THINKING ABOUT APPROXIMATIONS BETWEEN INCLUSIVE EDUCATION AND THE DECOLONIAL PERSPECTIVE: A CRITICAL SKETCH

Abstract

Decolonizing inclusive education is a critical invitation to revise mainstream European ideas on social justice, equity, human rights, among others. This perspective challenges the hegemony of colonial thought, seeking to resignify educational structures that perpetuate inequalities and exclusions. By recognizing and valuing the diverse voices and experiences of all students, especially those who have been historically marginalized. This essayistic text seeks to discuss the possibilities of thinking about the approximations between inclusive education and the decolonial inflection. It is not a matter of presenting this inflection as a final novelty capable of solving the theoretical and practical discussions of the area, nor of postulating it as the only possible way to understand the complexity of this field. On the contrary, it seeks to present, without any intention of exhausting the exercise, a rudimentary outline so that the old problem of inclusive education can find new readings and, perhaps, outline educational projects that allow the production of practices of resistance, of insurgency. To this end, the text, at first, explains, in general terms, some contours of the decolonial inflection to, in a second and central moment, think about the approximations that can be erected between inclusive education and decoloniality. The text ends by betting that decoloniality can present itself as a powerful artifact that goes beyond the mere integration of the subjects targeted by inclusive education, thus being a possibility of building pedagogical practices based on other assumptions.