1. Western Region Research Conference on the Education of Adults
U N I V E R S I T Y O F A L B E R T A | O C T O B E R 1 6 - 1 8 , 2 0 1 5
w w w . e d p o l i c y s t u d i e s . u a l b e r t a . c a | w r r c e a 2 0 1 5 @ g m a i l . c o m
REANIMATING ADULT EDUCATION: CONFLICT, VIOLENCE, LEARNING
W R R C E A

2. WRRCEA 2015
Edited by Laura Servage
Reanimating Adult Education: Conflict, Violence Learning
Proceedings of the Western Region Research Conference
on the Education of Adults
October 16-18, 2015, University of Alberta

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Proceedings
of the
Bi-Annual Western Region Research Conference
on the Education of Adults
October 16-18, 2015
University of Alberta
Edmonton, Alberta CANADA
Participating Institutions
Western Washington University
University of Alberta
University of Calgary
Ryerson University
University of New Brunswick
University of the Fraser Valley
University of North Dakota
Foreward
It is an exciting but also troubling time for those who dedicate themselves to research, teaching,
learning and activism in Adult Learning. Most of the people attending this conference can attest
first hand to the challenges of educating for social change in an increasingly complex,
interconnected, and globalized world. Over the past decade, our field has experienced
reverberations from post-9/11 politics of fear, a near global economic collapse in 2008, and
most recently, the displacement and oppression of millions under conditions of violent conflict.
How are we to respond? This question guided the theme proposed for this year’s conference.
For those of us who work in formal educational settings, neo-liberal ideologies have rendered
vocationalism and individualism as dominating ethoi. The aims of citizenship, in its many
senses, fall behind, or are re-scripted to serve economic interests. Formal education has also
expanded dramatically, but it remains inequitable, and slow to create spaces within which more
diverse human needs and perspectives can be explored. As Jubas and White in this volume
observe, “diversity” as a goal in higher education is worthy of scrutiny beyond its immediate
liberal appeal. We may have to work within certain boundaries in higher education, but this does
not mean forfeiting critique.
At the same time as market forces have marched steadily into expanding formal education
sectors, community and informal learning, with its largely emancipatory and democratic aims,
must fight for space in the public consciousness, and for resources to grow the power of
learning in the hands of the people and communities most in need of this precious yet infinitely
renewable resource. We need imaginative, emergent learning to counter the standardizing
discourses that surround us.
The papers and presentations for this conference illustrate the diversity of settings and
experiences that constitute “adult learning.” These span formal, and non-formal programs,

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universities and communities, and many kinds of learners. Aberdeen, Chell, and Monroe and
Monroe, in separate works, explore learning outcomes in community services agencies, while
Goulet and Ashraf seek to revitalize transformative learning theory in the context of community
development in Pakistan. Francis also takes an international perspective, problematizing sexual
binaries with a catalogue of different cultural perspectives on sexuality. Aboriginal learning is
considered by Pardy in her auto-ethnographic account of her experiences with a BC Aboriginal
cohort post-secondary program, and by Frey in her appeal for an interdisciplinary approach to
evolving understandings of Aboriginal law in North America. Women in non-traditional labour
roles are the focus of Skulmoski’s Bourdieusian analysis of women who succeed in male
dominated trades.
In this small (but mighty!) fourth meeting of WRRCEA scholars and practitioners, we cannot
begin to offer a comprehensive portrait of the range of issues that trouble our world. They are
diverse. They are nuanced. The need for justice is overwhelming. It can be discouraging. But
adult learning has always been fuelled by an audacious spirit of hope. This spirit unites us, and
keeps us working for a better world, even when the odds seem stacked against us.
Thank you for attending the conference.
Laura Servage, PhD
Proceedings Editor
Department of Educational Policy Studies
University of Alberta
Authors retain the copyright for all papers. No paper may be reproduced without the author’s
permission. Contact individual authors for permission to reproduce materials contained in these
proceedings.

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Table of Contents
Keeping Refugee Families Connected Through Heritage Language Schools ............................ 2
Trudie Aberdeen, University of Alberta
Participatory Research, Adult Education and Learning to Question in
Im/migrant Service-Non Governmental Organizations................................................................ 8
Wanda Johnson Chell, University of Alberta
Cross Cultural Understandings of Transnational Non-binary Sexual Identities (TNBSI) ...........13
Roger Francis, University of Calgary
Emergence, Confluence, and Momentum of Indigenous and Sui Generis
Intercultural Legal Studies: An International and Local Context for
Remodeling Legal Teaching......................................................................................................20
Natasha Hart Frey, Western Washington University
Adult Education, Community Development and Transformative Learning Theory
as Antidote to Conflict, Violence and Oppression in Pakistan....................................................27
Gail Goulet, Western Washington University
Muhammad Ashraf, Ryerson University
“Diversity” as Academic Keyword: Rhetoric and Meaning in Equity and
Internationalization Higher Education Texts ..............................................................................35
Kaela Jubas, University of Calgary
Melissa White, University of New Brunswick
How Women Who Are Survivors of Domestic Violence Perceive Education:
A Meta-Ethnographic Synthesis................................................................................................44
Steven D. Monroe, Western Washington University
Dale A. Monroe, Western Washington University
Conflict, Learning, and Transformation: Indigenization,Intercultural Intersections,
and Adult Learning Theory........................................................................................................50
Linda Pardy, Ed.D. University of the Fraser Valley
Critical Juncture: Repositioning Media Literacy in Literacy Education .......................................57
LeeAnne Pawluski, University of Alberta
Symbolic Violence as a Component in the ‘Practical Sense’ Strategies of
Successful Female Apprentices................................................................................................65
Lukas Kane Skulmoski, University of Calgary

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Keeping Refugee Families Connected Through
Heritage Language Schools
Trudie Aberdeen, PhD. Candidate, University of Alberta
Abstract: Throughout this paper, I show how language loss in refugee children is
detrimental to intergenerational communication. I define heritage language
school(s) (HLS), explain the consequences of HL loss, and show how HLS may
slow HL loss in children while providing additional benefits for adults in the
heritage language (HL) community.
Introduction
Canada currently accepts approximately 10,000 refugees each year (Government of
Canada, 2015). According to the government website, these are people “who have fled their
countries because of a well-founded fear of persecution, and are therefore unable to return
home.” Canada provides services to refugees which include reception services, assistance in
finding appropriate accommodation, language training in English or French, and opportunities
“to build networks with long-time Canadians and established immigrants” who can assist
refugees in “opportunities to participate fully in Canadian society.”
One way in which refugees have participated in Canadian society is through a HLS
which provides HL instruction to refugee, immigrant, or Canadian-born children. The benefits of
participation are not limited only to children; HLS provide benefits to the adults as well. In this
study, I define HLS as classes offered to the community’s children that teach language and
culture. Typically, classes are between two to five hours each week and are usually offered on a
Saturday or a Sunday. Content in these classes might include first language literacy, cultural
songs, traditional dance, folktales and arts and crafts. Since classes are offered and operated
within the community, there are no regulating or governing bodies. All four schools in this study
were started by dedicated community members who formed a not-for-profit board. All HLS
leaders relied on unpaid volunteers to work as teachers. Three schools operated through grants
received from municipal governments in Edmonton (City of Edmonton, 2015) or Calgary
(Calgary Foundation 60, 2015). A member of Fane’s community describes the events of his
school:
And then we need a lot of activities to do, not only just teaching language, because
culture is a necessity of different things. You can teach kids with arts and crafts, you can
teach kids with drums, you can teach kids with cultural events, like different things—
Fane (Member 1)
Methodology
The data for this paper come from a subset of my doctoral dissertation titled
“Understanding community heritage language (HL) schools in Alberta.” The data used in this
paper include 381 minutes of transcribed semi-structured interview data from one focus group
with a HLS community (Fane), three HLS leaders in refugee communities in the province of
Alberta (Monique, Fabian, Fritz), and one community development specialist (Candy). The
data in this study have been interpreted through Fishman’s (1997) Graded Intergenerational
Disruption Scale which examines language endangerment and works towards reversing
language shift. Hornberger and Johnson’s (2007) call for ethnographies of language policy and
Hornberger’s Language Policy and Planning Framework (2005) have also provided an
interpretive lens.

