“I Choose to Take My Stories From My Parents”: Theorizing Analepsis as Cultural Learning and Identity Development

• In Event: Exploring How Identity and Epistemic Engagement Shape Learning

Abstract

Calls to understand learning as inherently cultural suggest the need to examine the ways youth develop identities in relation to cultural stories. In this project, we engaged Latine youth in a community curation project at a local history museum. Drawing from participatory design and sociocultural theories, we sought to understand the ways young people built identities as historical actors. We put forth the notion of analepsis – using past events within a present tense narrative – as a tool to understand the ways youth identities develop alongside familial stories. This paper adds notions of analepsis to the literature around identity development in order to provide deserved attention to the complexity of the ways learning identities are tied to cultural and familial stories.

Authors

• Kristina M. Stamatis, University of Nebraska - Omaha

• Joseph L. Polman, University of Colorado - Boulder