Educational Psychology—Limitations and Possibilities

660 The Praeger Handbook of Education and Psychology
The implications for the field of educational psychology that emerge from our discussion
rest in part, we would argue, on two of the key tenets of indigenous knowledges and multiple
knowings that consistently fail to be addressed to any significant extent in mainstream educational
theorizing and practice. These are agency and spirituality. Both of these crucial elements represent
a site of transformation which educational psychology can (and must) clearly benefit if it is to
remain relevant to the lives of minoritized peoples and communities in their engagements with
the academy.
Within the anticolonial discursive framework we conceptualize agency as a site of liberation
and the practice/theorization of resistance by colonized and marginalized peoples to systemic
oppression/repression. We view it as a site of empowerment and active resistance formed by
the oppressed within specific social/spatial asymmetrical relations of political power. To borrow
from Grossberg (1993) we define agency as the “articulation of subject positions into specific
places (sites of investment) and spaces (fields of activity) on socially constructed territorialities.
Agency is the empowerment enabled at particular sites and along particular vectors ...itpoints
to the existence of particular formations of practices as places on social maps, where such places
are...potentiallyinvolvedinthemakingofhistory.Agencyasasiteis...realized(when) specific
investments are enabled and articulated.” To speak of anticolonial agency then is to know our
political self. It is to resist, rupture, and renounce dominance and oppression in counter hegemonic
ways. It is to refuse the violation and despiritualization of our collective minds, bodies, and souls.
It is to know and see colonialism for what it is, not for what it claims (Eurocentrically/universally)
to be. Anticolonial agency arising from an anticolonial discourse (Sefa Dei et al., 2002, p. 7) places
stress on power held and sustained through practice in local/social spaces to survive colonial and
colonizing encounters. It argues that power and discourse are not the exclusive terrain of the
colonizer. The power of resistance and discursive agency reside in and among colonized and
marginalized groups. As argued elsewhere (Sefa Dei et al., 2002, p. 7), subordinated/colonized
peoples had a (theoretical and practical) understanding of the colonizer that “functioned as
a platform for engaging in political/social practice and relations.” The notion of “colonial” is
therefore grounded in power relations and inequities that are imposed and engendered by tradition,
culture, history, and contact. Anticolonial agency/theorizing however, “rises out of alternative,
oppositional paradigms, which are in turn based on indigenous concepts, analytical systems and
cultural frames of reference” that are vital in reclaiming our sense of self and spirituality.
Our enunciation of anticolonial agency and indigenous knowledge as decolonizing educational
practice constitutes, we would argue, a libratory form of spiritual resistance. When we speak of
anticolonial agency and counter hegemonic epistemologies and practices as forms of spirituality
however, we are speaking of an action-orientated, revolutionary spirituality and not simply one
that is aesthetic. We are speaking of an inner spirituality that allows for the making of emotional
and intellectual paradigmatic shifts. While recognizing that there are multiple articulations and
readings of spirituality our understanding of spirituality here is not necessarily an ascription to
a high religious/moral order, but rather an understanding of the self/personhood and culture as a
starting point in our engagements with education and learning. As Dei has argued elsewhere (Sefa
Dei, 2004), education is anchored in a broader definition that encompasses emotional/spiritual
dimensions and cultural knowledge. An identification with the learning process that is personalized
and subjective makes it possible for learners to become invested spiritually and emotionally
in their education.
Spirituality and spiritual knowing can be pursued in schools as a valid body of knowledge
to enhance learning outcomes. Spirituality encourages and engages in the sharing of collective
and personal experiences of understanding and dealing with the self. A great deal of what is
“universal” in spirituality is related to aspects of knowing and asserting who we are (in relation
to dominant knowledges that tell us something else) what our cultures are, where we come from