Pedagogy, Culture & Society

Generative AI and Decolonial Praxis in Education: Possibilities in Paradoxes

Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools such as ChatGPT, Gemini, and Copilot are rapidly transforming societal and educational landscapes. From lesson planning to assessment design and broader dimensions such as social relations, these systems are being integrated into classrooms from primary to higher education at an unprecedented speed. Yet, critical considerations warn that these technologies are built on architectures that reproduce coloniality: Anglonormative dominance, Eurocentric and Global North-based data biases, extractive data practices, and corporate monopolization of knowledge infrastructures. Despite the seriousness of such issues, they remain peripheral in the field.

Against this backdrop, an urgent question emerges: Can generative AI ever be used as a form of decolonial praxis in education? This special issue seeks to address this paradox critically and creatively. While critiques of AI’s colonial entanglements are growing, there is little exploration of whether and how AI might be reimagined, hacked, repurposed, or even subverted to serve decolonial ends. The stakes are high: if AI is irredeemably colonial, education must resist its use; if it can be turned and tuned toward decolonial praxis, the implications for pedagogy, knowledge production, and justice-oriented education are transformative. What conditions can we strive to create to open such possibilities, however contingent and without guarantees?  The aim of this special issue is therefore to bring together interdisciplinary scholarship that interrogates the risks and explores the possibilities of generative AI in relation to decolonial thought and practice.

We aim to invite contributions that explore theoretical, empirical, methodological, and speculative approaches to the question, with space in (but not restricted to) educational contexts such as language education, higher education, and teacher education.

Submissions may engage with (but are not limited to) the following areas:

• Theoretical interrogations of whether Generative AI can ever align with decolonial principles, given its origins in data colonialism, corporate monopolies, and Eurocentric epistemologies, cultural values and aesthetics.
• Empirical explorations of how educators and students in diverse global contexts are engaging with GenAI tools in ways that either reproduce or resist colonial hierarchies.
• Speculative futures and critical design approaches that imagine what a genuinely decolonial AI system might look like (e.g., Indigenous futurisms, Afrofuturism, pluriversal imaginaries, data feminism, sustainability/resource-conscious practice).
• Linguistic justice and plurilingualism: Can GenAI challenge or does it reinforce Anglonormativity in education?
• Teacher education and professional development: What role could GenAI play in preparing educators for justice-oriented pedagogies, and what dangers might it pose?
• Ethical and political questions around the ownership, governance, and use of GenAI in relation to Indigenous, marginalized, and minoritized knowledge systems.

This special issue appeals to scholars and practitioners in education, higher education, teacher education, digital pedagogy, AI ethics, Indigenous studies, critical data studies, and decolonial theory. It will be relevant not only to academics but also to educators, policymakers, and AI designers grappling with how to responsibly and ethically shape generative AI’s future beyond the prevailing principle of scaling-at-all-costs.