The epistemological challenge of indigenous and school educational knowledge in intercultural education1*

Abstract

The object of this work is to understand and explain the epistemological tension between indigenous educational knowledge and the Eurocentric monoculturality of national education systems, from the complexity implied by school education in the contexts of the indigenous peoples of America. The justification for this style of education has been the colonisation of indigenous peoples and their integration into national states, denying the epistemes of their own educational knowledge in school education. In this scenario, we propose an epistemological critique of the construction of intercultural knowledge as proposed by states, based on epistemological pluralism. Specifically, we analyse the cases of the Milpas Educativas project in Mexico, the educational action called kimeltuwün in the Araucania Region of Chile, and the education policy of the State of Roraima, Brazil. We consider the political context that regulates intercultural education in the Bilingual Intercultural Education experiments of national states and the recommendations of Convention No. 169 of the International Labour Organisation. In conclusion, we propose a form of intercultural education that takes into account the epistemological tension between the indigenous and school epistemes. We also propose the need to construct a form of intercultural education adapted to the context of each indigenous people, in the framework of their interethnic relations with non-indigenous societies, through dialogue from the perspective of epistemological pluralism.