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Question One: How does language loss happen in refugee communities?
Fishman’s Graded Intergenerational Disruption Scale
In 1991, Fishman published the Graded Intergenerational Disruption Scale (GIDS) as a
way for linguists to classify endangered and threatened languages and to make priorities when
trying to preserve them. According to Fishman, languages become threatened or extinct when
“they have fewer users generation after generation and the uses to which these languages are
commonly put are not only few, but, additionally, they are typically unrelated to higher social
status, even within their own ethno-cultural community” (p. 81). Most simply put, language loss
happens when adults stop speaking the language with the children and the children have limited
other places to practice it.
Children in Refugee Communities
According to school leaders, children of refugee parents have strong English oral
language. Yet, all four of the school leaders in this study report that the children have listening
skills in their heritage language, but are unable to speak to it. As member 3 of Fane’s
community states, “All of the kids in the household, they speak good English. The challenge is
that they don’t speak our language fluently.” Monique states, “My kids for example, although
they have a hard time speaking, they understand.” Fritz explains the situation of his children,
now grown adults:
So when they came here, they were perfectly speaking my language. Also they spoke
the language of the neighboring country. So I said they could not have three languages,
it was too difficult, I told them to have two, English and my language. And yet, this one
was losing, and losing, and losing. My wife never talked to them in English, never.
Always until now, she talks in our language. They understand her, but they don’t answer.
They don’t reply. The oldest, sometimes she does. They can understand but they don’t
speak.
Fritz’ comment demonstrates that even with a strong desire by the parents to speak only
the heritage language with the children, it seems insufficient to pass along the language. A
possible reason for these language transmission challenges is due to what Fishman points out;
K-12 school is often “the first regular contact and co-operation with the world outside of Xish [the
heritage language] society” (p. 101). The leaders of refugee communities in this study also
attribute this language loss in the children with their entry into school. Member 4 of Fane’s
community says “Well, usually they speak it at home with their moms and their dads, but not
really well. When they are in school, they spend actually less time at home with their parents.
So, the most time they have they spend in their own school.” This comment was also echoed by
Fritz who explains, “So, when I count the time… In the morning, they have breakfast. They go to
school. When they come home, they eat whatever and then they watch TV. So it is very little
time that they have with us.”
This language loss in the community’s children carries with it repercussions for both
parent and child. For the parents, when children are not able to speak the language fluently,
they are unable to assist their parents in their adaptation to Canada. Member 4 of Fane’s
community states, “Even to the doctor—so when they try to bring it back to the mom, the
language is stuck there. So what the doctor just told him or her and said translate it to mom, the
language is stuck in between.” Later he adds, “When it comes to doctor’s visits or lawyer things,
or everything which is complicated they are stuck. They need their kids. And our kids cannot
actually speak our own language in order to explain it back to mom.” To assist their parents,
children do not simply need basic conversation skills, but rather they need complex language
skills. They need academic language to translate for their families, yet, they are not provided an
environment in which to acquire it. As member 4 shares, a lack of English literacy impacts the

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parents’ abilities to bring their children out into the community where they might be provided the
opportunity to gain more sophisticated language. He describes:
Let’s say now that the mom knows how to drive and is trying to take kids to an outreach
program. So parks, they have restrictions on those signs. If the mom does not
communicate with these guys or even read the traffic signs, how will they survive there?
If she doesn’t know how to speak good English for wherever they are going, she cannot
even go. The kids are growing up and they don’t know the language and they cannot
communicate back with their mom. We actually have this big challenge.
Without strong heritage language skills, refugee children are in a weak position to help
their parents to life in Canada. However, there are also consequences for children. Parents also
are unable to connect with their children, to share their values, and provide them with moral
education. Both member 5 of Fane’s community and Fabian describe the loss and
disempowerment for parents when they cannot pass on their values to their children.
And the culture. It is very important for the kids here. It is very difficult life here in
Canada. It is very easy to forget the culture. Even when the mother talks with them and
says “Do it this the way because that is how we do it in my culture”, they refuse it and
say, “Mommy, I don’t know.” The language, too, is very difficult. —Fane (Member 5)
Even our kids who are born here, you have difficulties really. We are not connected.
Because those kids, those who were born here even or our kids who were born there,
six years ago or something like that, they start forgetting about us. Like we are step-
parents. They say we are Canadian, they don’t even want to use our language. Even
they don’t want to listen to us because they think the language we speak, because we
are poor, it is nothing. —Fabian
Question Two: How do HLS assist with language maintenance
and community development in refugee immigrant groups?
According to Fishman, languages are classified according to an 8 point scale depending
on their chances of survival. Societal constructs which aid in intergenerational transmission of
language from parent to child are language use in the community, in schools, in the media, and
at work. Most of the world’s languages are classified as Stage 6 which “is concerned with the
reappearance of the intergenerational family” (p. 92). Fishman gives many strategies for helping
families stay connected such as “regular use of telephone calls, of amateur or local radio, of
closed circuit television, of frequent exchange of taped letters, songs and games for children,
[and] the formation of parents’ associations” (p. 93). Stage 5 differs in that literacy is available in
the community which in turn liberates the speakers of the less powerful language from the
“informational, attitudinal, ideological/philosophical and recreational” messages of the more
powerful language (p. 96). Communication between family members, access to speakers
outside the family, and literacy are key components in language survival.
In this study, the participants contend that the intergenerational family relationships are
strengthened because of the HLS. Additionally, benefits of children attending HLS are not only
evident in the children, but in the parents and community at large. Those listed by participants
are improved parent-child relationships, increased community pride, and increased knowledge
of Canadian systems.
Improved Parent-Child Relationships
According to HLS leaders, children who attend HLS improve their oral skills. Monique
feels that some developments are attitudinal: “We plant loving the main language in our
children,” and “we create awareness for our children that learning other languages is important
for them and for their future.” Furthermore, Fabian feels that children make linguistic advances.

10. 5 | P a g e
“Most of our kids because of this school, they know when we are talking and they know how to
say something back.” He describes the process:
The first part is that the kids they started to listen to [our language]. And even they sing it
with a cassette. They figure out what the songs mean. And then they start
communicating. Even when I am talking with my wife, the kids know what we are talking
about. That is a good thing because they were frustrated there before.
Candy explains that students who attend these schools gain an appreciation for their
families, and they come to understand that what their parents want for them is what many
parents from other cultures want for their children, also. She shares:
I think what is really neat is that the kids appreciate where their parents are from. They
get a little glimpse into their parents and their culture, or they hear the language at home
and then it kind of drifts away and then it come back again if they come back to these
schools. Especially at the school level, they see all of the cultural groups and this is
normal, this is okay.
HLS also benefit adults in the community. HLS gather parents together to work towards
a common goal: the improvement of the language abilities in children. Yet, working together with
the spirit of uniting the children, parents also fill their own psychological and social needs.
Member 3 of Fane’s community shares that schools give adults a chance, not only to reconnect,
but to take care of each other. He says:
In addition to is when we have the language school like we used to have it also helped
the parents come together some times. Because sometime here we have people who
are a little bit distressed, some people they are just sitting at home just watching TV all
the time. But when we have a place where our kids come together, so it also benefits the
adults to come together, too. Because when we are together in one place, the moms will
actually come together, now they are happy, they are in the school.
Candy sees HLS as an opportunity for elders in the community to fill some of the losses
that they have incurred over their lives as refugees. She explains these needs:
And when you have lost so much, a lot of people have lost their land, their culture, and
everything, or they come from places where they couldn’t practice certain things. Having
heritage language and arts is extremely important. So these are the things that kind of fill
that need….They get settled a little bit, they start organizing, and they see all of the
other community associations. There are other people from their background who have
been here for a while, they say that we have got to preserve our culture for our children,
so the first thing is “Our youth don’t understand and respect our culture, we have to save
our language and we have to save our cultural heritage.” So it kind of replaces losing
everything back home. And so that is how a lot of these associations start.
Increased Community Pride
According to Fishman, an important factor in preventing language loss in stage 6
languages is social cohesion amongst a group. He states, “Stage 6 involves the informal daily
life of a speech community. As such, it is difficult to plan (planned informality is a contradiction
of sorts). It can be facilitated, however; it can be fostered and encouraged” (p. 93). Candy
recognizes the need for connection and attributes the gathering of community members as an
opportunity to display community pride. She describes:
So they see other groups doing it and they say we should be doing this. That’s how we
show ourselves; that’s how we show our pride. So, I have an ethno-leadership
collaborative group. And that is what they all say. We are going to do music and we are
going to do heritage language, this is a common theme. We are all going to show off our
heritage together. We need more events. Heritage Days is not enough. So, it seems to
be a big driving need.

