Message from SIG Chair


SIG Chair



IMG_5326 (1)638267436482486700



August 2023

Greetings Colleagues,

Welcome to the Critical Peace Education SIG! My name is Shireen Keyl, and I will serve as the chair for academic year 2023-2024. I welcome you warmly to this virtual space of our SIG and I encourage you to explore our network of peace educators, critical scholars, and teacher-activists in an exchange of new knowledge and dialogic action!

As many of you know, we have recently changed our SIG's name to Critical Peace Education. As a collective, we felt including the criticality of peace education as a study and as a practice in this postmodern age is necessary in answering questions like, "Is all peace education by its very nature 'critical'? If not, what distinguishes 'critical' peace education from 'regular' peace education? What benefit might accrue from applying a critical lens to issues of peace education?" (Bajaj & Brantmeier, 2011, p. 221). In answering these questions, critical peace education scholars draw from decolonizing frameworks (Kester, et al., 2019) and critical pedagogical thought (Bajaj, 2018) to inform a paradigm shift toward critical peace education praxis. 

It is my belief that all formal and non-formal education must focus on the inclusion of critical consciousness raising (Freire, 1996) as a precursor to peace education in addressing inequity, disparities, racism, and all forms of bigotry. As we, in the United States, witness the erasure of Black enslavement in Florida's state curriculum standards, the condemnation of critical race theory, and national book banning at unprecedented levels, it is more urgent than ever to examine the intersection of peace education and critical theory in all its iterations to forward transformational teaching and learning practices for a more just, non-violent, and united populous. As scholars, we are uniquely positioned to address the theoretical underpinnings of this epistemological intersection; and, as teachers and activists, we are called upon to apply these ideas in critical praxis. 

We welcome scholars and educators from the "Global South" to join our ranks in the Critical Peace Education SIG. As we plan for the 2024 AERA conference, we will be especially deliberate to reach out to our colleagues from the “Global South” (e.g., the greater SWANA region, South America, the African continent) to increase dynamic exchanges of knowledge and research partnerships that will shed further light on the criticality of peace education. 

Thank you for your interest and support. We look forward to your ongoing participation and to another very productive year with you, the entire AERA  community, and beyond.

In solidarity,

Shireen Keyl, Ph.D.

Utah State University

Chair of the Critical Peace Education SIG

Bajaj, M., & Brantmeier, E. J. (2011). The politics, praxis, and possibilities of critical peace education. Journal of Peace Education, 8(3), 221-224.

Bajaj, M. (2018). Conceptualizing transformative agency in education for peace, human rights, and social justice. International Journal of Human Rights Education, 2(1), 13.

Freire, P. (1996). Pedagogy of the Oppressed. Continuum.

Kester, K., Zembylas, M., Brantmeier, E. J., & Hajir, B. (2023). Reflections on a Post/Critical Peace Education. In D. T. Archer, B. Hajir, & W. W. McInerney, (Eds.), Innovations in Peace and Education Praxis: Transdisciplinary Reflections and Insights (pp. 196-209). Taylor & Francis.