Developing an Indigenous Tourism Course: Indigenizing Curriculum through Participatory Action Research
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Issue Date
2025
Editor
Authors
Gurbanaliyeva, Malahat
License
Subject
School of tourism and hospitality management
Abstract
This research documents a Participatory Action Research (PAR) project that supported the development of a new Indigenous Tourism course within the Master of Arts in Tourism Management (MATM) program at Royal Roads University (RRU). Guided by principles of Indigenous Resurgence (Simpson, 2011) and anti-racist education (Dei 1996, 2000), the study explored collaborative models for co-constructing curriculum that decolonizes tourism education and reflects aspirations on Indigenization of education.The project was conducted in partnership with Indigenous scholar and curriculum developer Jasmine Feather Dionne, MATM Program Head Rebecca Wilson-Mah, and the researcher, with valuable contributions from Indigenous educators, subject matter experts, and representatives of Destination British Columbia. Semi-structured interviews conducted with emerging Indigenous scholars at RRU and non-Indigenous MATM faculty, as well as with an Indigenous tourism industry expert were analyzed using Deductive Qualitative Analysis (DQA), which combined theory-informed constructs with openness to emergent insights (Fife & Gossner, 2024).
Six themes were identified: history and experiences of the land; Indigenous cultures and representation; governance and economies; Indigenous ways of teaching and learning; profiling Indigenous tourism businesses; and pedagogy for Indigenous business profiling. DQA allowed to capture three more emergent themes: local and global context; Indigenization out of time; and legacy of tourism. Together, these findings emphasized the importance of situating curriculum in land-based histories, respecting cultural protocols, promoting Indigenous governance and economic autonomy, and treating Indigenous tourism businesses as co-educators through relational, experiential, and storytelling pedagogies.
The study concludes that Indigenizing curriculum requires sustained institutional commitment, increased Indigenous faculty representation, and accountability for long-term collaboration with Indigenous communities and businesses. By documenting this process, the research contributes to scholarship on Indigenous tourism education and decolonizing education, offering a model for PAR-based curriculum design as both an educational and ethical act that supports Indigenous sovereignty and self-determined futures.
Description
2025