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Often the children perform at cultural events what they have learned in school. Fabian
expressed how learning the heritage language was necessary not only so that the children
could participate, but so that they had something to offer to the community, to Canada, and to
the world. When he explains why it is necessary to learn his language for the community he
states, “You need to bring something with you.”
I had a hard time, a hard time, because it took me three years. I think that it is very
important to have our mother tongue and everybody realized that that was so important
to go to school. Before that, you need to know your parents’ language. And then when
you come to the community you bring something with you. But if you just grow up there
and then you come back and you don’t have that foundation, that’s it.
He explains that speaking his language is an opportunity to give back to Canada:
Us, we believe that we come here, myself included, We came here to do something
great. That means, because Canada, they welcome us, we need to do something better
and the reason is because our kids are going to be Canadian. They were born here. We
need to do better things for them to be living in good harmony.
He also recognizes that his language has suffered from colonialism, yet there is an opportunity
for language revitalization in Canada. Being able to keep his community’s language would be
his is a gift to the world:
They want to be a part of that thing and they will be happy to work on it. And then they
will be proud. We don’t want to have to say that was my language [somewhere else],
they can say this is my language here in Canada.
Increased Knowledge of Canadian Systems by Learning through Doing
As was explained earlier, Fishman points out that many children encounter the values
and systems of the mainstream language once they enter school. Similarly, many HLS leaders
learn about Canadian systems through their work in HLS. Candy explains some of the learning
that transpires for HLS leaders:
The city has a lot of resources for heritage language to start. And so that is why some of
this is happening, because everybody gets the little grant for arts, or recreation, or
heritage language, or for space. So you get a lot of small organizations that get these
little grants and they try to run things off that….That’s how we got it done because I
thought the doing was more important than having it perfectly organized. Because in the
doing is how they learned how to do. Because they learned how to get a little grant, how
to pay things, how to keep receipts, who is really in charge, how to give an honorarium
to a volunteer who teaches the language. So that is how you learn that stuff.
Conclusions
Language loss is a real and powerful force in refugee communities and works at
disconnecting parents from their children. Although many parents desire to pass on their
language and their culture, once children begin attending regular school they do not receive
sufficient linguistic input and they begin to distance themselves from their parents’ language.
This creates conflicts within refugee communities because the parents often require the children
to act as translators. To accomplish this task, children require academic vocabulary in the HL,
but the parents often do not know it or know how to teach it to their children.
One solution to increasing children’s HL proficiency is for them to study at a HLS.
Community HLS leaders report that these schools provide numerous benefits, not only to the
community’s children, but to other adults as well. Language becomes a way for adults to
organize their community activities, give to others, and learn how to operate within Canadian
systems.

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References
Calgary Foundation 60 (2015, July 25). Neighbourhood grants. Retrieved from
http://www.thecalgaryfoundation.org/grants-awards/grassroots-grants/neighbour-grants
City of Edmonton (2015, July 25). Emerging immigrant and refugee grant program. Retrieved
from http://www.edmonton.ca/programs_services/funding_grants/grant-emerging-
immigrant-refugee-communities.aspx
Fishman, J. A. (1991). Reversing language shift: Theoretical and empirical foundations of
assistance to threatened languages. Clevedon, UK: Multilingual Matters.
Government of Canada. (2015, August 16). The refugee system in Canada. Retrieved from:
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/refugees/canada.asp
Hornberger, N. (2005). Frameworks and models in language policy planning. In T. Ricento
(Ed.), An introduction to language policy: Theory and method (pp.24-42). Oxford:
Blackwell.
Hornberger, N., Johnson, D. (2007). Slicing the onion ethnographically: Layers and spaces in
multilingual education policy and practice. TESOL Quarterly, 41(3), 509-532.

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Participatory Research, Adult Education and Learning to Question in
Im/migrant Service-Non Governmental Organizations
Wanda Johnson Chell, University of Alberta
Abstract: In/voluntary im/migrant women taking part in an Edmonton based
Parenting and Literacy Program (PLP) within an Immigrant Service-Non
Governmental Organization (IS-NGO), engaged in participatory research,
analyzing and reflecting upon experiences of migration, speaking to continued
processes of racialization and (re)developing relational capital.
This research explored how Immigrant Service–Non Governmental Organization (IS-
NGOs), in the provision of service, (re)enforce the continued racialization of new im/migrants.
IS-NGOs are those organizations “contracted” through federal, provincial, corporate and/or
private funding to provide immigrant supports/social services through various programs,
including educational programs such English Language Learning (ELL) and Parenting and
Literacy Program (PLP). The research uncovered the responses of in/voluntary im/migrant
women to settlement, the IS-NGO and the PLP through creating a collective and dialogical
learning space with participatory research methodology and pedagogy focused on the
participant analysis of their experiences. By engaging in critical conversation, the participants
(re)developed relational capital, stimulated critical conversation as part of a process of IS-NGOs
renewal and progressed as language and literacy learners.
Research Purpose and Question
As an English language instructor within a Parenting and Literacy Program (PLP), I was
involved in initiatives intended to serve im/migrant women new to Alberta. The PLP is a specific
program offered by an IS-NGO (originating from a faith-based community) that has as its core
values: diversity, compassion, social justice and responsibility. According to the IS-NGO,
programs “emerge from needs identified through our individual and community connections with
immigrant populations” and are conceptualized as “flexible and responsive to community needs”
(Sillito, 2012). Organizational funding is derived in/directly from civil, provincial and/or federal
governments, other non-profit organizations, and corporate/private donations via grants and
fundraising. It is the intention of the IS-NGO, through the provision of settlement service, to
enhance the quality of life for newcomers to Alberta and for Canadians.
My role in the IS-NGO was to develop and deliver basic language and/or literacy
instruction to parents (specifically women) and to support and promote the skills required for
parenting within the Canadian context. In addition, I was to assist women in connecting to,
accessing and navigating available community resources. The original concerns, arising from
extensive engagement with learners in the classroom, were: i) a perception that programming
was not addressing the interests and/or needs of the participants, and ii) my own discomfort
with the norms being promoted through curricular resources. The intent was to place the
women’s knowledge, ideas, and experiences more centrally within the program and to educate
funders and program developers regarding the experiences, skills and aspirations of the
learners participating in the program. This research was not intended to improve the provision of
services to im/migrants so much as to provide an opportunity for critical reflection regarding how
existing programs and services may address and/or exacerbate the inequities im/migrant
women experience in Canada (Bierman, Ahmad Mawani, 2009; Boyd Yiu, 2009; Galabuzi,
2006, 2010; Vickers Isaac, 2012). In addition, the hope was to highlight areas of positive adult
literacy/language practices and generate critical discussion within the IS-NGO and with funders.

14. 9 | P a g e
The main purpose of the research was to explore how the provision of im/migrant
support services offered by IS-NGOs through various programs, such as ELL/PLP could be
racializing new im/migrants. I had a sense that “race” was significant at some level in the
development of programming and the organization of the IS-NGO, and through engaging with
participatory research and teaching, examples of racialization and race regimes were illustrated.
The following questions served as/came to guide the participatory research with
in/voluntary im/migrant women: What are the settlement experiences of im/migrants to
Canada/Alberta? What are some settlement experiences specific to programs and services
offered by im/migrant service provider IS-NGOs in Alberta? How are these experiences
indicative of a process of racialization of im/migrants typified by race regimes? What are some
of the responses to this process by program participants? What does the IS-NGO need to learn
from this critical analysis as part of a process of organizational and programmatic renewal?
As race is a controversial and uncomfortable topic, and the research was conducted with
vulnerable groups, the research required a broad set of questions that would allow the
participants to speak comfortably to a range of experiences. The three broad questions were i)
what was/is your global migration experience; ii) what is your experience as an im/migrant in
Canada; and iii) what was/is your experience as a participant in the parenting and literacy
program? The race optic surfaced from the participant’s experiences in relation to these
questions.
Race Regimes and Racialisation in Humanitarian IS-NGOs:
Conceptual and Analytical Schemes
Critical colonial feminist scholarship, specifically that pertaining to humanitarian NGOs
(Ahmed, 2000; Bannerji, 2000; Razack, 1998; Thobani, 1998) informed the data analysis. In
addition, critical scholarship in international development exploring issues of race and NGO
ization (Barry-Shaw Oja Jay, 2012; Heron, 2007; White, 2002; Wilson, 2012) shaped the
conceptualization of the organization. As such, the organization is construed as an Immigrant
Service-Non Governmental Organisation (IS-NGO) as opposed to simply an Immigrant Service
Organisation (ISO) or non-profit. Framing ISOs within NGO discourse highlights processes and
incurrences of “institutionalization, professionalization, depoliticilization and demobilization”
within organizations committed to social change and raises questions as to whether immigrant
services represents a specific form of regulation and containment (Choudry Kapoor, 2013
p.1). Mahrouse (2010) argues, well-meaning social justice efforts are “rich sites for exploring
racialized privilege and whiteness, because they reveal the extent to which white hegemony and
the liberal paradigm changes that which might otherwise shift existing power relations” (p.169).
Scholarship on the non-profit, white saviour industrial complex (Kivel, 2007; Smith, 2007; Teju,
2014) adds a further dimension of exploration into the interplay between charitable giving, the
state, funders, IS-NGOs and the educational programming offered.
Vickers and Isaac’s (2012) conceptual framework of race regimes and racialization
highlights the structures, discourse, and power relations that contribute to race-based
discrimination and provides the research critical bifocality- the ability to focus on the structures
and histories being spoken of, as well as the particular lives and realities of the participants
(Fine, 2013). It serves to temper an us (researchers/participants) /them (IS-NGO/funders)
dichotomy from forming when engaged in critical conversations directed towards organisational
renewal by directing attention upstream to the structures and practices of the state guiding the
IS-NGO and those who work for/within the organisation
A regime is the culture and social norms embedded, often unquestioned and enduring in
institutions and practice that come to regulate the operation of a government or institution and
its interaction with society and its sub-sections. Vickers and Isaac (2012) write Canada, as a
white colonial, settler nation consciously and with intent “created and contained race regimes-

