Counter-Visioning Black Education: Rhetorical Turns and Critical Discursive Shifts

Abstract

This chapter looks at some rhetorical and critical discursive shifts in Canadian schooling and education as a way to counter-vision Black education. It insists on non-forgetiveness of the over-determining effects of schooling relations and experiences for different bodies. It also calls for the critical engagement on schooling experiences of learners NOT merely as “descriptive appendages to our theoretical formulations”, but rather, as a clarion call for action. The discussion starts with a focus on the contemporary issues and challenges of schooling and education in the context of Ontario. The challenges of education impact disproportionately students who are Black, Indigenous and racially minoritized. In asking: what are the transformative possibilities of schooling and education today?, the chapter hopes to engage the critical reader to think and reflect on the possibilities of educational research. We stand to learn from practical strategies of radical inclusive schooling that engage learners cultures, histories, identities, and local cultural resource knowledge base. The pursuit of educational change also requires the collective interactions and involvements of teachers, students, administrators, parents, Elders, and local communities in order to create “communities of learners.” We also need classroom, school, and off-school dialogues to be multiple conversations about privilege, power and oppression, validation of diverse experiences, histories, knowledges, and practices. Such dialogues could include an appreciation of the historical and cultural narratives of all peoples in our diverse communities. Critical dialogues could include breaking down labels that dominate systems and practices. Decolonizing education is changing the normal [conventional] ways we teach, learn, and administer education. Decolorizing education is by engaging colonialism, settler colonialism and colonizing relations in general. Decolonizing education is about promoting counter and oppositional voices, knowledges and histories, and bringing into focus the lived experiences of students who have traditionally been marginalized from the school system. By decolonizing education, looking critically at the structures and processes of education delivery (e.g., teaching, learning, and administration of education), we create inclusive schooling environments that would appeal to and engage the diverse group of learners.