We are honoured to present this issue of The Australian Journal of Indigenous Education. It is a sentiment we express each time an issue is released but rarely do we unpack what this is exactly. Formerly, the Aboriginal Child at School, The Australian Journal of Indigenous Education has resisted and persisted the tide of state, Federal and global politics which ebb and flow through our work in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander education, and Indigenous education more broadly. Appearing sometimes as friend, sometimes as foe, and perhaps many more times as both, such practices, policies and politics present ongoing challenges for us but nevertheless, we are still here searching for and speaking particular kinds of justice into the space for the Indigenous children, their families and communities that matter to us. The current educational climate of neoliberalism — replete as it is with individualism, competition, measurement and accountability — is certainly no different but we are still here — persisting and resisting. We are still on our way to the kind of education we seek for Indigenous peoples at all levels locally, nationally and globally and the papers in this issue represent that search. To quote bell hooks in Teaching to Transgress, a much loved scholar in critical pedagogy, ‘the academy is not paradise. But learning is a place where paradise can be created. The classroom, with all its limitation, remains a location of possibility’ (1994, p. 207). The ongoing search to move beyond boundaries characterises much of the work that appears in The Australian Journal of Indigenous Education and it is this sentiment which we are honoured to present.

Indigenous Studies is a rapidly growing field of enquiry both nationally and internationally. The internationalisation of the discipline is dependent on its interdiciplinarity and on the collaborative efforts of interdisciplinary scholars. Colonised Indigenous people globally share similar experiences despite differences in histories and contexts. In collaborative situations, dedicated scholarship brings together Indigenous people and allies who are committed to the global expansion of Indigenous knowledge through shared understandings of experiences and histories. Collective efforts can improve curriculum development, enhance opportunities for publication, bring scholars together in conferences and symposia and provide opportunities for new research networks for Indigenous scholarship. This paper addresses spheres of collaborative and collective endeavours that continue to reap benefits nationally and internationally in the field of international Indigenous Studies.

This paper explores and challenges our assumptions as lecturers about preservice teachers’ knowledge and beliefs entering a mandatory Indigenous Studies subject. A total of 38 focus groups were conducted over two years (2011–2012) with preservice teachers enrolled in teaching degrees at the University of Sydney. Findings were analysed to identify and critically reflect on our assumptions about preservice teachers' prior understanding of the content and approaches to learning. To challenge our assumptions, this paper applies Brookfield's (1995) student and autobiographical lenses to engage in critical reflection and Nakata's (2002, 2007) ‘cultural interface’ to better understand the complexities, tensions and transformations that occur for learners in the Indigenous Studies classroom. Findings illuminated that assumptions about the level of resistance and indifference to course content were often overstated and rather, many preservice teachers were more likely to be insecure and reticent to express their ideas in this complex and potentially uncomfortable learning environment. Implications from the study highlight the need for ongoing critical reflection of lecturer assumptions about preservice teachers’ dispositions and how they engage with the subject to better understand the diversity of their knowledge and experiences and what this means for teaching and learning in this context.

Kaupapa Māori is thoroughly theorised in academia in Aotearoa and those wishing to use it as their research methodology can find support through the writing of a number of Māori academics. What is not so well articulated, is the experiential voice of those who have used Kaupapa Māori as research methodology. My identity as a Māori woman researching with Māori women became integral to my methodology and approach to the research. The highs and lows of my research experiences with Kaupapa Māori methodology are examined in this article. The discussion contends that Kaupapa Māori research methodology can be a framework, guide and support for research within a Māori context and adds an experiential aspect to understanding the wider field of Indigenous research methodology. My hope is that through my experience with Kaupapa Māori methodology other Māori and Indigenous researchers will be eager to embrace their own research methodologies.

This narrative article is based on an analysis of 61 documents, mostly articles, of which 37 were peer-reviewed, including research studies, reviews, conceptual research and narratives of practice. Review findings are reported with specific reference to the Australian and New Zealand contexts in relation to the following topic categories: the presence of indigenous music in the curriculums of selected ‘new world’ countries, teacher education in indigenous performing arts, questions of curriculum design and programming, resource selection, activity design, and school and community relationships. Certain key themes emerged across these topics: the need for a greater emphasis on more culturally nuanced music teacher education in relation to indigenous musics; the critical importance of teaching indigenous music/arts contexts; song ownership; and the need for music educators and researchers to develop a critical stance towards their subject and discipline.

