Buen vivir y educación para la práctica de la interculturalidad en el Ecuador

Abstract

This article is a contribution to reflect on “Buen Vivir” in relation to education in Ecuador, and analyzes real possibilities towards an education focused on the construction of a more just and fair society, where difference is experienced with equality and dignity. It is about an education for a society of “Good Living”. We propose the possibility of intercultural education practices where other epistemologies, other types of knowledge, other ways of being and understanding the world, other ways of learning and living, play a part. We propose thinking about education from different rationalities, often subaltern to an occidental modern rationality, traditionally viewed as the only legitimate truth. To think about a different kind of education presumes recognizing and learning about already existing experiences on intercultural education and cultural diversity in Ecuador. For this, other pedagogies are necessary. It is about pedagogies for social transformation, pedagogies for relevancy and autonomy, pedagogies for resistance, emancipation, liberation, and dialogue on an even ground, pedagogies that are respectful of differences, not homogenizing, that are about liberation and transformation. These other pedagogies demand creative educational practices and greater creativity from teachers, they require participation from the educational community and a creation of public policies in order to transform conditions of inequity and exclusion. They are, in the end, pedagogies of hope.