Volume 17, Number 1, 2026

EN:

This article examines a public library board meeting in a small Southern U.S. town with the goal of understanding local discourses about sexual and gender diversity amid increased challenges to LGBTQIA+ and BIPoC-themed books. Drawing on theories intertwining place, power, and identity, we analyze how arguments for and against censoring LGBTQIA+ materials are insidiously imbued with discursive practices part of, but not exclusive to, white Christian nationalism. Our analysis identifies three key discursive placemaking practices of white Christian nationalism that community members used: instilling fear, enforcing exclusions, and narrating temporalities (pasts, presents, and futures). Findings reveal that speakers—despite opposing ideological positions about LGBTQIA+ life—constructed a vision of their community influenced by whiteness and Christian nationalist ideologies. This analysis offers new pathways for understanding how public spaces become sites of contestation where multiple trajectories of power and identity converge, with implications for advocacy toward more inclusive and just library spaces.

EN:

Our article explores the possibilities of imagining a decolonial environmental education in Abya Yala/Latin America as an environmental-desiring machine underpinned by a South-complex environmental thinking, capable of generating subjectivations, promoting agency, and nurturing critical pedagogy praxes that place ecosystems sustainability and care-of-life at the very center. To illustrate those pluriversal alternatives, we present two educational and political-pedagogical experiences: a ‘nomadic curricula’ praxis on the Federal University of Espírito Santo (Brazil) mediated by (re)existence/resistance movements woven by Kapi’xawa and Kizomba collectives and communities; and a water-care popular environmental education experience in the Sochagota Lake (Colombia), as a pedagogical praxis of (re)existence/resistance to hegemonic market-episteme ‘water management’ models.

EN:

Liberia's higher education system, shaped by colonial legacies, neoliberal reforms, and fragile democratic institutions, functions less as a site of civic empowerment than as a mechanism that reproduces inequality and constrains democratic agency. Rather than operating as a neutral public good, education in this context is embedded within political-economic structures that reinforce rather than challenge elite dominance. Against this backdrop, the paper argues that critical pedagogy, emphasizing dialogic learning, critical thinking, and civic engagement, offers a framework for reimagining higher education as a space of democratic renewal. Adopting a conceptual literature review with an argumentative orientation, the study synthesizes international and African philosophical traditions of critical pedagogy to assess their relevance for post-conflict Liberia. It underscores the risks of uncritical borrowing, which can reinforce epistemic dependency and alienate students from indigenous cultural frameworks. To address these risks, the paper proposes the Liberian Critical Praxis/Dialogic approach, a localized framework built on three interrelated pillars: dialogic instruction rooted in cultural practices such as the palava hut, integration of indigenous knowledge into curricula, and ethical reasoning, including critical media literacy, anchored in communal responsibility. The paper concludes that reform must be gradual, context-sensitive, and culturally grounded. By situating Indigenous perspectives alongside international theory, the Liberian Critical Praxis/Dialogic approach contributes to debates on decolonizing higher education and demonstrates how post-conflict universities can foster democratic participation and civic resilience.

EN:

The epistemological commitments of any scientific discipline are reflected in the changing beliefs and identities of its students. Challenges to psychology’s scientific legitimacy presented by the recent replication crisis have underscored the need for critical and reflexive pedagogical perspectives in the discipline. This study aims to capture undergraduate psychology students’ changing views of their area of study, and what these changes suggest about tensions within the discipline. Interviews of first-year and fourth-year psychology students at the University of Toronto were analyzed using reflexive thematic analysis. Results show that the fourth-years, though more conversant with academic psychology’s values and commitments than their younger peers, were more troubled by issues pertaining to ethical and epistemological validity. Fourth-years also reported feelings of alienation and disenfranchisement due to their practical powerlessness to address theoretical issues of which they were critically aware. The results suggest a loss of confidence in psychology’s claims to knowledge, as well as a need for pedagogical change. Creating space in the curriculum and lab culture for reflexively critical inquiry and transformative perspectives would help mitigate the alienation and frustration expressed by many students.

