Decolonising Thinking, Being and Relating
A teaching unit on challenging colonial legacies and imagining decolonial futures
By Alejandra Jaramillo-Aristizabal & Jacoba Matapo
Year
9-13
Level
5 and above. The resources can be adapted to suit senior or junior secondary learning programmes
Duration
7-8 weeks
Learning areas
English, Social Sciences, Arts (Drama, Visual Arts, Dance)
Inquiry focus
Decolonisation
Description
This teaching unit engages with the effects of colonisation on indigenous ways of knowing, relating and being. It then engages with current indigenous whenua (land) and moana (ocean) struggles as sites of contestation over meanings, values and ways of relating with te taiao (the natural world).
Key understandings, knowledge & actions
Examine the philosophical grounding of European colonialism
Observe how indigeneity/indigenous are framed and consider why this matters
Understand the effects of colonisation on indigenous ways of knowing, relating and being
Correlate philosophical ideas about our place in the world with practices that enact the values and relationships associated with these ideas
Explore how indigenous ways of knowing, relating and being continue to contest Western colonial values today
Use our imaginations to start decolonising ourselves
Learning experiences
1. The Great Chain of Being: Philosophical underpinnings of European colonialism
2. Māori cosmogonies: Stories of origin
3. Land struggles: Contending worldviews
4. Decolonising futures through the imagination