Racing to Reconciliation: Decolonizing and Anti-Racist Research Methodologies for Social Work

The proposed roundtable session will address decolonizing methodologies for social work research centering issues of race, anti-racism and reconciliation in relation to the experiences of Indigenous and racialized social work researchers, students, communities and research participants. The need for anti-racist and decolonizing social work knowledge and practice is stark, as racialized and Indigenous peoples face over-representation in rates of child welfare apprehension, incarceration, educational push out and police violence. The insistence towards evidence-based practice in social work requires methodologies of gathering evidence that do not replicate or perpetuate colonial relations between the profession and Indigenous and racialized communities. Grounding the roundtable discussion in applied examples from their experiences as Indigenous and African Caribbean researchers, the panelists aim to facilitate dialogue and engage in collective knowledge building with participants with the aim of sharing strategies and practices for teaching and implementing anti-racist and decolonizing research methodologies.

The roundtable aims to explore and advance knowledge relating to following:

Methodologies capable of addressing issues of racism and other forms of colonial violence that effect the livelihood, lifespan and life choices and chances of racialized and Indigenous peoples;

Methodologies that directly address epistemological racism experienced by Indigenous and racialized scholars often under the guise of positivist notions of objectivity and measures of rigour and excellence;

Methodologies that restore the dignity and humanity of those whose lives are being studied and storied by ensuring that their lived experiences are perceived through a lens which does not individualize, pathologize, decontextualize, dehistoricize or depoliticize the effects of structural violence they endure;

Methodologies that support relationships of solidarity and transformation among Indigenous and racialized scholars in social work and related disciplines; and

Methodologies that contribute to decolonization and reconciliation by operating in a relational framework that is accountable to the resurgence of Indigenous lifeways and to “right relations” with Indigenous peoples and the Indigenous territories on which research is being carried out.