EN:

Recent global discourses about policing have interrogated the role of police (e.g., the #DefundthePolice movement) and amplified decades-old calls from scholars, educators, students, and activists to remove police from schools (e.g., #PoliceFreeSchools, #WeCameToLearn and nopoliceinschools.co.uk). Yet, copaganda continues to situate police, and police in schools, as necessary and desirable. In this essay, we present themes from the literature about school police. We then leverage those themes to advance a framework for the study of police in schools so that this research base does not function as copaganda. We emphasize an abolitionist approach to the study of police in schools that accounts for the history of policing as a racialized project, mobilizes critical and abolitionist perspectives, and takes seriously perspectives about defunding and removal in lieu of reform. We conclude by amplifying recommendations by abolitionist scholars and organizers.

EN:

This case study investigates the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Program (PSLF), a policy designed to enable student debt forgiveness after ten years of payments for individuals working in public service. The program has only forgiven a small number of loans; as of this writing less than 34% of people who have applied for the program have actually received loan forgiveness. What does this low number indicate about the program and the perception of higher education in the contemporary United States context? To answer that question, in this article, we review the history of the program, the scholarship about PSLF, and analyze its implementation using the tools of document analysis and critical policy analysis. We argue that the failure of the program communicates a clear message about the purpose of higher education in the United States under a neoliberal paradigm.

EN:

This special issue sheds light on the resistance and activism within educational spaces, inside and outside of classrooms and universities, for the liberation of Palestine. The issue is split into two parts, both with similar overarching themes. The first issue focuses on three themes: foundations, community activism, and hope.

EN:

This paper explores the unique experiences of Palestinian Americans within the U.S. education system through the lens of Critical Race Theory (CRT). Addressing a gap in existing literature, the research question investigates how racialization, demonization, and structural racism shape the educational and social experiences of Palestinian Americans. Utilizing a qualitative analysis of legal documents, media reports, policy papers, and academic literature, the findings reveal pervasive racialization and demonization, significant structural barriers, and severe suppression of political activism. These findings suggest that Palestinian Americans face unique and multifaceted systemic challenges that are not adequately addressed by traditional CRT frameworks. The development of a Palestinian American Critical Race Theory (PalestinianCRT) is proposed to better understand and address these specific issues. This research is important as it broadens the scope of CRT and calls for targeted advocacy and reform to promote social justice and equity.

EN:

In this article, we re/present our research alongside Palestinian Muslim students and families in Albert, focusing on research participants’ experiences of anti-Palestinian racism in k-12 schooling. To contextualize participants’ experiences, we explore literature around anti-Palestinian racism across Canadian and Israeli settler-colonial contexts. We elucidate two main narrative threads reverberating across research participants’ stories: participants experience(d) systemic anti-Palestinian racism in schools; yet they simultaneously engage(d) in education about Palestine in their homes and communities. Discussing ongoing anti-Palestinian racism in Canada, we conclude by offering several considerations and actions towards countering anti-Palestinian racism in Canadian schooling.

EN:

Indigenous peoples throughout the world have long been subject to settler colonial violence and elimination. This ongoing legacy of settler colonialism and struggle for Indigenous self-determination provides a felt experience that connects many Indigenous people to Palestinians fighting settler colonial oppression and occupation in their homelands. In this article, we highlight examples of Indigenous solidarity with/for Palestinians and look closely at the advocacy of one Diné educator and artist who transformed her business’ social media site into a powerful platform to educate people about the violence against Palestinians. After examining the rhetorical strategies that underlie this example of Diné civics and solidarity, we discuss how the legacy of Indigenous civics and solidarity with/for Palestine can contribute to teaching solidarities and activism for a free Palestine.

