clover, Educational Psychology & Leadership Studies
Departmental Member

Dr. Jason Price, Curriculum & Instruction
Outside Member

This study explores the ways in which Indigenous and non-Indigenous educators
have experienced working together as allies for social and racial justice. The study is
grounded in anti-oppressive, decolonizing, and participatory action research paradigms.
Theoretically, it is framed by anti-racism and anti-oppressive approaches that highlight
oppression, exploitation, and power. Within the theoretical field of antiracism, there is a
tendency to ignore Indigeneity, and the ongoing oppression and racialization of Indigenous
peoples (Lawrence & Dua, 2005; St. Denis, 2007). This study puts Indigeneity and
oppression at the forefront of ally development research.
The research was modeled upon an action research method called co-operative
inquiry (Heron, 1996). The inquiry group involved seven group members, including the
researcher. These group members came from diverse racial and social backgrounds. They
were all women who work in diverse educational capacities (adult educators, nurse
educator, counselor, teacher, lawyer). The inquiry spanned 11 weeks, with 18 hours spent
together over six group sessions. Two Indigenous leaders joined the group in two sessions,
to lend their experiences and insights on the role of allies.
Group members retained a high level of commitment throughout the study. The
study was a success in terms of analyzing many of the issues Indigenous and non-
Indigenous educators face when working together. It also highlighted the roles of allies and
useful strategies for allies to use. The study was shown to have a high level of catalytic
validity (Herr & Anderson, 2005) as many group members reported a high degree of both
epistemological (what they know) and ontological (how they become) learning. The results
of this study lead to new insights on how allies have traditionally been conceptualized and
the role that ontology plays in learning. The study also discusses how the congruence
between topic and method was navigated, and how that in turn led to the creation of an
allied space.
iv
Table of Contents