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that is legal and political institutions and practices based on racialism” (p.5). As a political
system, a race regime is composed of three distinct parts: i) structures: the institutions through
which those in power manage race regimes; ii) discourse/ideas: the ideology, laws and
regulations that establish categories according to race schema; and iii) power relations:
between the citizens and the denizens, the elite and the ruled. The distinct components of a
race regime, act as cogs working simultaneously to rationalise and perpetuate the unspoken,
two-tiered system of entitlements and responsibilities experienced in Canada.
For a race regime to exist there must be racialization, “the social, political, economic and
historical processes that utilize essentialist and monolithical racial markings to construct diverse
communities of colour” (Vicker Isaac, 2012, p.269). Mignolo (in Gaztambide-Fernandez,
2014) argues “racialization is always a classification and a ranking, and that classification is not
embedded in ‘nature’ but is man-made” (p.201). Schmitt (1996) highlights the common and
pervasive racist practices that exist in all institutions and in our society at large which contribute
to racialization. These include, infantilization, denigration, distrust, ridicule, exclusion, rendering
invisible, scapegoating and violence. Schmitt’s work provides the language for identifying and
naming the common practices which contribute, regardless of intention, to the racialization of
Canadian society and removes any notions of justifiable or acceptable racist practices.
Key Findings of the Research
IS-NGOs (un)consciously contribute to the racialization of im/migrants through:
capitalizing on humanitarianism and/or “good works” narratives to recruit and/or retain labour;
positioning clients as vulnerable or barriered to rationalize and solicit funding; using clients/staff
to become the “face” of the organization brand with multicultural marketing strategies tied to
performance (dance, costume, song); bureaucratic procedures that invent/ (re)enforce
ethnicities; acting as the service provider for exclusionary practices and policies on behalf of the
state in relation to the allocation of resources
The settlement experiences which emerged from our work together suggests:
racialization may occur prior to immigration; English is used as the criteria for exclusion as well
as being touted as the solution to socio-economic disparities; deskilling occurs within non-
waged labour as parents, and as contributors to home labour; im/migrant women experience
infantilization, denigration, and violence in accessing services such as health care; and that
there economic/social/political costs within Canada of maintaining home ties
The participant responses to processes of racialization include: an instrumental
approach to educational programming; the internalization of messages such as “illiteracy”,
“deficiency”, “scarcity of government resources”, and “anti-immigration sentiment”; practicing
absentee participation; (re)developing relational capital within existing structures; and finding
avenues of (re)claiming/celebrating sense of self/agency.
The lesson that can be drawn by the IS-NGO include: a consciousness and awareness
that the IS-NGO, regardless of intent, is not a neutral, benign or apolitical organization;
recognition that IS-NGOs committed to social justice can be sites for the (un)conscious and
(un)intentional racialization of im/migrants; an awareness that organizational decisions in
relation to program development, funding streams, and/or strategic planning can exacerbate/
mitigate racialization; the value of successful practices of supporting the (re)development of
relational capita; the necessity to continually seek ways to place the clients knowledge, skills,
and experiences more centrally in programming, procedures and practices.

16. 11 | P a g e
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London: Zed

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Cross Cultural Understandings of
Transnational Non-Binary Sexual Identities (TNBSI)
Roger Francis, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Abstract: The lived experiences of transnational non-binary sexual identities
(TNBSI) provide an intersection of knowledge and power with respect to the
differing cross cultural understandings of sexual identity. Traditional knowledge
has upheld that the binary sexual identity construct focuses on the male/female
and homosexual/heterosexual as the culturally imperative heteronormative
context. This hegemony contradicts the reality of sexual identity. An
understanding of TNBSI individuals’ sexual fluidity provides awareness of socio-
political contexts with respect to this TNBSI difference.
Overview
Transnational non-binary sexual identities (TNBSI) and their lived experiences are an
unexamined area of Canada’s transnational communities. It has been seen that an individual's
sexual desires and social desires can go in different directions at different times in an
individual’s life (Siddiqui, 2011). Canada’s multicultural landscape is littered with representations
of different transnational communities, and as such, there are various cultural understandings
around sexual identity. In spite of these different cultural understandings, TNBSI individuals in
their non-heteronormative contexts have learned to assimilate effectively into Canada’s
dominant culture. The realignment of knowledge around the related assimilation skills of TNBSI
offers additional insight with respect to acculturation and assimilation processes. This
realignment is positioned to inform knowledge development for an adult learning pedagogy
focusing on human adjustment and survival within the context of immigration into Canada. This
paper examines TNBSI and what the knowledge behind their lived experiences can offer to the
field of adult learning.
TNBSI Reality
The TNBSI reality speaks to individuals as fluid sexualities, who reside, shift and change
within the borders of the binary/non-binary construct based on life circumstances, feelings of
confidence and individual acceptance. Throughout all areas of life in Canada, the politics and
polarization issues of ethnicity, race, gender and sexual orientation differences are commonly
portrayed. What has not gotten much portrayal, however, is the recognition of fluid sexual
identities that exist by virtue of the diasporic communities and the different understandings and
interpretations of sexuality.
The TNBSI phenomenon has some semblance to Western understandings of
homosexuality and bisexuality. This paper’s discussion is not about bisexuality, but instead, is
about sexual fluidity and the capability that is inherent with TNBSI to ebb and flow within the
borders of the binary/non-binary construct. The forthcoming sections of this paper have been
organized to address: (1) Western/non-Western perspectives of sexuality; (2) cultural contexts;
(3) power and the borderland; (4) knowledge and adult learning; and, (5) transnational sexuality
studies. I conclude with a brief summary.
Western/Non-Western Perspectives of Sexuality
Western society as a whole has always operated in a traditionally binary thought
construct (Elizabeth, 2013). According to Hemmings (2007) the “literature routinely regards
opposite gender sexual contact as heterosexuality and same gender contact as homosexuality,

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as if the same phenomena were being observed in all societies” (p. 6) in the same way. It is
important to note that terms like lesbian or gay are not universally applicable across
geographical and cultural contexts (Hemmings, 2007). Transnational Sexuality Studies (TSS)
emphasizes the dangers of assuming that contemporary western identity categories are
universally applicable. TSS raises questions about the assumptions that are embedded in
understanding any type of same-sex behaviour as a cross-cultural truth. TSS challenges the
terminology and understanding of how being gay is understood in the western construct in
contrast to other parts of the world. The term queer, as it has been commonly used, very often
loses its specificity in transnational work, and comes to mean whatever the author needs it to
mean based on the given context (Hemmings, 2007). This term will, however, be used in
subsequent sections of this paper’s examination of different cross cultural understandings. This
is due to the prevalence of its use throughout the literature.
African Cultural Contest
African cultures are no more homogeneous in sexual practices than those found
elsewhere in the world (Oliver, 2012). Same-sex relationships have been documented among
different peoples in Uganda among the Banyoro, the Iteso and the Baganda peoples, where
social approval of same-sex intimacies has varied enormously across time and space (Oliver,
2012). Oliver (2012) explained that it is impossible to assign any single meaning to same-sex
intimacies because “they have assumed numerous social meanings in the African context
ranging from sin to the most noble form of love, as well as a means to establish hierarchy or
exercise political resistance through history” (p. 17). Sylvia Tamale (2009), further supports
Oliver’s aforementioned perspective, where in her public address at Makerere University, she
provided several examples of sexual identity diversity within African cultures.
Bangladeshan Cultural Context
Siddiqui (2011) showed us how in predominantly Muslim Bangladeshan culture, the
“meanings and use of categories such as gay (effeminate males who are sexually attracted to
men) and MSM (men who have sex with men)” (p. 3) are two completely different things that are
not identifiable in the same way as has been done in western cultures. In Bangladesh, men
have more latitude and freedom to act on their sexual preferences “as long as social and familial
obligations are met through marriage, and all acts are hidden from public view” (Siddiqui, 2011,
p. 4). The premise for persons who are straight and others who are not, is by no means a self-
evident attribute. In Bangladesh an individual's sexual desires and social desires can go in
different directions where sexual identities are fluid, overlapping, contextual and contingent
(Siddiqui, 2011). According to Siddiqui (2011), in Bangladesh one cannot assume that “an
equation between sexual conduct and sexual identity” means the same thing in North American
contexts, because “along with [sexual] fluidity, many men exhibit indeterminacy in relation to
[their] sexual identities” (p. 9). In Bangladesh, “sexualities and sexual identities are fluid, multiple
and overlapping” (Siddiqui, 2011, p. 10) and this is commonplace within that culture.
South Asian Cultural Context
In Indian culture, some argue that the category of MSM is an assertion of racial/cultural/
social difference (Siddiqui, 2011). It interesting to note that in the South Asian territory, the term
gay means that this is someone who participates in both sexual roles (Siddiqui, 2011). Both
roles of being active as well as passive (passive meaning - being penetrated, and active
meaning - the penetrator), where this understanding of being gay is clearly a completely
different interpretation of the word as it is known in western contexts (Siddiqui, 2011). According
to Siddiqui (2011), in the rest of South Asia, “the most obvious distinction between those who

