This conceptual paper explores the intersecting domains of epistemology, decoloniality, and power dynamics in university education. It scrutinises the hegemonic prevalence of Western knowledge systems and the resultant epistemic exclusion and marginalisation of alternative and indigenous knowledge paradigms within academic environments. Digging…

Native men in higher education experience among the lowest persistence and graduation rates in the United States (Condition of Education, 2020). Native men are subjected to systemic barriers brought by settler colonialism such as racism and patriarchal hegemony which negatively impact their perceptions of masculinity and forces them to move away…

Indigenous epistemologies view a person as a whole, interconnected to land, in relationship to others. Knowledge is subjective and collective. However, hegemonic western knowledge created dualism that are perpetuated through western schooling with detrimental effects on Indigenous knowledge systems and livelihood. The dualisms separate mind from…

Bourdieu's concept of habitus clivé illuminates Indigenous Australians' experiences in tertiary environments for both Aboriginal students and Aboriginal staff. Habitus formed through family, schooling and social class is also shaped by urban, regional or rural upbringing, creating a durable sense of self. Aboriginal people in Australia live in all…

This article applies the concept of va to reconceptualise and critique the tensions in higher education for Pasifika in Aotearoa New Zealand. We assert that a radical shift is needed within higher education to confront the neoliberal ideals of a knowledge economy that have permeated all levels of the institution, from the politics of academic…

Since Universities Australia's Indigenous Strategy recommended a sector-wide approach to 'closing the gap' between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians, universities have grappled with how to do this. Resisting mainstream approaches to curriculum development that eschew any kind of relational accountability (Wilson, Shawn. 2008.…

The scholastic success of Bolongaia (Maria Lock), at the Parramatta Native Institution in 1819, arguably positions her as an academic giant. Bolongaia's exam results challenged the opinions of the day when she 'bore away the chief prize'. Bolongaia's academic success was based purely on her acquisition of western based knowledges and values. In…

In this article, differing interpretations of the internationalisation of higher education curriculum are explored analysing the structural and cultural aspects of the curriculum. Voices of tertiary staff from around the world taking part in a four-week, fully online course, entitled "Internationalising the curriculum for all students"…

The promise of higher education remains elusive for many Indigenous students in Australia. To date, institutional efforts to improve the persistence and retention of Indigenous students have been largely piecemeal, poorly integrated and designed to remediate skill deficits. Yet, market-led expansion of Australian higher education is driving…

We discuss the recent reworking of Murdoch University's Australian Indigenous Studies major. For the discipline to realise its charter of decolonising knowledges about Indigenous peoples, it is necessary to move Indigenous Studies beyond the standard reversalist and unsustainable tropes that valorise romanticised notions of Indigeneity and…

While access to higher education has increased for Indigenous Australians, participation and completion rates remain lower than those of non-Indigenous Australians. A sound evidence base is needed to ground equity initiatives if they are to address the specific needs of Indigenous students. This paper presents the results of a scoping review of…

In the complex and diverse region of Oceania, researchers often work across more than one cultural understanding. Thus, a researcher's position with regard to their research requires careful ongoing negotiation because position, when understood through relationality, is fluid. Negotiating position requires acute reflexivity of the researcher but…

"The Western tradition", as passe-partout, includes fringe figures, émigrés and migrants. Rather than looking to resources at the core of the Western tradition to overcome its own blindnesses, I am more interested in its gaps and peripheries, where other thoughts and renegade knowledges take hold. It is in the contact zones with…

Modern universities are uniquely European in origin and characteristics. With the diffusion of the European model into the university throughout the world, the heritage of colonialism and the fact that contemporary universities are Western institutions without much linkage to their indigenous intellectual traditions are the fundamental reasons for…

Taking the Institute for Housing Studies in Rotterdam as a case study, this paper aims to theorise the ways non-Western, international students construct and negotiate knowledges in Western institutions of higher education. It describes the types of knowledges these students identify as characteristic of their learning abroad, distinguishing…