Abstract
Calls for decolonization across higher education have prompted librarians to confront how information literacy teaching can reproduce harm towards knowledge holders (Leung, 2022; Marsh, 2022; Behari-Leak, 2019). At Western University (Canada), our team of librarians, faculty, and students has responded by reframing our teaching and research through knowledge justice (2022). This approach is grounded in the belief that everyone has the capacity to be knowledgeable, and acknowledges that this right is often denied to us because of our social identities (Fricker, 2007; Battiste, 2018). Knowledge justice challenges the dominance of Eurowestern epistemologies and calls on educators to act on our responsibility to engage with diverse perspectives while recognizing the boundaries of our own knowing (Leibowitz, 2015; Campbell et al., 2025).
What began as a curriculum project introducing knowledge justice to nursing students has grown into a research collective investigating our distinct roles and shared responsibilities in advancing decolonization. As librarians, faculty, students, and educational developers, his work has transformed how we teach, collaborate, and understand expertise.
In this panel, members of a knowledge justice research collective at Western University will share what we have learned by working across disciplines and professional boundaries, navigating discomfort, and partnering with students. We will discuss how librarian–faculty–student partnerships have created space for personal reflection and systemic action, and how these relationships have shaped our institutional capacity to teach and practice knowledge justice.
Attendees will gain insight into how relational approaches can reframe library instruction, how students’ voices help reimagine what counts as knowledge, and why faculty are the true learners in knowledge justice classrooms. Together, we will consider what it means to take collective responsibility for epistemic change and to sustain this work through community, humility, and courage.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of the session, participants will be able to:
Identify practical strategies for collaborating with faculty and students in developing learning experiences grounded in knowledge justice.
Reflect on their own professional role and responsibilities toward enacting knowledge justice.
Recognize the relational and emotional labour involved in cross-role partnerships and articulate ways to sustain this work.
References
Battiste, M. (2017). Cognitive Imperialism. In M. A. Peters (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Educational Philosophy and Theory (pp. 183–188). Springer Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-287-588-4_501
Behari-Leak, K. (2019). Decolonial Turns, Postcolonial Shifts, and Cultural Connections:Are We There Yet? English Academy Review, 36(1), 58–68. https://doi.org/10.1080/10131752.2019.1579881
Campbell, H., McKeown, A., Sansom, L., Holmes, K., Lengyell, M., Dilkes, D., Leyland, Z., & Glasgow-Osment, B. (2025). Knowledge Justice in the Helping Professions. Instructional Technology Resource Centre (ITRC). https://doi.org/10.5206/TTYQ9415
Fricker, M. (2007). Epistemic Injustice: Power and the Ethics of Knowing. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198237907.001.0001
Leibowitz, B. (2017). Cognitive justice and the higher education curriculum. Journal of Education, 68, 93–111.
Leung, S. (2022). The Futility of Information Literacy & EDI: Toward What? College & Research Libraries, 83(5). https://doi.org/10.5860/crl.83.5.751
Marsh, F. (2022). Unsettling information literacy: Exploring critical approaches with academic researchers for decolonising the university. Journal of Information Literacy, 16(1), 4–29. https://doi.org/10.11645/16.1.3136
Western Libraries. (2022). Library Curriculum. Western University. http://www.lib.uwo.ca/teaching/curriculum.html
