Undeterred and Unmanaged: Actualizing Social Justice, Critical Literacy, and Detracking Efforts in Suburban Classrooms
2022-05
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Undeterred and Unmanaged: Actualizing Social Justice, Critical Literacy, and Detracking Efforts in Suburban Classrooms
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2022-05
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While there’s a significant body of literature written by researchers who delineate the shifting definitions of literacy in the 21st century and the ways students perform literacy events that are culturally relevant to their lives in school and in out-of-school contexts, much of this research is situated in urban contexts. There is a need for research in the ways that culturally relevant pedagogy and critical literacy efforts are actualized in suburban contexts--if, in fact, they can be or should be. This dissertation examines what happens when secondary English teachers in one suburban high school design and implement a detracked, social justice English class for all sophomore students, and explores the impact of such a class on students years later. The development of the course and three students who were enrolled in the class were the focus of the research, a qualitative case study aimed at discovering insights that can be shared with future and current teachers related to the ways that we can productively take up matters of power, privilege, and culture in literacy classrooms with students that might have a lasting impact. To begin, I tell the story of the creation and implementation of a detracked sophomore English class that centers on a social justice curriculum, rich with texts that challenge the social constructions of race, class, and gender. I then explore in greater depth how three students who were enrolled in the class years ago articulate the impact, if any, of this class on their developing understanding of these critical issues when they were in high school. Finally, I discuss the ways these focal students articulate the need for critical education in K-12 settings from their now-adult perspectives. Findings reveal resistance to detracked courses, especially those taught through a social justice curricular framework, is predictable and responsive to current political contexts. Further, students who were enrolled in the course can articulate the ways in which units that explored cultural conflict, stereotyping, and systems of power, led them to come to a greater understanding of themselves, their own racial identity, and of the ways systemic power intersects with elements of identity. Focal students shared their memories of the course and how it connected to work they took up as undergraduate students, and the ways that it continues to shape their adult perspectives today. The teachers engaged in creating and implementing this course, as well as the students who participated in it, contribute to the important calls for culturally relevant pedagogy and critical literacy in suburban classroom spaces, even in the face of great difficulty.
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University of Minnesota Ph.D. dissertation. 2022. Major: Education, Curriculum and Instruction. Advisors: Marek Oziewicz, Justin Grinage. 1 computer file (PDF); 196 pages.
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Tholen Hatten, Rachel. (2022). Undeterred and Unmanaged: Actualizing Social Justice, Critical Literacy, and Detracking Efforts in Suburban Classrooms. Retrieved from the University Digital Conservancy, https://hdl.handle.net/11299/241327.
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