Sea Country: navigating Indigenous and colonial ontologies in Australian environmental education
Whitehouse, Hilary, Watkin Lui, Felecia, Sellwood, Juanita, Barrett, M.J., and Chigeza, Philemon (2014) Sea Country: navigating Indigenous and colonial ontologies in Australian environmental education. Environmental Education Research, 20 (1). pp. 56-69.
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Abstract
In this paper, we contribute to land education research by focusing on the Torres Strait Islands in the Coral Sea at the far north of tip of Cape York, Australia. We describe the Torres Strait Islander concept of Sea Country and Torres Strait Ailan Kastom (translated as 'Island Custom'). We then analyse some of the ways in which settler colonisation has challenged these ways of knowing and being. Our inquiry looks at how Sea Country is positioned within two contemporary Australian examples of environmental education: firstly, within the new Australian Curriculum cross-curriculum priorities that mandate that special attention be given to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures and also to the concept of sustainability; and secondly, within the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park Authority's Sea Country Guardians programme This analysis of environmental education curriculum and practice identifies the ways in which the concept of Sea Country and the Indigenous cosmology it represents are simultaneously supported and ignored in the current Australian environmental education context.
| Item ID: | 31328 |
|---|---|
| Item Type: | Article (Research - C1) |
| ISSN: | 1469-5871 |
| Keywords: | Indigenous education; Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander education; Sea Country; land education; decolonisation; Australian Curriculum |
| Additional Information: | The article was republished by Routlege as a book chapter: Whitehouse, Hilary, Watkin, Felecia, Sellwood, Juanita, Chigeza, Philemon, and Barratt, Mary Jeanne (2016) Sea Country: navigating Indigenous and colonial ontologies in Australian environmental education. In: McCoy, Kate, Tuck, Eve, and McKenzie, Marcia, (eds.) Land Education: Rethinking pedagogies of place from Indigenous, postcolonial and decolonizing perspectives. Routledge, New York, NY, USA, pp. 56-69. |
| Date Deposited: | 29 May 2014 06:26 |
| FoR Codes: | 13 EDUCATION > 1303 Specialist Studies in Education > 130301 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Education @ 80% 13 EDUCATION > 1302 Curriculum and Pedagogy > 130212 Science, Technology and Engineering Curriculum and Pedagogy @ 20% |
| SEO Codes: | 93 EDUCATION AND TRAINING > 9399 Other Education and Training > 939901 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Education @ 100% |
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