Increasing engagement with Indigenous knowledges (IKs) in mainstream tertiary educational institutions presents both ethico-political and epistemological challenges. This article engages these challenges by first cautioning against making wholesale distinctions between IKs and Western knowledges (WKs) and then examining the epistemological and politico-cultural entailments of the figure of the mainstream WK knower. Although the WK knower is typically cast as a sovereign being in command of knowledge, the practicalities of processes of knowing reveal the knower as at least partially relational. While the sovereign knower typically returns to his/her self in mainstream WKs, thereby disavowing or subsuming cultural others in ways that compromise serious engagement with IKs, relationality suggests more positive possibilities for becoming susceptible to Indigenous concerns and ways of knowing. This does not spell a relativist agenda. Rather, it shows that knowledge is established through relational processes and that WK knowers might better engage IKs by become less sovereign and more relational knowers.

With the push towards ‘Indigenisation’ in Australian tertiary institutes, the discipline of English at the University of Newcastle undertook a pilot project to investigate what this could look like and what it meant for staff and students. This paper reflects our efforts to engage with notions of ‘Indigenisation’, based on national and international exemplars and presents one of our efforts to indigenise our discipline of English. We argue that our shifting and changing understanding of integrating Aboriginal ways of knowing into mainstream English courses is both difficult and essential.

The Indigenous Sky Stories Program may have the potential to deliver significant and long-lasting changes to the way science is taught to Year 5 and 6 primary school students. The context for this article is informed by research that shows that educational outcomes can be strengthened when Indigenous knowledge is given the space to co-exist with the hegemony of current western science concepts. This research presents a case study of one primary school involved in the Indigenous Sky Stories Program. It showcases how teachers and students worked in conjunction with their local community to implement the program. The results suggest that introducing cultural sky stories into the science program, engaged and primed Year 5 and 6 students to seek out additional sky stories and to investigate the astronomical content mapped to the National Science Curriculum. The involvement of Aboriginal elders and community enriched the experience for all involved. The integrated science program appears to generate positive engagement for both Indigenous students and their non-Indigenous peers. Additionally, the program provided a valuable template for teachers to emulate and which can act as a model for the requirement to include Indigenous perspectives in the new National Science Curriculum.

The aim of this article is to provide teachers with knowledge of ways in which Eurocentric (re)naming practices inform contemporary pedagogical approaches, while providing understandings pertinent to the mandatory inclusion of the cross-curriculum priority area: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures (Australian Curriculum Assessment and Reporting Authority, 2015). While we have focused on Eurocentric naming practices, we have also been conscious of names used by Aboriginal peoples and Torres Strait Islanders to name themselves and others and as non-Indigenous Australians we acknowledge that it is not our place to explore these in detail, or offer alternatives. In this article, we have explored the history of nomenclature as it relates to original inhabitants, the connotations of contemporary (re)naming practices in Australian education and discussed the importance of drawing on cultural protocols and engaging local communities for teaching and learning of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures. It is anticipated that discussions arising from this article may open up spaces where teachers may think about ways in which they approach Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories and cultures.

Australia is rapidly losing its Indigenous multicultural and multilingual identity. This vast continent has lost 90 per cent of its Indigenous languages and cultures, without adequate documentation, and risks losing the rest by 2050 if action is not taken. There are formal, accredited linguistics courses designed specifically for Indigenous Australians to document and maintain their traditional languages. This research assessed the relevance of linguistic training for Indigenous Australians in remote communities and whether it provides the necessary skills for Indigenous Australians to document and maintain their languages in their particular workplace or community. The study found that Indigenous Australians come from a diversity of areas across the vast continent of Australia, live a diversity of lifestyles, have a diversity of linguistic attitudes and have access to different and often limited resources and support to meet their goals of documenting their endangered languages. As a result, standardised formal training is generally unlikely to provide the necessary linguistic skills needed for their particular community or workplace. However, by matching linguistic training with individual language community's linguistic situation, targeted training could increase the documentation of Australia's Indigenous languages.