Supervisory Committee ........................................................................................................................ ii
Abstract ......................................................................................................................................................iii
Table of Contents .................................................................................................................................... iv
Acknowledgments .................................................................................................................................. vi
Dedication ................................................................................................................................................ vii
Frontispiece .......................................................................................................................................... viii
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION.............................................................................................................. 1
Problem Statement ...................................................................................................................................................... 1
Research questions & goals of the study ............................................................................................................ 2
Conceptual Framework ............................................................................................................................................. 3
Existing Research.......................................................................................................................................................... 5
Research Design ............................................................................................................................................................ 5
Re-conceptualizing the field .................................................................................................................................... 6
Significance of the Study ........................................................................................................................................... 7
Situating myself ............................................................................................................................................................. 8
Overview of the thesis .............................................................................................................................................. 11
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ............................................................................................... 12
Aboriginal Education and Indigenous Epistemology ............................................................................... 12
Educational Approaches to Race ....................................................................................................................... 19
Social-Justice & Racial-Justice Allies ................................................................................................................. 26
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY .......................................................................................................... 33
Methodological Paradigms ................................................................................................................................... 33
Interpretive Paradigm ............................................................................................................................... 33
Action Research & Participatory Action Research ...................................................................................... 34
Decolonizing Methodologies ................................................................................................................................. 37
Situating the Study as a Hybrid............................................................................................................................ 40
Research Method........................................................................................................................................................ 43
Co-operative Inquiry .................................................................................................................................. 43
Narrative Inquiry ....................................................................................................................................................... 46
Co-operative Inquiry in Action ............................................................................................................................ 48
Ethics ................................................................................................................................................................ 48
Recruitment ................................................................................................................................................... 48
Participants .................................................................................................................................................... 51
Inquiry Group .............................................................................................................................................................. 51
Community Leaders .................................................................................................................................................. 53
Initiating the Group .................................................................................................................................... 54
Schedule, Logistics & Commitment...................................................................................................... 57
Co-operative Inquiry Research Questions ........................................................................................ 58
Co-operative Inquiry Research Methods ........................................................................................... 59
Format of Sessions ...................................................................................................................................... 60
Indigenous Leaders .................................................................................................................................... 61
Group sense making ................................................................................................................................... 61
Analysis and Interpretation .................................................................................................................... 64
Data Sets & Coding ...................................................................................................................................... 65
v
Dissemination of Results .......................................................................................................................... 66
Limitations & Challenges ......................................................................................................................... 66
Quality of Research ..................................................................................................................................... 69
Process Validity .......................................................................................................................................................... 70
Authentic Relationships .......................................................................................................................................... 71
Dialogic validity .......................................................................................................................................................... 71
Catalytic validity ......................................................................................................................................................... 72
CHAPTER 4: RESULTS ......................................................................................................................... 74
The Space....................................................................................................................................................................... 75
Identity struggles ........................................................................................................................................ 76
Allied space .................................................................................................................................................... 79
Struggles with racism & racial conflict ............................................................................................... 83
Effects of Schooling ................................................................................................................................................... 84
Inter-group & tribal group conflict .................................................................................................................... 86
Constraints & Supports To Allied Relationships .......................................................................................... 88
Constraints ..................................................................................................................................................... 89
Cultural Misunderstandings .................................................................................................................................. 89
Essentializing ............................................................................................................................................................... 91
Impatience & despair ............................................................................................................................................... 92
Insider/Outsider relationship .............................................................................................................................. 93
Lack of Confidence & Courage .............................................................................................................................. 95
Liberal multiculturalism & political correctness ......................................................................................... 96
Power and Privilege .................................................................................................................................................. 98
Supports, Roles, and Strategies for Allies ....................................................................................... 101
Know Thyself ............................................................................................................................................................ 102
Know the Other ........................................................................................................................................................ 105
Build relationships ................................................................................................................................................. 111
Reframe the Experience ....................................................................................................................................... 113
Plant the seed............................................................................................................................................................ 118
Heal Yourself & Inspire Others ......................................................................................................................... 121
CHAPTER 5: DISCUSSION ................................................................................................................. 126
The Ontological Turn ............................................................................................................................................ 126
Exploring Allied Space .......................................................................................................................................... 133
Allied-Based Development .................................................................................................................................. 139
Beyond whiteness .................................................................................................................................... 139
Relationships amongst allies ............................................................................................................... 141
Allied identity as an ontological way of being .............................................................................. 146
Process of Inquiry ................................................................................................................................................... 149
Co-operative inquiry as method ........................................................................................................ 149
Anti-Oppressive Approach to Research .......................................................................................... 153
Conclusion .................................................................................................................................................................. 157
REFERENCES ......................................................................................................................................... 161
Appendix ............................................................................................................................................... 168
Appendix A: Certificate of Ethical Review .................................................................................................. 168
Appendix B: Recruitment Materials ............................................................................................................... 169
Appendix C: First Session materials ............................................................................................................... 171
Appendix D: Inquiry Questions ......................................................................................................................... 175
Appendix E: Final Evaluation Form ............................................................................................................... 176
Appendix F: Inquiry maps ................................................................................................................................... 179
vi
Acknowledgments

I extend a heartfelt ‘thank you’ to the six brave women who volunteered to
participate in this research. You took the time out of your busy lives to wrestle with
the topic and allowed yourselves to be in ‘uncomfortable’ spaces. Your commitment
to the topic and the process was unshakeable. You are each responsible for the
creation of our allied space. I wish you the best of luck on your life long learning
journeys.
Thank you to Dr. Catherine McGregor, my supervisor and mentor, for
allowing me the space to follow my own ideas and passions. You were always there
when I needed you. You supported me one hundred percent. Thank you to Dr. Jason
Price for believing in me from the very beginning. Your thoughtful guidance in the
design of this research was crucial. To Dr. Darlene Clover, your insight and feedback
along the way has been much appreciated. Thank you to Dr. Catherine Etmanski for
reigniting my passion for teaching. You breathe life into the academy. Thank you to
Olga Gladkikh, who first introduced me to emancipatory adult education, and
facilitated my understandings of participatory research. To Dr. Gweneth Doane,
thank you for your strong mentorship, which includes introducing me to the
ontological turn. It is because of your support and your way of being that I was able
to reframe the experience of this research and pay closer attention to what the
research was showing me, instead of what I thought I should be looking for.
To all of my friends, family, and colleagues—I could not have done this
without you. You had so much faith in me, every step of the way. Thank you to my
parents for instilling in me such a strong work ethic. To my brother and his family—
thank you for always providing me a reprieve in the “country” whenever I needed it.
Thank you to those colleagues who helped to inform my thinking by sharing your
own insights and experiences for this research. To my closest friends—thank you
for checking in on me when I appeared too busy to check in on you. I always knew
you were there, supporting me, even from afar. To my partner, Peter—thank you
for your constant encouragement, and for supporting my quiet time “in the library”.
You always found a way to make me laugh. You made the writing process bearable.
vii
Dedication

