Decolonizing rehabilitation: “The educational aspect of healing, from naturalism to autonomy”

Abstract

To integrate aspects of cognitive sciences and a critical decolonized education into physiotherapy is the proposal to contribute both to a higher undestanding and to the generation of pedagogical experiences in rehabilitation, fostering a space where recovery and education coexist as two inseparable phenomena, both co-built on the relationship among therapist, patient and environment and in this way, opening up the discussion towards what we understand as teaching in the health care field, and aiming at re-conceptualizing the rehabilitation experience into an integrative model, coherent with the educational needs of our society and thus improving the promotion and prevention in healthcare.

The present reflection contains several topics, such as the biology of knowing, enactivism, rehabilitation sciences and even topics related to the pedagogy area. All of these topics are articulated into a decolonialist stamp, by searching a deeper understanding and facilitation of the human being’s autonomy.