EN:

We are a Black femme-led multidisciplinary group of artists, activists, community members, and most importantly human beings who are committed to creative resistance in solidarity with Palestine. As Black people based in the greater Charleston South Carolina area, we are connected to the legacy of resilience and resistance in the Lowcountry. Our inspiration stems from a feminist, armed resistance group, the Chrysanthemum Flowers, established pre-Nakba in 1933. Emboldened by these eco-radical ancestors, we aimed to create a larger-than-life sized public flower installation to express continued solidarity with the Palestinian liberation movement. This paper documents the nine months preceding our proposed installation which included collaboration with various community groups to lead arts workshops, film-screenings, book discussions, and teach-ins about the intersections of Black and Palestinian liberation, how to build collective power, and several ways to stand with Palestine and other oppressed peoples around the world. This paper outlines our organizing process including: 1) show of solidarity, 2) relationship-building, and 3) sustainable, ongoing practice. Ultimately, we are guided by the Combahee River Collective Statement which calls for action on both local and global issues to strive for coalition building with women of color and persons in the Global South.

EN:

Many self-proclaimed “social justice” teacher educators remained silent on Palestine prior to, during and following October 7th, 2023, citing ‘not knowing enough about the conflict’ to absolve themselves of the responsibility of addressing the genocide–and the ongoing settler colonial apartheid state. In teacher education, this compulsory Zionism is particularly troubling, especially for teacher education programs and faculty who claim to follow the foundations of critical race theory and culturally sustaining pedagogies. This tension begs the question: Do Palestinian Lives Matter in Teacher Education? I explore instances of compulsory Zionism in teacher education institutions and introduce teacher candidates’ quotes to demonstrate why this compulsory Zionism is harmful to us all. Building on FaithCrit (the intersections of Faith and Critical Race Theory in Education) to conduct an autoethnographic analysis, I introduce a teaching framework I call ‘Pedagogical Integrity’ to demonstrate how teacher educators can implement anti-Zionist turns in teacher education–and why it is imperative that we must engage them.

EN:

Proponents of critical pedagogy aim to liberate oppressed populations through emancipatory forms of praxis (Darder et al., 2017). This article draws on this pedagogy, in particular Freirean pedagogy, to explore refugee education offered by The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). Drawing on interviews with UNRWA teachers and other educational staff, alongside document analysis, this paper examines how UNRWA in Jordan enact its mandate. In particular, the article focuses on a policy program, ‘Human Rights, Conflict Resolution and Tolerance (HRCRT)’ that UNRWA implements in their education. With an analysis shaped by core aspects of a Freirean pedagogy, the paper argues that the HRCRT program creates authentic possibilities for advancing Palestinian liberation. Despite the unknown future for both the Agency and the Palestinian refugees, findings from the interviews and other data materials reflected a shared consciousness of the purpose of the UNRWA-led education for Palestinian refugees, which is in accordance with both UNRWA’s mandate and fundamental principles within Freirean pedagogy.

EN:

This article offers an auto-theoretical, exploratory account of teaching writing as a Palestinian educator at the American University of Beirut in 2023–2024 during the war on Gaza and the escalation of violence in Lebanon. Written in a series of chronologically organized vignettes, the manuscript blends memoir, correspondence, lesson plans, and critical pedagogy to document how war enters the classroom through microaggressions, silencing, and institutional failure to recognize politically situated harm. Drawing inspiration from the essay tradition the article foregrounds process, uncertainty, and affect as legitimate forms of scholarly inquiry. Reflections on formative teachers in Canada, a Jewish-Canadian childhood friendship, and intergenerational memory illuminate how race, identity, and worldliness shape pedagogical becoming. The article situates experiential teaching during genocide within composition studies, arguing for the exploratory essay as an ethical and pedagogical response to crisis. It further details curricular revisions undertaken during wartime, including collaborative assessment, anti-thesis essay structures, and the use of fairytales—particularly Palestinian children’s literature—as a means of restoring imagination, solidarity, and care. Ultimately, the article testifies to the necessity of courageous dialogue, institutional accountability, and pedagogies that resist silence while affirming relational hope amid devastation.