My purpose for conducting the critical self-reflective research described in this article was a desire to improve my effectiveness as a teacher in the field of First Peoples' education. The impetus for undertaking this research was a critical incident in my teaching career that I refer to as My Story of Sal. Writing autoethnographically, I use personal narrative as method, and show My Story of Sal as a representation of curriculum and pedagogy in my teaching praxis. I apply a critical lens of whiteness studies to the narrative to reveal whiteness in my classroom.
This critical reflective practice article juxtaposes the temporal relationship between lived experiences in my past, with my present actions as a schoolteacher. Presented in the style of a dwam—the state of semiconsciousness that precedes sleep—I uncover dominant colonial narratives that continue to inscribe racialized power relations in school curriculum and pedagogy, and that have done so throughout my experiences as a child–student and an adult–teacher. Drawing from Albert Memmi's “colonizer who refuses,” my dwam demonstrates critical awakening as a white teacher through six scenes that span four decades.
Applied Theatre Research: Radical Departures by Peter O’Connor and Michael Anderson (2015) Bloomsbury, London ISBN 9 7814 7251 3854 (ebook), US$24.99.
Critical Plays: Embodied Research for Social Change, by Anne Harris and Christine Sinclair (2014) Sense, Rotterdam ISBN 9 7894 6209 7537 (pb), 9789462097544 (hb), 9789462097551 (ebook), $36.00 (pb).
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