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call themselves gay and those who are defined under the umbrella term of MSM” (p. 5) is more
so a class and economic distinction than anything else. It is less about the identity difference of
the social construct, and more so an issue of economic positioning. In South Asia, those who
are MSM are poor and marginalized more so for their social construct than for their sexual
construct (Siddiqui, 2011).
Black North American Cultural Context
The term gay is a limited North American descriptor which does not speak to the array of
differences occupying the same sex activity spectrum (Grace Wells, 2009). For example, the
gay terminology is one that has been avoided in the black American community by non-obvious
males who engage in same sex activity on the ‘down low.’ The down low activity in this context
means engaging in same sex activity in secret, where said black American males are
indistinguishable in their main stream society, and are often men with female companions and
children. The aforementioned discussion around cross cultural understandings of sexual fluidity
provides context for exploring this non-heteronormative phenomenon via a borderland
theoretical framework.
Borderland Theoretical Framework
Borderland theory is all about the existence of sexual identities that fall outside of
cultural norms where “borderlands simultaneously develop their own cultures while challenging
hegemonic ideology” (Callis, 2014, p. 7). According to Callis’ research study undertaken in
Lexington, Kentucky, the sexual binary of heterosexual and homosexual is becoming less
hegemonic, however the binary perspective is still a powerful system of sexual categorization.
Callis (2014) applied borderland theory in looking at sexualities that exist within the borders of
heterosexuality and homosexuality. Callis referred to Gloria Anzaldúa’s book Boarderlands/La
Frontera, which discussed the geographical region (border territory) between the USA and
Mexico as an open wound where the lifeblood of two worlds merge to form a third country of
border culture. Callis further referred to how Anzaldúa described individuals living in this border
as having plural personalities with an insider/outsider perspective of a dual life between the
cultures of USA and Mexico.
Although Anzaldúa was writing about a specific geographical borderland, she
additionally discussed the psychological borderlands, the sexual borderlands and the spiritual
borderlands. It is this extension and connection of borderlands that is being used within this
proposed study, to present a deeper level of understanding of non-binary sexuality as it exists in
the western interpretation of heterosexuality as contrasted to homosexuality. According to Callis
(2014), because of the “continued hold the sexual binary has on constructions of sexuality,” (p.
3) non-binary identities are best understood as existing within a sexual borderland, a region of
space between heterosexuality and homosexuality. This sexual borderland is viewed by Callis
as forming separately from the binary system, where:
For those people inhabiting this borderland, it is a place of sexual and gender fluidity, a
space where identities can change, multiply, and/or dissolve. For heterosexual and
homosexual-identified people living on either side of the border, the borderland serves
multiple purposes. It can become a boundary not to be crossed, or a pathway to a new
identity. Because the borderlands are emerging from within the current binary system of
sexuality, they interface with individuals of all sexual identities. (2014, p. 3)
This spectrum of sexual identities within the binary/non-binary construct are seldom publicly
discussed due to the fear of politicization that comes with open disclosure.
The different layers of other sexual identities emerging beyond the western conventions
of heterosexuality, homosexuality and bisexuality are numerous. Some of these other sexual
identities include, but are not limited to: demisexuality, lithsexuality, pomosexuality,
pansexuality, skoliosexuality, ambisexuality, sapiosexuality, ethnosexuality, heteroflexibility,

21. 16 | P a g e
homoflexibility, asexuality and polysexuality. Definitions for the aforementioned sexual identities
existing fall outside the scope of this paper. There is an absence of academic research with
regards to these emergent sexual identities, and in particular as they relate specifically to
TNBSI. This absence is even further noted, where even “liberal lifelong educators who link
lifelong learning to issues of social learning and social justice tend to be silent on” (Grace, 2013,
p. 181) non-normative sexual identity phenomena and issues. Educator silence on these issues
speaks to the hegemony of heteronormativity in adult learning (lifelong learning) discourses and
practices (Grace, 2013).
Knowledge and Adult Learning
The paradigms arising from TNBSI are informative to any adult learning pedagogy that
deals with human existence, human survival, human self-love, human self-acceptance, and
human identity constructions. In our communities, “adult educators can strategize and develop
policies, programs, courses, and activities that problematize anti-queer perspectives, initiatives,
symbols, and language in a heterosexualizing culture-power nexus” (Grace Hill, 2001, p. 4)
and in so doing start a wave of constructive change for current and future generations. The
nature of the homosexual/heterosexual binary along with political and academic discussions on
these matters, have historically functioned erroneously. In functioning erroneously they have
managed to leave certain queer persons out and, as such, have historically contoured “larger
sociocultural sites like mainstream adult education as exclusionary environments for queer
persons” (Grace Hill, 2001, p. 4).
An inclusion of all queer understandings along with a sensitivity and an awareness of the
TNBSI phenomenon will help adult educators to improve sociocultural learning sites (Grace
Hill, 2001, p. 4) that will tap into the coping skills inherent to TBNSI. The acquisition of
knowledge about queer studies enables adult “learners to challenge heterosexualizing
discourses and heteronormative ways of being, doing, becoming, and belonging” (p. 5) and in
so doing “situate queer performance as an alternative pedagogy that often forms new directions
for personal development as it cuts across themes of postmodernity such as diversity, identity,
and self-definition” (p. 5).
Knowledge is not easily defined and its understanding and misunderstanding is freely
present throughout all the different layers of adult learning (Grace Hill, 2001). At a
fundamental level knowledge involves making sense of information, lived experiences, and by
an extrapolation of this then queer knowledge and TNBSI knowledge, can easily be classified as
a composite of the multiple ways that individuals construct meaning of their lives as participants
in a non-normative community (Grace Hill, 2001). Queer knowledge constitutes sites of
learning and by its mere existence provides an opportunity to “build inclusionary pedagogy by
challenging hierarchies, suspending classifications, and resisting dichotomization in regard to
modes of intelligibility (ways of understanding the world)” (Grace Hill, 2001, p. 4). Adult
education (adult learning), is ready for an alternative pedagogy that will “transgresses adult
educational space” (Grace Hill, 2001, p. 2) and rejuvenate the landscape of learning.
Grace and Hill (2001) suggested that queer knowledge can be used to effect change by
“deploying queer knowledges as political activities for social transformation” (p. 2). In order for
there to be a change in thinking it is important for adult educators to nurture learning spaces that
“problematize social and cultural formations, including heteronormative adult education, that
have historically relegated queer persons to a sociocultural hinterland” (p. 2) where said
individuals have had to “struggle with issues of being, self-preservation, expectation, becoming,
resistance, and belonging” (p. 2). Where it has somehow gotten twisted, is that history has
heterosexualiz[ed] culture and discourse and public pedagogy has been full of heterosexism
and homophobia and negation against the integrity of identities that fall outside the normative
context.

