Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Psychology, Vol 9(4), Dec 2023, 392-404; doi:10.1037/stl0000387
To dismantle oppression, educators should consider the role of the undergraduate college classroom in promoting equity, diversity, and inclusion. Decoloniality has pushed psychology to rethink ways of disrupting and dismantling institutionalized oppression through theory, research, and practice (Maldonado-Torres, 2017). With specific attention to the undergraduate classroom, we argue that decolonial pedagogy is a critical component of the larger decolonial project that can humanize the classroom and strengthen students’ skills around equity, diversity, and inclusion. By reimagining the undergraduate classroom, educators should consider how all aspects of teaching (syllabi, course content, design, and projects) can be used to challenge dominant norms within society and education. Coauthored with 10 undergraduate students, we describe how decolonial pedagogy was intentionally incorporated into course design to foster a more equitable, diverse, and inclusive classroom environment. Using critical autoethnography (G. E. Anzaldúa, 2002; Boylorn & Orbe, 2014), students describe how decolonial pedagogy can create a liberating classroom for students through three aspects of course design: community agreements, the final project, and assessment. The article concludes with lessons learned for future teachers invested in decolonizing their classroom through course design. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved)