Reaching for Mangoes: Mobilizing Stories of Ecojustice and Teaching in Politically and Ecologically Vulnerable Places

• In Event: Saturday Roundtable 7:45 am
  In Roundtable Session: Writing the Landscape: Stories of Place and Identity in Diverse Narratives (Table 19)

Abstract

This paper shares learning from a collaborative study with educators who took part in a two-day retreat in Fall 2022 in which they took part in collective sensemaking, immersive place-based walking, and composed zines. Analysis brought together ecolinguistics and mediated discourse approaches to understand and amplify the stories of teachers seeking to explore and teach for ecojustice literacies. Our findings suggest that, while educational policy is undoubtedly located in social contexts, it is also an ecological injustice with direct implications for literacy teaching and learning. As censorious educational policy alights across the country, literacy scholars need to mobilize such narratives to bring ecojustice literacies to their communities and the children who will inherit the planet.

Authors

• Alexandra Panos, University of South Florida

• Kristin Valle Geren, University of South Florida

• Katharine Hull, University of South Florida

• Michael B. Sherry, University of South Florida