From Deconstruction to Construction: Centering Decolonial and Critical Insights on Reimagining Education Scholarship

• In Event: Decolonizing Education: Critical Perspectives and Liberating Practices

Abstract

Almost twenty years ago Hurtado (2003) wrote that women of color feminists epistemologies embodied “the choice to construct rather than deconstruct.” (p. 218). In this theoretical paper I center and elaborate on this idea and discuss how it may be applicable for education scholarship. Building on Hurtado’s (2003) foundational work, I draw from and center decolonial and critical epistemologies to explicate the ways research and scholarship can engage in the project of construction. In particular, I offer a framework for research and scholarship that both involves emphasizing the following: critical and collective memory; imagination and creativity; desire and hope; minoritized voices and stories; and the material and discursive conditions. The paper discusses the significance of construction in education scholarship.

Author

• Rican Vue, University of California - Riverside