Figuring Participation: Asian American Youth Navigate Figured Worlds of Civic Engagement Through Youth Participatory Action Research

Abstract

Asian American youth are a diverse and increasingly prominent civic demographic. There is thus a pressing need to examine, in literacy studies, how they conceptualize the possibilities and limits of civic engagement. Drawing on sociocultural literacy, Asian American studies, and figured worlds perspectives, this poster examines how nine Asian American high school youth used their multiple literacies to navigate multiple figured worlds of civic engagement and, consequently, theorize their orientations to democratic participation.

Author

• Ankhi Thakurta, Boston College