Theorizing Literacies as Affective Flows: Attuning to the Otherwise Possibilities of Hip-Hop’s “In-the-Red Frequencies”

• In Event: Amplifying Youth Voices in Hip-Hop Literacies and Sonic Storytelling

Abstract

In this theoretical and conceptual paper, we consider how meaning-making, literacies, identities, power, privilege, and in/equities are entangled with/in non/human sociomaterial force-relations. Inspired by Rose, we build theoretically on the philosophical principles of hip-hop—flow, rupture, layering, and sampling. We invite educators to attune to “in-the-red frequencies,” or “noisy” political philosophies/practices that Black communities have used to create alternative realities to white supremacist patriarchal systems of oppression. Afrodiasporic approaches to mobility and sounding pivot us away from humanist ways of knowing/being/doing/researching literacy and toward more “fugitive modes.” Theorizing affective literacies via flow↔rupture↔layering↔sampling enables ethical practices that respect multiple perspectives/histories/truths; account for affect, power, privilege, positioning, and complicity; and highlight “otherwise worlds” not predicated on hegemonic whiteness, anti-Blackness, and sociopolitical violence.

Authors

• Bessie P. Dernikos, Florida Atlantic University

• Bianca J. Nightengale-Lee, Western Michigan University

• Jaye Johnson Thiel, University of Alabama

• Kimberly Lenters, University of Calgary

• Erin Bailey, Reading Is Fundamental