Refusals of Erasure: Centering Indigenous Resurgence as Survivance in Teacher Education

Session Type: Paper Session

Abstract

This invited Division K VP session aligns with AERA’s 2026 theme Unforgetting Histories and Imagining Futures: Constructing a New Vision for Education Research. This panel will offer insights into the past-present-future continuum central to Indigenous knowledge systems, reminding us “that an alternative future is also determined by our understanding of our past” Estes (2019). Collectively, the panel will centre the words of Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o (2013) who reminds us, “It’s because we can imagine different futures that we can struggle against the present state of things” by mapping out genealogies of refusals, reminding us that the current struggle of erasure is deeply embedded in troubling histories, but more importantly Indigenous resurgence as survivance creates pathways towards Indigenous futures in teacher education.

Sub Unit

• Division K - Teaching and Teacher Education

Chair

• Jennifer Brant, University of Toronto - OISE

Papers

• Refusals of Erasure: Centering Indigenous Resurgence as Survivance - Leilani Sabzalian, University of Oregon

• Centering Indigenous Resurgence as Survivance in Teacher Education - Valerie J. Shirley, University of Arizona

• Centering Indigenous Resurgence as Survivance in TE - Frank Deer, University of Manitoba; Hugh Burnam, Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center

• Refusals of Erasure: Centering Indigenous Resurgence as Survivance in TE - Bryan McKinley Jones Brayboy, Northwestern University

• Refusals of Erasure - Jarita Greyeyes, McMaster University

Session Organizer

• Nicol R. Howard, Chapman University

Discussant

• Jeremy Garcia, University of Arizona