From Below, on the Left, With the Earth: Notes Toward a Pedagogy of Utzilaj K’aslemal/Buen Vivir

• In Event: The Struggle Against Oppression and Racial Injustice in Education

Abstract

This paper explores the affordances of a pedagogy of buen vivir, Utzilaj K’aslemal—collaboratively designed by the co-authors—for fostering ethical relations to the land, among youth, and to past and future generations in Guatemala. It focuses on the pedagogical practices of a multi-year initiative aimed at fostering youth climate activism and reviving ancestral agro-ecological practices. In a design-based approach, data collection were collected in a series of workshops with Mayan youth and community elders. The results present pedagogical principles and meanings young people constructed through the program’s inter-generational activities. The paper addresses questions of relationality, ethics, and the land. These are growing areas of focus cultural historical and Indigenous scholar-educators, but are underexplored in the context of political education.

Author

• Michael Bakal, University of California - Berkeley