Co-Creating a Transformational and Liberatory Space With Students, Not for Them

• In Event: F*ck da System: Womyn of Color Engaging in Critical Praxis

Abstract

Humanizing the teaching space is very much at the forefront of all educators dedicated to transformational and liberatory education. Through infusing a high school World History course with Delgado-Bernal and Solorzano’s (2001) Transformational Resistance and Duncan-Andrade’s (2004) Youth Popular Culture, my intention was to co-create a space with working class students of color where they could self-reflect and process resistance towards school. In this inquiry, the goal was to create that space with students to become co-constructors of curriculum and be conscious of the different types of resistance responses towards an oppressive educational system.

This inquiry is grounded in infusing Transformational Resistance (Delgado-Bernal and Solorzano, 2001) into the thematic question of a high school World History curriculum and engaging students with Youth Popular Culture (Duncan-Andrade, 2004) in order to practice naming the different types of resistance. The fact that my curriculum was infused with resistance theory comes from Teaching to Transgress by bell hooks (1994) that states ‘theory could be a healing place’ (p. 61). In working with a majority of a self-identified Latina/o student population and infusing the work of two educational researchers who based their work off Latina/o high school students, I wanted the classroom space to be one of healing through the connection between students’ lived experiences and their process of self-recovery. In taking hooks (1994), Freire (2000), and Darder (2012) as guiding points, I hoped that through the use of content that was relevant to students and created by them they in turn would be able to see themselves as producers of knowledge and link this to their lived experiences in order to theorize about how they resist in schooling and beyond.

This inquiry is rooted in praxis tradition of theorizing and practicing resistance theory. In bringing together the interest of working class youth of color and educational theory of Transformational Resistance, students were able to co-create a liberatory space within a traditionally oppressive system. This inquiry became a way for the teacher-student relationship to change the hegemonic nature of curriculum development by transforming the teacher-student relationship into co-constructors of knowledge.
The findings demonstrate that when the class engages youth popular culture, students are able to participate as co-producers of knowledge and incorporate their humanity in a traditionally oppressive schooling system. Students were able to engage because the topics came from them and were socially relevant to them. When students become co-constructors of curriculum, the class is transformed into a space made by them and for them, making it easier for students to learn and use academic terminology of transformational resistance. Students were able to explain that the education system in general is not created with them as the co-planners or with them in mind. While learning that what happened in the past is important, what is most important to students is that they are engaged in courses that will teach them what they want to learn.

Author

• Thalia Catano, Los Angeles Unified School District