Literacies, Arts, and Dissensus: Toward Radical Equality in Participatory Literacy Research with Youth, Teachers, and Artists in Non-Dominant Communities

Session Submission Type: Symposium

Abstract

This symposium develops Rancière’s ontology of radical equality for participatory research methodologies in literacy studies. Papers describe how youth-teachers-researchers-artists in studies across multiple countries used their literacies in acts of dissensus—or the active resistance to an unequal distribution of the sensible. Implications include pathways toward more radically equal methodologies in literacy research that require continued inquiry into the affective textures of reading, talking, and making that cultivate pedagogies of passionate and artistic dissensus.

Content Area

• Area 7: Social, Cultural, and Political Issues of Literacy Practices In and Out of School

Chair

• Ty Hollett, Penn State University

Discussant

• Lalitha Vasudevan, Teachers College, Columbia University

Individual Presentations

• Youth-teacher-researchers’ literacies in a secondary English classroom after community violence: Thinking-feeling a (re)distribution of the sensible - Christian Ehret, McGill University

• Urban arts and dissensus: Building a school partnership between artists, teachers and researchers - Bronwen Low, McGill University

• Cultivating literacies of dissensus and dissention with youth - Naomi Nichols, McGill University; Jessica Ruglis, McGill University