Youth Navigating Conflict in Queer Activism: Exploring Literacy Events Across a Secondary Classroom and Club

• In Event: Marriott Roundtable Session 21
  In Roundtable Session: Learning From Youths' Activist Writing and Literacies

Abstract

Drawing on a yearlong literacy ethnography at a public urban comprehensive high school, I discuss the experiences of students – both queer and straight cisgender youth – navigating conflict as they used literacy for queer activism in a sophomore English Language Arts (ELA) course and GSA club. Drawing on sociocultural perspectives on literacy and humanization, I argue that in literacy events when conflict was a competitive process for establishing dominance, people were dehumanized and queer activism was stymied. In contract, when conflict was approached as an opportunity for collective learning, people were humanized and queer activism was amplified. These findings suggest the need to rethink discourses of “safe spaces” and to attend to conflict in more nuanced ways in queer-inclusive literacy education.

Author

• Ryan Schey, University of Iowa