ABSTRACT
Hegemonic language ideologies, policies, and practices which position English language as superior to Spanish and Indigenous languages are prevalent across schools in Colombia. Their presence connects to larger questions regarding cultural and structural violence. This chapter discusses a Participatory Action Research (PAR) project conducted with a school in a low socioeconomic community of Colombia. We examine how the school begins to transform an oppressive, colonial English as an Additional Language (EAL) curriculum into one which challenges structural and cultural violence. We present the first stage of the PAR project, exploring how critical theories of the South can inform this transformative process and how decolonial approaches to EAL programs could look like in a remote school in Colombia. We emphasize a dialogical, self-reflective, and participatory process to examine various forms of data which inform the PAR cycle of reflection and action. Based on this initial data, we illustrate how a decolonial EAL curriculum can address structural and cultural violence and contribute to the construction of peace. We hope this chapter provokes reflection and encourages inspiration as we consider what is possible in the construction of a decolonial EAL curriculum and its role in the construction of peace.
