Dr. Nicholas Ng-A-Fook | University of Ottawa, Canada
Friday, May 5, 2023 | 3:30 – 5:00 pm (PST) | via Zoom
Faculty Host: Dr. William Pinar
View the Seminar Poster here
Abstract
What is curriculum theory in-the-making at this place and moment in time? For this presentation, Dr. Ng-A-Fook will draw on Janet L. Miller’s memorable essay English Education in-the-Making, to both situate and contextual a response to such curricular inquiries. Dr. Ng-A-Fook will take up certain theoretical concepts and a life writing research methodology to “reactivate” and “reconstruct” the international, national, and provincialized curriculum studies scholarship which has shaped the situated particularities of this current moment of “curriculum theorizing” as a first-generation settler immigrant whose family now lives on the unceded and unsurrendered ancestral traditional territories of the Algonquin people. To conclude, Dr. Ng-A-Fook will discuss the different ways his research team at A Canadian Curriculum Theory Project are working toward unlearning settler colonial logics as a curriculum inquiry and theorizing in-the-making.
Bio
Dr. Nicholas Ng-A-Fook is a Professor of Curriculum Theory and Vice-Dean of Graduate Studies. He is actively committed toward addressing the 94 Calls to Action put forth by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, in partnership with local Indigenous and school board communities. His teaching and research are situated within the wider international field of curriculum studies and life writing research. Dr. Ng-A-Fook is currently part of several SSHRC grants that seek to disrupt settler colonialism, systemic racisms, and inequities across the school and university curriculum. He is the recipient of the Ted. T. Aoki Distinguished Service Award for his service to the Canadian field of Curriculum Studies. He has co-published several award-winning books such as, but not limited to Oral History, Education, and Justice: Possibilities and Limitations for Redress and Reconciliation; Oral History and Education: Theories, Dilemmas, and Practices; and Provoking Curriculum Studies: Strong Poetry and Arts of the Possible in Education. He hosts FooknConversation, a podcast, that addresses different societal challenges and curriculum inquiries with colleagues, community activists, artists, educational leaders, teachers, and politicians.