Researching for Repair: Enacting Critical Frameworks When Analyzing Young Adult Literature

Session Type: Symposium

Abstract

This symposium focuses on research that interrogates cultural depictions and reader understandings of young adult literature (YAL). Together, these papers provide an outline for the ways teacher educators can assist pre- and in-service teachers in adopting critical stances when selecting young adult literature for classroom use. The first paper examines the uses of the Black Girls’ Literacies Framework in evaluating historical fiction about enslavement in the United States; the second paper explores how a racialized reader response framework can help students develop racial literacy; finally, the third paper utilizes the Internalized Racism Scale for Asian Americans to critically analyze internalized white supremacy in youth literature written by Asian American authors.

Sub Unit

• SIG-Critical Educators for Social Justice

Chair

• Stephanie Robillard, St. Mary's College of California

Papers

• Teaching to Affirm: A Critical Content Analysis of Novels About Enslavement - Stephanie Robillard, St. Mary's College of California; Emma Bene, Stanford University; Elena Darling-Hammond, Stanford University

• A Tool for Supporting Racial Literacy: Diverse YAL and Racialized Reader Response - Arianna Banack, University of South Florida

• Critically examining Asian American Kid Lit - Rosa Nam, Colorado State University

Discussant

• Tracey Terece Flores, University of Texas at Austin