Settler grammars and the Australian professional standards for teachers

ABSTRACT

In 2011, the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership introduced new Professional Standards for Teachers, which require that graduate teachers possess knowledge and understanding of Indigenous students and cultures. The authors conducted interviews with 12 non-Indigenous teacher educators at one Australian university in order to understand how these Standards are interpreted and implemented. We adopt Calderon’s framework of settler grammars to interpret the dialectic of presence and absence that teacher educators in our study describe. Extending this frame to an analysis of the Australian Professional Standards for Teachers, we find that settler grammars function to simultaneously erase Indigenous claims to sovereignty and epistemological equality, whilst promoting a representation of Indigenous people that asserts the primacy of the settler colonial state.

KEYWORDS:

• Indigenous education
• Indigenous curriculum
• teacher education
• graduate standards

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank all members of the research team and the teacher educators who shared their experiences with us, alongside Dr Emily Gray and two anonymous reviewers at APJTE for thoughtful feedback on our manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. The authors recognise that the phrase “Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people” does not respect the diversity of Australia’s First Nations people. Yet it is often preferred over the word “Indigenous”. We acknowledge that both phrases are colonial impositions, and where possible we prefer to name specific nations (e.g. Wurundjeri). In order to assist readability, the authors use the phrases “Indigenous” and “Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people” interchangeably, recognising the limitations of this approach.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the RMIT University Learning and Teaching Investment Fund.

Notes on contributors

Nikki Moodie

Dr Nikki Moodie (Gamilaraay) is a Lecturer in Indigenous Education at The University of Melbourne. Her research focuses on educational transitions, networks and public policy.

Rachel Patrick

Dr Rachel Patrick is a Lecturer in Education Studies at RMIT University. Her research focuses on policy, equity, and teacher professional identity in Australia and New Zealand.