Momina Khan
Momina Khan, BSc, MSc, MEd, PhD
Bio
Momina Khan, a mother of four children, holds a PhD and MEd in Education from the University of Saskatchewan, an M.Sc in Management Studies, and a B.Sc in Home Economics from the University of Peshawar, Pakistan. In life and scholarship, as a mother, poet, scholar, and woman of color, she engages in constructing counter stories through interweaving narrative and poetry. The narratives of her experiences from immigration to citizenship, from multiculturalism to eurocentrism, from parent involvement to parent engagement, and from a racialized mother to a researcher are narratives of gaps, silences, and exclusions shaped in the untapped spaces children and families encounter in schools and curriculum. She strives to re-conceptualize the dominant aspects of mandated curriculum by decentering the Eurocentric perspective, knowledge, and content. She challenges curriculum makers, educators, and teachers that there are alternative perspectives of knowing worthy of inclusion. Dr. Khan has published several peer reviewed articles, book chapters and poems pertaining to the topics of racialized parents and students positioning, knowledge, voice, and rights. Her work invites schools and educators to become leaders in eradicating barriers to racialized students’ sense of self, sense of hybridity, sense of belonging, and sense of citizenhood.
Dissertation Abstract
The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms (1982) guarantees fundamental freedoms of conscience, religion, thought, belief, and opinion. However, the interpretation of such freedoms, and the extent of accommodation within the context of secular public schools, is not always clear (Shariff, 2006). I am a mother of four children who hold multiple identities, languages, nationalities and beliefs as Canadians. In this autobiographical narrative inquiry fused with poetic representation, I explore my ‘mother stories’ of my children’s experiences with curriculum in schools. Through this research, I examine the critical role of curriculum, implementation of curriculum, and shared curriculum making in affirming the identity of ethnically diverse students. The narratives of my experiences from immigration to citizenship, from multiculturalism to eurocentrism, from parent involvement to parent engagement, and from a mother to a researcher are narratives of “gaps, silences, and exclusions shaped in the bumping places children and families experience in schools” (Clandinin, Huber, J., Huber, M., Murphy, Pearce, Murray-Orr, & Steeves, 2006, p. 173). Our lives are lived, and stories of our lives are told, retold, and relived on storied landscapes (Clandinin & Connelly, 2000), landscapes on which larger social, cultural, and institutional narratives are simultaneously unfolding (Murphy & Bengezen, 2015). Seeing narrative as a “way of organizing episodes, actions, and accounts of actions” (Sarbin, 1986, p. 9), I deliberately engage in constructing counter-stories to challenge dominant stories of curriculum. I aim to sensitize readers – educators, curriculum and policy makers, parents, and community members – to the issues of identity politics and to experiences shrouded in silence in order to deepen individuals’ capacity to respond to the place and voice of people who are different from them (Ellis & Bochner, 2000). Growing up between two cultures, living in in-between spaces, balancing cultural identities and a sense of belonging is a highly complex process for children. Teachers, curriculum makers, and schools all play a fundamental role in shaping students’ identity. Too often, schools are places in which the complex conditions of minority parents’ and children’s lived experiences and their right to be heard are excluded and ignored. Practically, socially and poetically, this inquiry has the potential to positively impact the lives of culturally diverse students, parents, and families by reimagining curriculum in ways that include multiple narratives, identities, realities, perspectives and practices and, thus, a place for their equal rights, voices on this land and in their home, Canada.
Full Dissertation