Willful Ignorance and Preservice Teachers' Framing of International Cross-Cultural Experiences

• In Event: 29.066 - Intercultural Learning Following an International Teaching Experience: Preparing Intercultural Teachers for Social Justice

Abstract

Theoretical Framework: The international cross-cultural experiences of preservice teachers impact their pedagogical, curricular, and personal development as future educators and people. Study abroad programs in particular emphasize an active production of knowledge through cross-cultural experiences. The influence of neoliberal ideology, expressed through the logic of capitalist globalization, on preservice teachers’ international cross-cultural experiences must be considered (Kinginger, 2010) when investigating how reentry shapes the framing of what was learned and what knowledge was produced by each individual. The reinforcement of positions of social privilege based on international cross-cultural experiences serves to further justify inequitable social power dynamics at home upon reentry (Phillion, Malewski, Rodriguez, Shirley, Kulago, & Bulington, 2008).

Discussion: Preservice teachers on a short-term study abroad program in Honduras are taught about US/Honduras socio-political relations and history through experiential and co-curricular activities, course readings, and class discussions. Yet, when interviewed about their experiences upon reentry they often claim ignorance about these topics. This willful ignorance about existent social inequities, both globally and in local communities, is an active production of certain knowledges that uphold ways of unknowing. Therefore, an exploration of how knowledge production and ignorance, is facilitated through preservice teachers’ international cross-cultural experiences is useful for cultivating understandings of inequitable social realities within pedagogical development.

Scholarly Significance: Instead of viewing ignorance as a void to be filled with knowledge, it needs to be understood that preservice teachers and academics alike are complicit in the production of unknowledges. Ideological omissions are created with knowledge production through both insights and blindness (Malewski & Jaramillo, 2011). The preparation of future educators through international cross-cultural experiences must consider the willful ignorance of preservice teachers and teacher educators through purported knowledges that have been justified by neoliberal ideology. We explore the interpretations and meaning-making processes of preservice teachers dialogically, towards the aims of social equity and justice. If we are to move towards social justice we must consider the borders and fringes of hegemonic ideologies. The contemporary hegemony of neoliberal thought influences the continued meaning-making of international cross-cultural experiences by preservice teachers upon reentry and in future practice. The knowledge produced through interpersonal relationships internationally can be critically interrogated and understood within a way of knowing – neoliberalism – that seeks homogeneity. Teacher educators and preservice teachers will benefit from critical interrogations of how various heritages are constructed as knowledges, and as alternatives to the hegemony of neoliberal globalization.

Authors

• Hannah Dockrill, Purdue University

• Jubin Rahatzad, Purdue University

• Suniti Sharma, Saint Joseph's University

• JoAnn I. Phillion, Purdue University