The Longue Durée of the Geopolitics of Curriculum

The sociopolitical turn in mathematics education and decolonial theory

“…Questions considered (among others) are the following: Can there be social justice without questioning modernity/coloniality? What frame of reference does the former depend on, and what does the latter reveal about mathematics as we expand the scope of the 'social' towards a planetary frame of reference (Fúnez-Flores, 2023a, 2023b, 2023c? From the literature drawing on decolonial theory, we learn that mathematics education has been subordinated to scientific-oriented mathematics, a form of universalised mathematical description and representation that sustains a Eurocentric world view.…”

Anibal Quijano: (Dis)entangling the geopolitics and coloniality of curriculum

“…By understanding the coloniality of power as intersubjective and relational, we can examine how colonial relations of power are contested by the heterogeneous realities, histories, knowledges, struggles, experiences and modes of coexistence. Focusing on the irreducibility of historical–structural heterogeneity and its epistemological and geopolitical possibilities enables the articulation of decolonial thought and praxis in distinct contexts, particularly in rethinking, resisting and transcending the longue durée of coloniality (Fúnez‐Flores, 2022a, 2023). Quijano's conceptualization of heterogeneity allowed him to shift his attention towards decoloniality, which amplifies the multiplicity of ways of thinking, being, co‐existing, sensing, doing and relating that resist the matrix of coloniality while simultaneously creating the conditions for escaping the seductive existential–epistemological prison of modernity (Sibai, 2018).…”

“…In curriculum studies, the emerging scholarship drawing on decolonial theory usually does not maintain a sustained dialogue with Quijano's extensive work (which begins in the 1960s), with the exception of those who adopt materialist perspectives (e.g. Fúnez‐Flores, 2020, 2022a, 2023; Fúnez‐Flores & Phillion, 2019; Díaz Beltrán, 2018; Jaramillo & McLaren, 2008; Leonardo & Porter, 2010; Paraskeva, 2016a; Rose, 2019; Streck & Adams, 2012). Despite having articulated decolonial theory's primary analytical concept, which has informed the social sciences and humanities for the past three decades, Quijano's work surprisingly remains marginal in the broad field of education and curriculum studies iii .…”