Recent political and educational policy shifts within Australia have renewed concerns with achievement and engagement "gaps" when Indigenous and non-indigenous school students are compared. The position taken for this article however, hopes to demonstrate that this shift is unlikely to result in improved outcomes because of an ongoing…

This article explains how the speaking and listening practice of yarning circles can be used in the literacy classroom. The article opens with an account of a live enactment of yarning circles with elementary students in a mainstream classroom in Australia. It explains the purpose and origin of yarning circles in Indigenous communities, and…

In this article, we propose to approach Indigenous education beyond the formal/non-formal dichotomy. We argue that there is a critical need to conscientiously include Indigenous knowledge in education processes from the school to the community; particularly, when formal systems exclude Indigenous cultures and languages. Based on ethnographic…

This article explores the potential of queering as a mode of critique by problematising the ways in which liberal politics of race shape normative understandings of health in a high school classroom. Drawing on findings from an Australian and New Zealand (NZ) research project designed to respond to religious and cultural difference in school-based…

This conceptual article, based on data collected and analyzed within a larger study, considers perspectives on cultural diversity and research in the context of the current politicized educational environment within the United States. Drawing from previous research conducted in a graduate course exploring language, literacy and culture, the author…

Educational under-achievement by a section of the Maori population is a persistent problem for New Zealand. This article is a theoretical examination of the practice and consequences of a culture-based curriculum that is promoted as the solution. We develop the argument that not only is the "cultural solution" at odds with the complex…

This article describes a learning program of the Tohono O'odham or "desert people" of the Southwestern United States and Mexico. Their culture and knowledge on both sides of the border is for them a special way of life known as "himdag," where science is built into everyday life of gathering, hunting, farming, artistry,…

This paper provides a foundational framework to bring into conversation indigenous world views in reimagining universities. Highlighting a specific indigenous world view, the university is presented as a site for critical conversation and transformative praxis. We discuss the workplace experiences of indigenous staff in a university and infer from…

The study in one country to support the development of education in another is a regular event in the field of contemporary tertiary education, and it is likely to grow as developing countries accelerate their educational development projects and as Western universities seek international student funding. This article reports the case study of a…

This short piece offers two literal and figurative snapshots of what land education looks like in action in Hawaii. The first snapshot depicts a contemporary example of Indigenous Hawaiian taro cultivation in the Limahuli valley on the island of Kauai. The second snapshot illustrates the food sovereignty movement in Waianae, Oahu located at the…

Eco-heroic quests for environmental communion continue to be represented, mediated, and glorified through film and media narratives. This paper examines two eco-heroic quests in the Alaskan "wilderness" that have been portrayed in two Hollywood motion pictures: the movies "Grizzly Man" and "Into the Wild". Both films…

In this paper, we aim to contribute to ongoing work to uncover the ways in which settler colonialism is entrenched and reified in educational environments and explore lessons learned from an urban Indigenous land-based education project. In this project, we worked to re-center our perceptual habits in Indigenous cosmologies, or land-based…

Indigenous communities raise concerns that they are overresearched and tired of research always asking the same questions and reproducing the same answers, thus pressuring researchers to open the discourse on mixed methods research so as to enable new debates and approaches to emerge. A postcolonial indigenous paradigm provides a theoretical…

In response to the banning of Mexican American Studies in Tucson, students in the newly formed Chican@ Literature, Art, and Social Studies program displayed their resiliency in the face of the oppressive actions of the Tucson Unified School District and the state of Arizona. This article serves as a platform for the voices of these dedicated youth…

This paper draws on a case study of a small alternative Indigenous school in Queensland, Australia. From the perspective of several of the school's Indigenous Elders, the paper foregrounds the significance of group differentiation at the school on the basis of Indigenous representation. However, it also considers how such…