Afterword

Sheila Batacharya and Yuk-Lin Renita Wong

The contributors to this collection explore the sentient-social experience of embodiment in relation to pedagogical practices and to processes of decolonization. Writing both from within and beyond academic settings, the authors consider ways of knowing that contest the hegemony of Eurocentric knowledge production, variously seeking to develop embodied ways of teaching and learning that provide scope for additional sources of knowledge. In so doing, they offer a series of possible responses to an overarching question: If we seek to unsettle approaches to education that rest on Western epistemological frameworks and serve to perpetuate colonial relations of power, then how might attention to embodied experience help us to develop more equitable and inclusive models of learning, ones that contribute to, rather than hinder, the work of decolonization? In approaching this question, each author moves with conviction and purpose, but their collective goal is not prescriptive. They deliberately resist Western expectations of closure, visible in the assumption that questions will be given definitive answers. Rather, their essays mark a point along a continuum of challenges and investigations, one that remains, and should remain, open-ended.

Apart from its consideration of integrative approaches to embodiment, pedagogy, and decolonization, what sets this collection apart from the bulk of scholarship on embodied learning is its understanding of embodiment as a process of becoming critically attuned to sentient-social experience. From this perspective, the development of alternative pedagogical models demands attention to the symbiotic relationship between the discursive and the material aspects of embodiment. Our experience of our material bodies, as the site of knowledge, physical sensations, and of emotion and intuition, is inevitably conditioned by the ways in which our bodies are inscribed with meaning through discursive processes of racialization, gendering, and queering, as well as through differences in socioeconomic class and in physical and mental ability. In considering embodied learning and its relationship to decolonization, the contributors to this volume refuse to draw a line between the discursive and the material. More broadly, they resist the imposition of oppositional binaries and instead uphold integrated, holistic ways of knowing that are more relational than dichotomous.

In emphasizing the material foundations of human experience, the essays in this collection push both educators and scholars of embodiment to engage with decolonization not as an abstract concept, the meaning of which can too easily be expanded to encompass other socially transformative projects, but instead in terms of material relations of power. In Canada, these relations of power are evident in the juxtaposition of discursive expressions of concern, on the one hand, and, on the other, the continued refusal of the state to fully honour treaty obligations, the willingness to accept poverty and ill health as facts of Indigenous life, and the denial of the rights of Indigenous peoples to cultural, political, and economic self-determination. Integral to altering material relations of power is the reclamation of Indigenous knowledges, methodologies, and practices, which serve to reconnect the individual to the relational collective and to the land and, in so doing, promote the resurgence of an inner life force of wholeness.

Understood in this way, as a process of healing and renewal, decolonization is not simply a negation or an undoing, the antithesis of colonization. At the same time, in contrast to New Age appropriations of Indigenous spirituality and healing traditions, decolonization in no way denies the violence and oppression generated by and perpetuated through colonialism, racism, imperialism, and capitalism. Indeed, the issue of cultural appropriation comes up in several of the chapters in this volume. Especially from the standpoint of counterhegemonic knowledge production, incorporating Indigenous knowledges into contexts other than those in which they originated can be productive, provided that ethical and political considerations are fully engaged. Indigenous knowledges have value: they benefit people in ways both tangible and intangible. In drawing on them, one must therefore honour not only the integrity of the knowledges themselves but also those who created them and are willing to share them. One must ask how traditional knowledges can be shared and used in a way that contributes to equity and that respects the dignity and the right to self-determination of the communities to whom these knowledges belong.

The practice of embodied writing, on which a number of the authors in this collection focus, contributes to the decolonizing of knowledge production by exposing the weaknesses of hegemonic cognitive frameworks and the dichotomies that these construct between mind and body, intellect and spirit, self and other, and discourse and matter. These authors also call into question the idea of writing as solely a cognition-based activity. Exploring the limitations of Western knowledge production undermines the taken-for-granted supremacy of Eurocentric thinking, including the ways that definitions of rationality and objectivity have been used to marginalize and posit Indigenous knowledges as not scientific and coherent in their own right. Another theme in the collection—the need to unsettle privileged subjectivities and interrogate the intertwined relations of colonialism and capitalism—similarly highlights the degree to which hegemonic discourses and ways of organizing societies are unsustainable, exploitative, and destructive of life and spirit.

We are certainly not the first to critically examine the legacies of colonialism, nor are we the first to point to the shortcomings of conceptual frameworks grounded in Western liberal thought. However, it can, in fact, be difficult to escape the influence of dominant ways of thinking and being. Over the course of her career, Roxana Ng examined historical materialist research and activism, on the one hand, and the mechanisms of internalized oppression and embodied strategies for resisting it, on the other—only to circle back and critique the ways in which those embodied strategies are themselves bound up with socially constructed and organized relations of power. Her approach was not linear, and such ongoing self-reflexive critical scrutiny is arguably a means to avoid inadvertently capitulating to hegemonic frameworks that reinforce dichotomies and attempt to discipline the parameters of thinking—and thus to limit resistance. The need for critical vigilance also suggests one of the fruits of collaboration, as others may see what we do not.

Indeed, for us, the process of editing this collection has demonstrated that academic activity can be enhanced by a focus on relationship building. Roxana Ng’s research and teaching certainly provided a model to emulate. Over many years, she collaborated in both academic and community contexts in order to learn and teach qigong and integrate this knowledge and practice with her eclectic activist involvements and interdisciplinary scholarship. We thus decided early on that our editorial process required a face-to-face meeting of the authors. Our first thought was simply that such a meeting would help to encourage collaboration—although, as it turned out, the meeting accomplished far more than that: it deepened the authors’ appreciation of each other’s work, as well as their collective commitment to the book and their trust in the editorial process. At the end of the day, one of the contributors told Renita, “I now know you, sister.” We understood this comment to mean, “I will engage in this work in a spirit of relationship and trust.” This is the spirit in which we pursued this project, and, looking back, we understand why it was important to proceed as we did. Being physically present and in relationship is sustaining. An embodied approach to scholarly activity—one that is anchored in human presence and that values the ethical aspects of relationship building—produces effects that extend far beyond a single book or project.

We think of this book as an extended conversation around the themes of embodiment, pedagogy, and decolonization, with the themes themselves interlacing and sometimes coalescing, while at other times remaining distinct. And, like many conversations, this one is far from finished. We hope that this book will spark additional exchanges and debates among a wider audience, and we look forward to critical responses and engagement from our readers.