Defining Restorative: Educator discourses, white supremacy, and resistance

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Saturday 3:45 pm
  In Roundtable Session: Unsettling Empire through Indigenous Histories

Abstract

This paper analyzes how educators define restorative practices (RP) and whether these definitions reproduce, resist, or omit characteristics of white supremacy culture. Using a decolonial framework and critical discourse analysis, we examine open-ended survey responses from 149 Minnesota educators. We interrogate how definitions of RP engage, or fail to engage, with its historical and cultural origins, particularly its appropriation of Indigenous practices. Our analysis highlights widespread relational framings but identifies troubling silences around coloniality and historical accountability. By revealing how educator discourses align with settler logics, this study invites future research on liberatory, anti-colonial RP in education. Findings contribute to critical debates on the institutionalization of RP and implications for educator training and accountability, school disciplinary policies, and addressing cultural appropriation.

Authors

• Ceema Samimi, University of Minnesota

• Nox Zand-Dow, University of Minnesota