Liberating Social Work Education Through Decoloniality

Abstract

ABSTRACT Within Social Work education, there has been a rising call for decoloniality. Among the areas most frequently targeted for transformation are the privileging of Christian Euro-centric sources of knowledge and means of transmission, Christian Euro-centric relational norms and behaviors, Euro-centric standards of excellence and professionalism. The origin of coloniality is steeped in four pillars, White Supremacy, Patriarchy, Capitalism and Christianity, labeled as the Colonial Matrix of Power (CMP). Bolstered by the promises that the principles comprising modernity (development, progress, rationality) are good for all, those managing and controlling the CMP define what are considered legitimate forms of knowledge (epistemology) and status of being (ontology). This paper offers a perspective on how the transformation of social work education is contingent upon the development of critical consciousness, legitimization of indigenous knowledge and cosmologies, critical realism, epistemic disobedience, and the primacy of connection and relationship among all entities. Through re-developing these skills and practices, social work education can take a verdant role in the decoloniality of professional education.