Abstract:

The use of cultural-historical activity theory (CHAT) as and analytical and methodological framework is gaining prominence in educational research due to its ability to account for historically developing cultural practices and tools from both an individual as well as social perspective. We contend, though, that there is space within this expanding, multidimensional approach for adapting CHAT-based research so as to more appropriately consider the implications of coloniality for analysing activity within the global South. Thus, in this paper we present insights gleaned from using CHAT to investigate ways of decolonizing the teaching and learning of history in a rural community that is strongly influenced by indigenous ways of knowing and being. We outline how a CHAT-based research intervention known as the Change Laboratory was applied and adapted for researching with this community, and suggest ways in which this method, and the epistemological and axiological principles underlying it, could be re-worked to align them more appropriately with the relational ontological assumptions that inform the ways of knowing and being of the participating indigenous community.

Keywords:

History, education, research, cultural-historical activity theory, decolonization.