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Transnational Sexuality Studies (TSS)
An examination and understanding of TNBSI provides knowledge acquisition that can
enhance human capacity (Grace, 2013) as a key paradigm for adult learning. An investigation of
TNBSI falls naturally under the umbrella of TSS. The interdisciplinary field of TSS is complex
and according to Hemmings (2007), cuts “across sexuality studies, gender studies, postcolonial
theory, queer theory, anthropology, critical race studies, literary studies, development studies,
globalization theory and reproductive health studies, among others, and, in fact, might be said to
constitute one way of bringing these disciplinary or interdisciplinary concerns together” (p.4).
According to Grewal Kaplan (2001), goods “and people come to circulate in new ways, so too
identities emerge and come into specific relations of circulation and expansion” (p. 2). As we
examine the “globalized framework of encounter and exchange, sexual identities are similar to
other kinds of identities in that they are imbued with power relations” (p. 2). These power
relations are connected to the inequality that exist due to globalization, where in a global world
of borderless existences, it is important to examine the specificities and continuities of sexual
identities (Grewal Kaplan, 2001).
TSS reflects a borderless world that examines flows of bodies across space not limited
to geography and national borders (Mizzi, 2008). TSS highlights the absence of non-western
perspectives of the non-binary sexuality construct where Judeo-Christian culture as a
contrasting perspective “exercises hetero-normativity as a means to obtain social control”
(Mizzi, 2008, p. 2) with very little tolerance for anything beyond the binary view. According to
Hemmings (2007), we can assume that any level of inquiry in TSS comprises encounters
between non-binary subjects “who misrecognize and mistranslate one another continually, and
that sexual meanings will change as subjects negotiate and experience them in their daily lives”
(p. 16).
Conclusion
A glimpse of different cross cultural understandings of human sexuality has provided
context for this paper’s journey of clarifying the TNBSI reality. A TNBSI individual can approach,
inhabit, or depart from the geographical borderlands at multiple points in their life and with
different perspectives each time (Callis, 2014). With this in mind, consider someone who lived a
married life in Miami, who then lived a homosexual life in Toronto, and then subsequently lived a
bisexual/pansexual/pomosexual life in Toronto. This progression is a perfect illustration of
TNBSI fluidity under the lens of borderland theory.
Individuals who are residents in borderland culture are in tune with reading cultural
maps, as the knowledge, understanding and sensibility gained from this existence allows for a
heightened appreciation and understanding of difference (Grace Benson, 2000).
Borderlanders quietly exist within and outside of hetero-normative contexts and as such are
able to understand heterosexist culture and its perceptions of queer persons, and in so doing,
are able to leverage this knowledge and awareness for their own advantage (Grace Benson,
2000). As a result of this, borderlanders are able to navigate efficiently across all cultural and
socio-political contexts of their lives. Some of what can be learned from border crossers
(TNBSI) are:
 how to act, assimilate, affiliate and represent effectively according to different
cultural contexts (especially the dominant cultural context);
 how to handle assimilation, adjustment and knowledge acquisition by virtue of
the fact that constant change is common place for TNBSI; and
 how to navigate all types of politicization and use the tensions of politicization to
build successful and efficient life strategies.
There is an absence of research that addresses TNBSI and their learning processes
within Canada’s landscape. Multiculturalism, sexual identity and social identity intersect where
TNBSI persons endeavor to learn, adapt and formulate their social identity within Canada. The

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TNBSI reality offers knowledge and learning away from the current normative perspectives
(Grace Hill, 2001) and can broaden the adult learning landscape for a rejuvenated rhetoric in
the field of adult learning.

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Oliver, M. (2012). Transnational sex politics, conservative Christianity, and antigay activism in
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Siddiqi, D. M. (2011). Sexuality, rights and personhood: tensions in a transnational world. BMC
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2009. The Equal Rights Review, 4, 49-57.

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Emergence, Confluence, and Momentum of Indigenous and Sui Generis
Intercultural Legal Studies:
An International and Local Context for Remodeling Legal Teaching
Natasha Hart Frey, Western Washington University
Abstract: In this review the author considers the emerging role of
interdisciplinary and legal education in modeling, teaching, and contributing to
emerging sui generis, intercultural legal systems in North America. In particular,
the review considers educational efforts to engage indigenous legal tradition,
within the context of work currently underway in the Coast and Strait Salish Sea
region.
Introduction: Emergence, Confluence and Momentum
Several reasons exist for taking an interdisciplinary, contextual approach to discussing
this topic. First, this topic really is emerging and not yet a comprehensive body – in the sense
that there is an existing body of literature or research from which to base a narrowly focused
inquiry into Teaching, Learning and Modeling Indigenous Sui Generis Intercultural Law.
Substantial bodies of literature address indigenous law as a topic in and of itself, and an even
greater quantity of work concerns legal education. Where the two topics meet specifically
however, is somewhat recently emerged. In terms of legal study, this ‘moment’ is also being
described as “jurisgenerative” (Carpenter Riley, 2013, Echohawk, 2015).
The more specifically the literature pertains to the topic, it seems the more likely it will
include words and phrases such as: changing, creating, exploring, finding, incorporating,
innovations, quest, realizing, revitalizing, recovering, and so forth – all indicating movement. 1
Consistently, this review refers to a “momentum”, to reference both our time and the expanding
nature of possibilities inherent in this emerging area of research and practice. In review of the
topic of teaching and modeling indigenous theory and practice in legal education, an
interdisciplinary stream consisting of topic and location specific study from various scholarly
fields: historical analysis, law review, theories of legal education, archival practice, cultural
cartography, and educational administration are considered as interrelated in the context of this
interdisciplinary converging-stream, style review.
Second, it is both methodologically fitting and demonstrative of Indigenous research and
educational paradigms to ground theory and research, and teaching in legal studies, in location
- to a place, a context, a reason. In Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous
Peoples, Tuwhai Smith describes post-colonial discourse, with the primary point of reference
being colonialism, settlement, and subsequent resistance, as a means by which the ‘power to
define the world’ gets re-inscribed by “Western” minded scholars (Smith, 2012). Smith describes
“the” Indigenous intellectual perspective and methodology as place based epistemology,
whereby understanding requires recognition of how meaning is transmitted through specific
features of the landscape according to the oral and mnemonic traditions of local people (Marker,
2009). In this review, context is provided out of a simultaneous convergence of: place of author,
place of significant leading studies and programs, and most importantly, tying this all together in
relation to this topic - place of intersection of non-indigenous law with traditional indigenous law
where indigenous rights are compromised as a result. As stated above, this pertains to the
Coast and Strait Salish lands, islands, and seas region.
1 See specific titles in References

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Historical and Legal Rationale: Sui Generis Intercultural Legal Studies in North America
To what extent do the indigenous peoples of the Americas still use their own
law? What is their right, privilege or freedom to have their own laws and
procedures to resolve disputes? What is the practice of North American States in
dealing with indigenous laws? What is indigenous or traditional law? (Yazzie
Zion, 1997, p.55)
2016 marks the 50th Anniversary of the United Nations General Assembly adopting the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1966, ICCPR), and the 40th Anniversary of
the ICCPR (1976) as being “in-force.” Driving the scholarship and legal efforts to enact the
norms set forth by documents such as the UN Declaration, is the fact such norms have
historically been eroded when looked at in practice (Borrows, 2005, Echohawk, 2015, Jewell
James, 2013, Carpenter and Riley, 2013, Zion and Yazzie, 1997).
When another culture is allowed to authoritatively judge the factual authenticity
and meaning of Aboriginal narratives, Aboriginal people lose their power of self-
definition and determination. The rhythm of life is lost which we have known
since the beginning of time. (Sampson, TTASELEK, 2015)
Crown and National courts are an inherently biased source of interpretive authority
where indigenous legal issues and perspectives are considered, and have not consistently
recognized indigenous legal methodology. Despite this, decisions over the last 25 years indicate
significant changes are underway. Since the 1990’s the Supreme Court of Canada has
incrementally recognized what is now the beginning of a sui generis approach in judging
indigenous legal traditions and indigenous rights. Primarily found in the context of the manner
by which Indigenous [Aboriginal] oral tradition is to be considered and recognized as evidence,
and with regard to Aboriginal legal perspectives.
Writing about legality and relations in the First Nations and Canadian context in his
conference presentation Building an Indigenous Legal Community, John Borrows, 2
discussing
the inherent inequity of interpretive power currently, takes what would be termed in education –
a strengths-based approach, pointing out some basic, and yet discounted aspects of the legal
history of the state of Canada: “Many indigenous legal traditions have not been surrendered by
treaties and have not been clearly and plainly extinguished by the Crown. Indigenous law exists
today” (Borrows, 2005, 1, 161). Discussing legality and traditional or Indigenous law in the
United States, Zion and Yazzie have a similar message of traditional law’s foundational role and
immemorial nature, writing: “Indian justice methods and institutions persist into modern times,
and they continue to be a viable method of law and justice….They are a legitimate means of
self-governance and a model for industrial societies which now recognize the shortcomings of
state justice systems and methods” (Zion Yazzie, 1997, p. 56).
Borrows argues the current legitimacy and relevancy of indigenous law in Canada from a
perspective that what is currently “on the books” in terms of doctrinal and theoretical tenets of
the law in Canada, is in fact based on Indigenous Law, and that to recognize this in practice
would mean to interpret law in Canada as sui generis. In his 2012 paper, Duty to Learn, Chief
Justice Finch of the British Columbia Court of Appeal explains that in addition to “the duty to
approach questions of interpretation generously, and the duty to consult and accommodate, that
the honour of the Crown also demands of legal professionals a duty to learn about and from
Indigenous legal orders” (Askew, 2014, p.2 citing Justice Lance S.G. Finch, 2012).
2 Canada Research Chair in Indigenous Law at the University of Victoria Law School

