Queering Safe Spaces by Design

• In Event: Power and Privilege in the Learning Sciences: Critical and Sociocultural Theories

Abstract

Objectives. This presentation explores strategies for making the construction of safe learning spaces an explicit object of design, through analysis of two case studies. Drawing on the principles of queer theory and the methodological commitments of Design-Based Implementation Research (DBIR, Fishman et al., 2013b; Penuel et al., 2011), the authors address the following questions:
1. How might practitioners operationalize the notion of “safe space” in contexts that explicitly address issues of gender and sexual identities?
2. What might it look like to make the creation of safe spaces the explicit object of educational design?

Theoretical framework. We conceptualize “safe space” through the lens of queer theory (Berlant & Warner, 1995; Butler, 1999, 2004; Kumashiro, 2002; Pinar, 1998; Sedgwick, 1990; Sumara & Davis, 1999), arguing that: a culture of heteronormativity and cisnormativity pervade many learning contexts; this culture generates material and symbolic violence against LGBTQ learners; support for LGBTQ people and rights tends to privilege dominant (white, middle class, monogamous, able-bodied, gender-conforming) values systems, and therefore often fails to generate a culture of safety for those who fall outside of these dominant values.

The DBIR perspective takes this framing of “safe spaces” as the starting point for defining and addressing a problem through educational design. As a methodological framework, DBIR is well suited to the commitments of queer theory: DBIR aims at participatory, collaborative design; aims at tackling broad social issues (such as heteronormativity and cisnormativity in educational contexts), and emphasizes drawing threads to connect locally meaningful design efforts (Fishman et al., 2013a; Fishman et al., 2013c; Penuel et al., 2011; Sabelli & Dede, 2013),.

Methods and data sources. Following the principles of DBIR, we demonstrate how participants in the two chosen learning contexts negotiated the challenges of creating safe spaces and organizing conditions to promote safety. The presentation will draw on data collected from two different contexts. In context 1, an undergraduate education course focused on adolescent development where experiences of queer youth are highlighted throughout, data come from end of course reflections provided by all students. In context 2, a 4th/5th grade classroom, curricular materials were developed to support students’ engagement with gender diversity and gender variance; these materials and students’ response to them serve as a primary data source for this presentation.

Results. We present the following design principles, drawn from and illustrated by data collected in the two highlighted contexts:
• Render varied stories of transgender and cisgender queer youth visible that highlight: youth agency in the face of discrimination, the search for intimacy, and the power of support from others.
• Think queerly about collaborators: Broaden and shift assumptions about who ‘counts’ as a stakeholder.
• Design for fluidity: Create contexts that enable participants to enact multiple, flexible gender and sexual identity positions.

Significance. Although a consensus has emerged that constructing safe educational spaces for LGBTQ learners is valuable and important, little scholarship offers strategies for designing with “safe spaces” in mind. This paper aims to fill that gap.

Authors

• Jacob McWilliams, University of Colorado - Boulder

• William R. Penuel, University of Colorado - Boulder