What Does Indigenous Education Mean? Portuguese colonial thought and the construction of ethnicity and education

This article consists of an analysis of issues concerning ethnicity and education from a historical perspective that emphasises both realities as cultural constructions of colonial education ideas and practices. Considering the case of∼thePortuguese Colonial Empire in particular, the author reviews the evolution of answers given to the question “what does indigenous education mean?” within metropolitan colonial thought from the last quarter of nineteenth century onwards. Thus, the examination of debates about colonial education and colonialism, the author argues, proves how cultural constructions and perceptions of race and ethnicity are linked from a historical perspective. Simultaneously, the author examines how both of these imagined communities are constructed in connection with educational issues. These are created either as categories that allow for the legitimization of certain educational practices and policies, or as colonized communities which are also constructed through colonizers' perceptions of (uncivilized) educational indigenous structures

Colonialism · Empire · Ethnic group · Indigenous · Indigenous Education · Perspective (graphical · Political science · Portuguese · Social science · Sociology · Anthropology · Educator Training and Historical Pedagogy · Gender Studies · Global Education and Multiculturalism · Law · Tourism, Volunteerism, and Development