TAPAHTÊYIMOWIN: A HEURISTIC STUDY OF INDIGENOUS EDUCATIONAL LEADERSHIP

Abstract

I elected to initiate dialogue with three Indigenous educational leaders and explore their experiences in educational leadership, the knowledge and strategies that they employed in pursuing objectives on behalf of their communities and how making tacit knowledge and skills visible supports the development of Indigenous educational leaders. Opportunity to reflect on their experiences illuminated their struggles and achievements and helped to tell the story of Indigenous participation in educational leadership. The bricolage (Kincheloe & Berry, 2004) conceptualizes research eclecticism useful as a lens for investigation. Parts of Western and Indigenous concepts were cobbled together into a methodology useful in exploring knowledge generated from the margins. The phenomenological practice of bracketing colonized narrative brings Indigenous contributions to the forefront. Heuristic research methods (Moustakas, 1990) provided a platform for learning that enlisted the experience of the researcher as a vehicle to personal reflection and new growth. The act of refashioning bits of Western methodologies into something useful for this decolonizing endeavour is an Indigenous act motivated by the conceptualization of the Trickster figure in Indigenous thought and tradition. The research participants drew on their foundational experiences to overcome the challenges of participating in mainstream education. Through their participation, they leveraged change through commitment, expertise and innovation. I was inspired by what they knew and did that was unique to their experience and how that knowledge and those skills could be mobilized to strengthen an Indigenous position in educational leadership. The product of this research is a liberating vision of Indigenous educational leadership useful in fostering more deliberate efforts in resistance, restructuring and reclaiming to ensure greater Indigenous participation in research, epistemology and educational practice.