Vice-Presidential Session. Consequential Futures: The Contested Pursuit of Truth in Freedom Dreaming

Session Type: Symposium

Abstract

This session brings together researchers, educators, and youth to explore how “truths” are constructed, contested, and transformed in educational policy and praxis. The papers analyze how these negotiations of truths are also tied to ethical and political consequences and possibilities that exist at the interactional, organizational, and societal levels. The presenters draw from diverse theoretical and methodological approaches and a variety of school and non-school settings that include different age-groups and disciplines to envision social futures. The common theme undergirding the intergenerational and interdisciplinary scholarship is that people need to be able to dream of new possibilities and even new worlds to better understand their current realities and to be able to work toward transformative alternatives within learning spaces.

Sub Unit

• Division G - Social Context of Education

Chair

• Nicole Mirra, Rutgers University

Papers

• Conditional Dreaming: The Role of Structural and Cultural Context in Civic Speculation - Nicole Mirra, Rutgers University; Antero Garcia, Stanford University

• From Police Officers to Community Builders: Learning and Dreaming as Movement Between Speculative Spaces and Schools - Michael Alan Chang, University of California - Berkeley; Thomas M. Philip, University of California - Berkeley

• World-Making, Dreaming, and Learning in an Intergenerational Course on Educational Justice - Corey Winchester, Northwestern University; Shirin Vossoughi, Northwestern University; Megan Bang, Northwestern University

• Freedom Dreams Nested Within the Small Stories of Improvisational Jazz Artists - Ananda M. Marin, University of California - Los Angeles; Lindsay E. Lindberg, University of California - Los Angeles; Brenda Y. Lopez, University of California - Los Angeles

Discussant

• Angela N. Booker, University of California - San Diego