Telling My Story: Impacts of Racial and Gendered Identities on Students' Voices

• In Event: Narratives of Students of Color: Experiences On and Off Campus

Abstract

Sharing personal narratives are one way students make themselves understood in classrooms, providing a window into their racial, ethnic, and/or cultural values. In this study, I investigated how a diverse group of undergraduates utilized their personal narratives when manifesting their voices in a children’s literature course. This qualitative case study sought to better understand how students’ racial and gendered identities mediated how students’ employed their stories in academic settings. Findings suggest that White-Cis students are more likely to share their stories and at times manufacture connections to their own life and course content to be understood. Whereas their underrepresented peers frequently censored or avoided employing their personal narratives in sharing their ideas.

Author

• Lauren Fletcher, University of Louisville