Interculturalizing teacher training: Readings for the epistemological opening in graduation for teachers curriculum

Abstract

The issue of cultural differences has been the focus of many contemporary educational studies. It seeks to build an education open to differences, guided by the respect and appreciation of diversity, which requires rethinking the initial and continuing training of teachers. In this sense, the objective of this theoretical study (VILAÇA, 2010) is to discuss the possibility of critically interculturalizing teacher training. We discuss the asymmetric relations produced by the coloniality of power (QUIJANO, 1992), understanding cultural differences as discursive creations (SILVA, 2014) historically hierarchical in a monocultural education (VEIGA-NETO, 2003) that has been strongly questioned by other subjects and others pedagogies (ARROYO, 2012). The perspective of intercultural education (CANDAU, 2016) emerges in this context by proposing a radical opening to differences (WALSH, 2010), including studies on teacher education (CANEN, XAVIER, 2005 and MELO, 2014). In this context, the proposition made in this work is that graduation teachers´ courses include in their curriculum non-western epistemologies in order to radically interculturalize teacher training. Finally, we consider that this proposal is a challenge that drives the creation of other ways of educating.