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Teaching, Learning, and Modeling Indigenous and Sui Generis Intercultural Law
Because traditional Indigenous legality is not contained in a framework of “legal system:”
a series of designated centralized institutions, rules, and pre-determined consequences – as are
the dominant English and French inspired legal systems of North America today, study requires
conceptual epistemological development from students not already familiar with traditional
Indigenous knowledge and lifeways. Key methodological principles for teaching and learning
Indigenous and sui generis intercultural law are: place, language, and oral traditional
knowledge.
The Role of Interdisciplinary Methodology
Interdisciplinary study provides a cross sectional analysis of organic themes, shows
where there is a recurrence of ideas, and in this way reveals the importance of specific
influences from multiple different academic vantage points. This has potential to reveal
consistent or divergent understanding, and to significantly corroborate findings. In reaching an
accurate understanding of Coast and Strait Salish lifeways and legality, and legal history of
relations with Canada and the United States, an interdisciplinary perspective is both supportive
and instructive. From educational studies to archival practice – the gap in interpretive power
between colonial empires and indigenous peoples is being notated. By looking from a multitude
of academic perspectives it can be seen where the flow of systemic inequity originated - in the
form of an idea of superiority and inferiority between peoples. Understanding this causative
element as pervasive, and learning to recognize the effects in a variety of contemporary
contexts is fundamental in the process of untangling the legal knots that secure the “ladders” of
colonial empires. Across disciplines, scholars are looking retroactively, critically, at where the
notion of Euro-centric superiority over Indigenous peoples manifested these “knots,” and
attempting to untie them. This is happening in such a variety of disciplines so as to take note
and consider how these streams support one another. Asking, where are there convergences
that strengthen the current momentum in the direction of equitable justice?
When looked at from an interdisciplinary perspective, there are unmerged streams of
academic reinterpretation from various scholarly fields, not in discussion with each other about
this re-interpretive nature of studies, yet they are aligned in their approach to correct, reform,
balance, and essentially – to be able to claim accuracy, when interpreting foundational
information within their disciplines. That getting to this result can require significant
reinterpretation is intrinsic to most Indigenous scholarship that includes reference to colonialism
or resistance to colonialism. Striking however, is the frequency and timeliness of academic
perspectives from across disciplines, calling for and implementing what can be seen as sui
generis approaches to considering their field or topic from an intercultural perspective, in order
to begin to consider reaching an accuracy of originality in their understanding and interpretation.
In the case of legality and legal studies – understanding the original agreement between parties
according to the perspective of both parties is what this means.
Certain existing disciplines are strategically well-suited to including perspectives of
Indigenous peoples and corroborating information and meaning in relation to Treaty protection
and other types of legalistic rights realization efforts. Of note to this review, and to the context of
Coast and Strait Salish place and legal issues, are four areas: Archival Convention, Traditional
(Land) Use Studies (TUS or TLUS) (also including Cultural Cartography or Counter-Mapping),
Indigenous, Decolonization, Resistance Arts, Post-Colonial Theory, (types of) studies, and
Educational Studies.

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Interdisciplinary Examples
Teaching indigenous legality in law schools. In his 2012 paper A Duty to Learn, BC
Appeals Court Chief Justice Finch calls on the legal profession, particularly law students and
law schools, to teach and learn from Indigenous legal orders:
[It may be] …unrealistic to expect the current generation of judges and counsel to
achieve the shift in perspective necessary to incorporate indigenous legal systems into
the existing legal order. However, those at the beginnings of their legal careers and
educations … are best positioned to gain an appreciation of context and foreclose the
calcification of perspective. (Finch, 2012, p. 20)
In her 2014 paper Indigenous Legal Traditions and the Challenge of Intercultural Legal
Education in Canadian Law Schools, University of Victoria Indigenous Law research affiliate H.
Askew discusses the significant gap between Supreme Court of Canada directives and legal
practitioner training. While recognizing an increasing level of understanding amongst the legal
community that Indigenous legal perspectives are to be ‘taken into account’, and a moment of
legal educational opportunity, Askew also recommends a careful and conscientious approach,
asking: “What kind of training might legal professionals need to have in order to do justice to
diverse Indigenous legal perspectives on a range of rights? And how might the profession foster
sensitivity to these perspectives?” (Askew, 2014, p. 2)
Teaching and learning from traditional Indigenous legal perspectives and systems is now
the collaborative duty in-part, of educational and legal institutions who train legal professionals
and determine practitioner qualifications. This is not a simple or straightforward endeavor
though, and presents concerns for avoiding processes that remanufacture historically consistent
Eurocentric appropriation and domination of Indigenous knowledge. There are as many or more
highly specific place and community based sources of Indigenous legality as there are
similarities or parallels in the essence of teachings. Institutionalizing such highly contextualized
teachings runs a risk of misinterpreting meaning and homogenizing Indigenous concepts by
over-comparing them into alignment with existing customary legal processes and conceptual
frameworks. Unprecedented levels of institutional leadership from and collaboration with First
Nation and Native American communities are required in designing the legal educational
process, practitioner qualifications, and implementation of such programs.
Program example: University of Victoria (UVic) Faculty of Law Indigenous Law Research
Unit and proposed Juris Indigenarum Doctor (JID) Program. The Indigenous Law Research Unit
(ILRU) at UVic carries out Indigenous law research for the Accessing Justice and Reconciliation
Project (AJR). AJR is a collaborative effort between the ILRU at UVic Faculty of Law,
Indigenous Bar Association of Canada, and Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada,
intended for honoring “the internal strengths and resiliencies present in indigenous societies,
including … legal traditions” (UVic ILRU, 2013, p.4). The ILRU has developed an Indigenous
legal research methodology, to “draw law from publicly available Indigenous stories and to
synthesize these findings into bodies of law within different Indigenous legal orders” (UVic,
ILRU, 2013, p.7).
Also emerging from UVic Faculty of Law, is a four-year Juris Indigenarum Doctor JID
program, combining place based learning of Indigenous legal traditions with law school
classroom learning and curriculum. According to Askew, citing Borrows and the JID program
proposal, the Juris Indigenarum Doctor program would be the only degree program of its kind in
the world (Askew, 2014, p. 20). The proposed JID program combines the Indigenous legal
research methodologies developed by the ILRU for case briefing traditional stories, with
experiential and place-based learning of Indigenous legal traditions (immersive, transformative,
community placement), with academically traditional law school classroom learning and
curriculum. Graduates would receive an Indigenous Law Degree and a Canadian Law Degree
(UVic, ILRU 2013, p.17).

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Higher education policy and practice modelling: administration, access, and assessment.
How can Higher Ed policy model the fundamental teachings of programs focused on
revitalization of indigenous legal traditions and sui generis intercultural law? What does it mean
to bridge the gap between theory and practice in this context? “The meaning behind shared
principles and aspirations can only be seen when they are applied to the mundane and to the
everyday to actually help to solve problems in real relationships between people” (UVic, ILRU,
p.10).
Policy issue example: practitioner access and qualifications. In describing the McGill
Faculty of Law program, which has students learn both common and civil law traditions, Askew
explains, quoting McGill students McDonald and Maclean “the McGill Programme invites
attention to the key questions, processes, and commitments through which a legal education
serves to constitute legal knowledge and law,” and goes on to further state “the programme
ought to aim at broadening the range of people who are enabled to learn how to seize, wield,
and critique law’s institutions, normative structures, processes and rhetorical discourses”
(Askew, 2014, p. 21, citing McDonald and Maclean, 2005, 721 at 730).
Policy recommendation example: modeling the promise of “free passage.” While
borderland status is not an actual physical feature, it is a huge impediment in the context of the
Coast and Strait Salish place and practices. The Coast and Strait Salish practice of “free
passage” agreed to in Treaty is not honored in contemporary times. The U.S. Canada border
has been and is detrimental to Indigenous people and traditions on both “sides” of the 49th
Parallel. This is well documented throughout the academic literature, and in fact is the singular
basis for much work (particularly that coming out of institutions located in the Salish Sea
bioregion).
In terms of educational administration, free passage can be modeled. One of the
recurrent themes of Indigenous legality is decentralization of law from singular institutions. This
makes the administration of Indigenous law programs, and perhaps other programs that attempt
to deconstruct the conceptual and physical consequences to Indigenous peoples whose
territories and relations are bisected by international borders, in a position of modeling or
remodeling legality. The policy recommendation that flows from this, in the context of programs
offered at UVic, geographical location of UVic as in traditional Coast and Strait Salish territory
and as in proximity to the U.S. Canada international border, is to reconsider the admissions
status of students as “International”, who in fact identify as Coast or Straits Salish. This is a
simple recommendation, but one that, on several levels, offers to model the Indigenous
tradition, principles, and academic theory being put forth.

