Abstract
Within science education, the oft-included mandate of scientific literacy continues to problematically (re)produce humanism’s Eurocentric legacies through the implicit message that its ontology, Cartesianism, is the only ontology. Working within and against this mandate for decolonizing purposes, this chapter asks: How might scientific literacy be enacted otherwise if it is configured with/in other-than-Cartesian ontologies while still privileging knowing nature (i.e. space, time, and matter) through empirical observation? Drawing from and putting into conversation alternatives to scientific literacy, Karen Barad’s agential literacy and Gregory Cajete’s ecologies of relationships, a pedagogy of relationally storying nature is developed and discussed herein. The relational stories produced by youth participants are then read through and with these alternatives literacies to discuss consequences and possibilities for decolonizing science education.
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© 2016 Marc Higgins
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Higgins, M. (2016). Decolonizing School Science: Pedagogically Enacting Agential Literacy and Ecologies of Relationships. In: Taylor, C.A., Hughes, C. (eds) Posthuman Research Practices in Education. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137453082_12
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137453082_12
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
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