Teaching Social Justice Using Postcolonial Texts by Balzer, Geraldine; Strong-Wilson, Teresa; Burke, Anne;

Long description:

This book explores how teachers can re-examine their emotional investments in enacting dominant settler values through changing their text selection and teaching practices. Based on a longitudinal qualitative research study conducted by a national team of literacy scholars in collaboration with practicing literacy teachers at eight sites across Canada, the book investigates how groups of teachers, working collaboratively in inquiry groups, develop and implement curriculum to promote their own and their students’ understandings of social justice in postcolonial and settler spaces. In particular, the book highlights the rich and dynamic landscape of postcolonial authors, illustrators and texts, the development of culturally- sensitive curricula, and critical pedagogies possible in addressing contemporary and historical issues, both local and global.

This book is primarily of interest to literacy scholars, literacy instructors (teacher educators) in teacher education programs,educational leaders, practicing teachers from the K-12 spectrum, and school district staff and policy makers with responsibilities for or interests in the potential of literacy and literature engagement for social justice education. The book is also be of interest to postsecondary educators and teacher educators wishing to use literature in social justice, anti-racist, and anti-oppressive courses.

Table of Contents:

Introduction.- Keeping our ideals: Teaching literature with decolonization at heart.- Challenging the taken for granted.- Stepping into the discomfort zone: Exploring tensions and possibilities for social justice teaching with postcolonial children’s literature.- Towards Indigenous reconciliation: Transformative dialogues and pedagogies.- Analyzing pedagogical practices for social justice in a multi-age class.- Complicating empathy: An ‘educational’ journey toward ethical responsibilities, subjectification and reconciliation.- “Rupture of the Ordinary”: Engaging Students in Complicated Conversations through Postcolonial Literature.- Student voice in the context of “socially just” education.- “I Don’t Know What They Think Until They Talk”: Exploring the Place of Talk in Elementary and Secondary Classrooms.- Afterword.