Letters to Learn By: Epistolary-Based Pedagogy for Honoring Memory and Voice in the College Classroom

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Friday 11:45 am
  In Roundtable Session: Memory as Method in Education: Policy Histories, Community Pedagogies, and Liberatory Futures

Abstract

Objectives
Letters (sometimes called epistles) memorialize a writer’s intimate thoughts thereby revealing a wealth of information about the socio-historic context during which the letter was created. Because they offer a raw glimpse into the author’s past, letters endure as records of official communication and firsthand accounts of historical narratives (Chávez-García, 2016). When Scholars of Color (SOC) engage critically with letter writing as a tool for historical recovery, they enshrine memories often left unrecorded in official archives (Anzaldúa, 1981; 2012; Garcia & Yosso, 2020). Building on the liberatory tradition of creative writing prominent in Ethnic Studies (Lorde, 2012) and leaning into the transformative potential of letter writing as pedagogy (Moore & Seeger, 2009), this paper details how letter writing can be used as pedagogical tool for fostering historical recovery in the college classroom. This paper posits the following questions: (1) How can faculty foster historical recovery in the higher education classroom by leveraging letter writing as a pedagogical intervention? And (2) How, if at all, can SOC forge stronger connections between the self, and their everyday life histories when engaging in a Critical Race Feminista Epistolary Praxis?

Theoretical Framework
This research couples Chicana/Latina Feminisms with Critical Race Theory in Education to form a Critical Race Feminista Epistolary Praxis (CRFEP; Escobedo, 2024). A CRFE uplifts opportunities for SOC to communicate, through letter writing, their understanding of and resistance against the historical legacies and contemporary manifestations of intersectional oppressions. Working from a CRFEP in the college classroom means uplifting opportunities for SOC to transform their creative writings into artifacts of memory making.

Methodology & Data Sources
This study takes a conceptual approach in offering a framework for implementing pedagogy and crafting curriculum designed to elicit the historical recovery process with SOC. Data pieces include primary sources housed within the author’s personal collection such as course syllabi, course assignments, and course evaluations for classes taught within Ethnic and Education Studies departments. An analysis of these primary sources provides a rationale for designing epistolary-based curriculum and pedagogy in the higher education classroom.

Study Findings & Scholarly Significance
Findings reveal, when faculty employ an epistolary-based pedagogy that nudges SOC to speak back to systems and individuals that perpetuate their disenfranchisement, both faculty and students activate the transformative potential of letter writing as a historical recovery tool. Indeed, a pedagogical application of a CRFEP leads educators and SOC (1) to name quotidian experiences of systemic exclusion and (2) to denote blueprinted lessons for social change. Thus, deliverables emergent from a pedagogy grounded in an epistolary tradition become primary documents that cement poignant visions for social redress. As such, the curricular implementation of a CRFEP empowers both faculty and students to reclaim their identities as history makers uniquely equipped to enact social transformation through their everyday pennings. In line with the AERA 2026 call to leverage creative ways for "unforgetting" histories often left untold, this paper repositions epistolary-based pedagogies as tools for envisioning more liberatory educational futures.

Author

• Cindy R. Escobedo, University of California - Los Angeles