Racing neoliberalism and remote Indigenous education in the Northern Territory of Australia: a critical analysis of contemporary Indigenous education language policy and practice

ABSTRACT

Despite a lengthy and successful history of Indigenous multilingual/multiliteracy education and English as an Additional Language or Dialect programmes in Australia's Northern Territory, these programmes have virtually disappeared. The current denuded offerings in school instruction are a consequence of locally nuanced manifestations of neoliberal global developments. This paper uses Roberts and Mahtani's (2010) market orientation to race to examine the localised expression of global neoliberal influences in Northern Territory remote Indigenous contexts.

Trotz einer langen und erfolgreichen Geschichte der indigenen mehrsprachigen/multiliterativen Bildung und von Programmen für Englisch als zusätzliche Sprache oder Dialekt im australischen Northern Territory sind diese Programme praktisch verschwunden. Die entblößten Angebote im Schulunterricht sind eine Folge lokal nuancierter Ausprägungen neoliberaler globaler Entwicklungen. Dieses Papier verwendet die Marktorientierung von Roberts und Mahtani (2010), um den lokalisierten Ausdruck globaler neoliberaler Einflüsse in abgelegenen indigenen Kontexten des Northern Territory zu untersuchen.

KEYWORDS:

• Australian Indigenous education
• Indigenous language education
• Australian language education policy Critical education policy analysis
• Neoliberalism and education

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Janine Oldfield

Janine Oldfield’s research work has focused on English literacy education for Indigenous students in addition to bilingual education and language education policy in Indigenous contexts. She is also involved in pedagogy theory in relation to Indigenous students. She has worked in higher education since 1995 as an ESL, project manager, project writer, academic English instructor/lecturer and higher education lecturer and researcher in New South Wales Australia, Cambodia, Melbourne and the Northern Territory. For the past decade, Dr Oldfield has been involved in a language education and policy research project in the Northern Territory.