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An analysis of the use of autobiographical narrative for teachers’ intercultural learning

journal contribution
posted on 2017-01-01, 00:00 authored by Anne CloonanAnne Cloonan, Brandi Nichole Fox, Sarah OhiSarah Ohi, Christine HalseChristine Halse
The currency of intercultural education has risen worldwide in response to increased diversity within societies resulting from migration and global lows of populations. As intercultural education becomes a core responsibility of schooling, critical, detailed analysis of pedagogies for teachers’ own intercultural learning is largely absent in education research, in contrast to attention to developing students’ intercultural capabilities and theoretical and policy analyses. In beginning to address this limitation, this article offers a critical, reflexive analysis of our use and the efficacy of using autobiographical narrative for teachers’ intercultural learning. Framing theories include interculturality, autobiographical narratives for teachers’ professional learning, reflexivity, and the effects of silence and silencing in relation to diversity and intercultural relations in schools. Three instances of teacher autobiographical narrative elicited as part of a large-scale, longitudinal study of intercultural education in Australian schools are deconstructed to elucidate their explicit and hidden meanings and effects. The analysis reveals that while autobiographical narrative has productive potential as a strategy for stimulating teacher reflexivity about cultural identities and intercultural relations, it also contains hidden dangers and traps that caution against viewing it as a pedagogical cure-all in the development of teachers’ intercultural knowledge and skills.

History

Journal

Teaching education

Volume

28

Issue

2

Pagination

131 - 144

Publisher

Taylor & Francis

Location

London, Eng.

ISSN

1047-6210

eISSN

1470-1286

Language

eng

Publication classification

C1 Refereed article in a scholarly journal; C Journal article

Copyright notice

2016, Informa UK

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