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References
Askew, H. (2014). Indigenous legal traditions and the challenge of intercultural legal education
in Canadian law school. Retrieved from:
http://www.oba.org/CBAMediaLibrary/cba_on/pdf/Foundation/StudiesFellowshipHannaA
skew.pdf
Echohawk, R. (2015, April 21). Webinar: Realizing International Indigenous Rights in Domestic
Law. American Society of International Law [Producer] Retrieved from:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_UOaLt9U_Elist=PLyUpVV7s6LsYUTAQL_U5O2
KF_ZbHuQyMJindex=7
Borrows, J. (2005). Creating an Indigenous legal community. McGill Law Journal, 50, 153-179.
Borrows, J. (2005). Indigenous legal traditions in Canada. Washington University Journal of Law
Policy, 19, 167-223.
Borrows, J. (2013, April 26/27). The First Nations quest for justice in Canada. Singing a New
Song Conference, Church of St. John the Divine: Victoria, BC. Retrieved from:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PlAb2oOxzE
Calliou Group (2015). Company website. Retrieved from:
http://www.calliougroup.com/studies.html, http://www.calliougroup.com/training.html
Carpenter, K.A. Riley, A. (2013). Indigenous peoples and the jurisgenerative moment in
human rights. California Law Review, 102, 172-234.
Carpenter, K.A., Fletcher, M.L.M., Goldberg, C.E., Riley, A.R. (2014, March 7). Good native
governance: Plenary 1 innovations in law, education, and economic development.
Retrieved from:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoWUGpjKgHwlist=PLyUpVV7s6LsYUTAQL_U5O
2KF_ZbHuQyMJindex=9
Claxton, N.X. (2004). ISTÁ SĆ IÁNEW̱ , ISTÁ SX̱ OLE “To fish as formerly”: The Douglas Treaties
and the Saanich Reef Net Fisheries. University of Victoria.
Frogner, R. (2010) “Innocent legal fictions”: Archival convention and the North Saanich Treaty of
1852. Archivaria, 70, 45-94
Gifis, S.H. (2010). Barron’s Law Dictionary (6th Ed.). United States: Barron’s Educational Series
Indigenous Law Research Unit at University of Victoria. (2013). Revitalizing Indigenous law and
changing the lawscape of Canada. Canada: University of Victoria Law, Indigenous Bar
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James, J. (2013, August). The search for integrity in the conflict over Cherry Point. Retrieved
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Jones, C. (2009) Indigenous legal issues, Indigenous perspectives and Indigenous law in the
New Zealand LLB Curriculum. Legal Education Review, 19(1/2), 257-270.
Mandell, L. (2014, April 18). Presentations to Arts One students from the First Nations Studies
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McAdam, S., (SAYSEWAHUM). (2015). Nationhood interrupted: Revitalizing ne`hiyaw legal
systems. Saskaton, CA: Purich.
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the-canadian-state-video/

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Morris, G.T. (1992) International law and politics: Toward a right to self-determination for
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longer-optional-law-curriculum-requires-aboriginal-rights-and-treaties/
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Adult Education, Community Development and Transformative Learning
Theory as Antidote to Conflict, Violence and Oppression in Pakistan
Gail Goulet, PhD, Western Washington University
Muhammad Ashraf, PhD. Ryerson University
Abstract: This paper analyses the roles, issues, and current state of community
development in Pakistan. Mezirow’s (1994) Transformative Learning Theory is
considered for its current usefulness as a tool for community development in
Pakistan. We propose a Pakistani adult education, community development
process based on Participatory Action Research (PAR).
Introduction
Pakistan occupies a strategic location geographically and that is of interest to the major
powers. It attracted the colonial interest because of its British colonial experience and provided
the US with manpower against the former Soviet Union. This is probably one of the reasons why
the Pakistani education system has a history of borrowing educational and developmental ideas
from these countries. After the 9/11 attacks in New York USA and the growing forces of
extremism, the ongoing debate of the place of community development has intensified. Some
believe community development is an opportunity for raising skills and standards of education.
Others criticize it as a contemporary adaptation of cultural imperialism which leads to a
universal, eventually Western society.
For this paper we use documentary analysis as it seems the most appropriate strategy
with which to adequately research the potential of community development in Pakistan. This
strategy is most frequently descriptive and qualitative in approach, which can be based on the
interpretation of secondary sources and cover a range of research, government publications,
news, journals, texts, census reports and videos. The documents are examined on their
significance to our analysis of the value and potential of community development and
participatory action research in Pakistan.
This paper looks at the past experience of the Village AID community development
program in Pakistan as described in the case study by Jack Mezirow (1963). We discuss the
history, the current situation in light of the potential of community development as described in
the Pakistani context by Mezirow (1963) and the subsequent development of Transformative
Learning Theory (Mezirow, 1981, 1991). The current dilemmas and tensions Pakistan faces in
its efforts to shed colonialist mentalities and develop solutions towards peace and sustainable
development. We propose a Pakistani adult education, community development based on
Participatory Action Research (PAR) (Gordon, 2006; Hall, 1981, 1993), with training and
discussion for PAR facilitation that acknowledges and incorporates the potential for
Transformative Learning.
The Beginning of Pakistan
Pakistan is a former British colony, which was formed as a Muslim partition from India on
August the 14th, 1947. The country currently has four provinces (Balochistan, Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab and Sind) and a total population of 173,593,380 (World Bank Report
(2010). Pakistan has enjoyed a decent rate of GDP growth since gaining its independence
(estimated GDP per Capita of $2600 at the end of the year 2009), it has still remained unable to
turn this into a successful investment for human development. Although, the country has
realized and mainly focused on economic growth but always tried to achieve this goal without
investing significantly in the human side, in education and human resources (Ashraf, 2014).

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Eventually, the situation has resulted in a low literacy rate, an imbalanced economic structure
and a less able work-force (Hussain et al., 2003). The partition of subcontinent into India and
Pakistan in 1947 was experience was a violent one for many people. As Jack Mezirow (1963)
describes, it was
a nightmare of religious fanaticism and political violence of a magnitude and intensity
incomparable in modern history. Some six million Muslim refugees, for the most part up-
rooted villagers, illiterate and unskilled, without food shelter or personal wealth migrated
from India to Pakistan, while more than five million Hindus and Sikhs, including most of
the stabilizing middle class professionals, merchants, and educators, fled from the
Punjab. Against remarkable odds Pakistan has weathered fourteen years of
impoverishment, social disorganization, public corruption, famine, epidemic, loss of
founding leaders, constant threat of war, and revolution. (p. 37)
Writing in 1962 Mezirow, from his experience as an International Cooperative
Administration (ICA) (U.S.) community development advisor in 1958 and 1959, was interested in
the people living in the villages who were working in agriculture but were not landowners. He
reports that “90% of the rural village population is occupied with agriculture. In 1951, more than
half the cultivated land in Pakistan was owned by landlords known as zaminars. In East
Pakistan 50 to 70 per cent is cultivated by tenants who pay rent to zaminars, the remainder by
share-croppers who sublet land from the tenants or by further subinfeudation” (Mezirow, 1963,
p. 39).
For economic development to occur in Pakistan, with the most egalitarian and
democratic values, these villagers would need to develop ‘the understandings they need for
democratic participation in discussion and cooperative problem solving” (1963, p.14). A
Community Development model was sought to overcome a multitude of ingrained cultural and
economic barriers. As Mezirow describes:
Community Development attempts to provide means of bridging the gap between ruling
elite and rural population, of developing and strengthen self-government, of overcoming
villagers’ traditional suspicions and hostilities toward government representatives and
programs, of fostering civic responsibility and political maturity through experiences in
cooperative decision making and action, and of developing a corps of motivated junior
administrators who are development oriented. It seeks to upgrade and instrument the
motivations and aspirations of the people, to integrate them with national aims and
efforts, to assure social, political and economic evolution through popular involvement in
directing and carrying out change. (1963, p.15)
The Community Development model would provide training to staff that would enable
them to assist the villagers identify and solve their own problems, with the assistance of
technical experts and other resources. While different models could be developed, they would
all have to have the following characteristics: 1) concern with balanced, integrated development
of the whole of community life which implies the integration or co-ordination of technical
specialties; 2) planning based upon the “felt needs” of the people; 3) emphasis on self-help
efforts; 4) a central concern for identifying, encouraging and training local leadership; and 5)
provision of technical assistance in the form of personnel, equipment, materials or money.
(Mezirow, 1962, p. 15).
The goal was to help villagers help Pakistan develop both economically and as a
democracy. It was observed that the villagers had little experience in decision making, having
lived under the vestiges of colonialism. Their poverty further exasperated their situation,
rendering them without the energy, or the means to see beyond their current situations. They
mistrusted the government, which had been completely authoritarian. As Mezirow (1963) relays
the work of Pye (1960):
…problems of insecurity, resentment and inferiority are the bred of ages of paternalistic
and exploitative rule by religious and political elites which zealously controlled their