To the strong Indigenous leaders who participated in this research.
This work would not exist without your teachings.
You planted the seeds.
You inspired.
viii
Frontispiece

If we examine critically the traditional role of the university in the pursuit of
truth and the sharing of knowledge and information, it is painfully clear that
biases that uphold and maintain white supremacy, imperialism, sexism, and
racism have distorted education so that it is no longer about the practice of
freedom. The call for a recognition of cultural diversity, a rethinking of ways of
knowing, a deconstruction of old epistemologies, and the concomitant demand
that there be a transformation in our classrooms, in how we teach and what we
teach, has been a necessary revolution—one that seeks to restore life to a
corrupt and dying academy.
-bell hooks
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

PROBLEM STATEMENT
Indigenous1 people in Canada have been racialized, separated, and oppressed
by settler cultures since colonization. Colonization has been described as a ‘shared
culture’, between those who have been colonized and those who colonized (Smith,
1999). There is a long-standing history of ignoring the socially constructed and
politically marginalized place in which First Peoples have been relegated (Smith,
1999). Some Canadian post secondary institutions have finally begun prioritizing
issues of Indigeneity, especially how Indigenous knowledges and Indigenous
research broadens understandings of Other ways of knowing, and promotes ethical,
community-based research practices (Battiste, 2008). We are at a pivotal learning
point in the field of education, with an emerging focus on Indigenous epistemology
and Aboriginal education, and how these affect teaching and learning practices
within the academy and other educational institutions. But how well is the
university preparing pre-service teachers and graduate students to return to
educational settings and ‘work with’ these new kinds of knowledges in a culturally-
sensitivity way, and as advocates with Indigenous people?
As educators2 in our schools and organizations, we continue to socially
reproduce what we know, and reinforce behaviour and socio-cultural habits in line
with our worldviews (Bourdieu, 1993). Antiracism theory has unfortunately ignored

1 Throughout this thesis the terms Indigenous and Aboriginal are used interchangeably to
denote the First Peoples of Canada. First Nations, Inuit, and Métis are used when appropriate.
2 The term ‘educator’ is used throughout this paper and includes those working in an educative
capacity, in any field. This includes formal, non-formal and informal learning spaces.
2
Indigenous peoples in its analysis (Lawrence & Dua, 2005), and instead focused on
immigrant and multicultural issues in the Canadian context. Several Indigenous
scholars and researchers in Canada (St. Denis, 2007; Lawrence & Dua, 2005) have
advocated for antiracism theorists to expand their focus to include the ongoing
racism and marginalization experienced by First Nations, Métis, and Inuit in Canada.
Therefore, it is critical to attach a decolonizing anti-racist approach to discussions of
the interpersonal working relationships amongst and between educators of
Indigenous and non-Indigenous backgrounds. Of course racialized views and
mistrustful relationships will not disappear overnight, but working to recreate a
new positive sense of relations together will require both Indigenous and non-
Indigenous people alike, consciously working to understand historicity (Freire,
1970): how our economic, political and cultural history informs the present and the
future in Canada. These new understandings will involve open communication,
honesty, and a commitment to working together as allies, to create a new sense of
agency, a new sense of what is possible. This study argues that we need to create
opportunities to open the conversation between educators, both Indigenous and
non-Indigenous, who share the same commitments towards social, political and
economic justice for Indigenous peoples.

RESEARCH QUESTIONS & GOALS OF THE STUDY
The research questions guiding this study are:
1. How has building racial-justice allies been experienced, from the perspective
of a select group of both Indigenous and non-Indigenous educators?