Many of us who work at universities in teacher preparation programs are wondering if we have been doing enough to promote social justice ideas. The recent events have, perhaps, caused us to think about the inequality of access to health care. The ongoing social unrest helpfully forces us to look inward at our own racist actions and beliefs. How can we do better? How can we be better? Two literacy educators who help me think about this work are Ashley Boyd and Janine Darragh. I am glad they offered to post for the blog.
Young Adult Literature as a Catalyst for Social Action
If you’re reading this blog post, most likely, you, like us, believe wholeheartedly in the potential of young adult literature to change lives. We have heard such testimonies from adolescent readers, and have had, on occasion, the same experiences ourselves. As we work with young people, preservice, and in-service teachers in the field of young adult literature, we are further convinced that these books we love have the capacity to not only impact readers on an individual level, but also to alert students to the potential they have to enact change in their communities and the world.
YAL tackles topics such as racism, heternormativity, poverty, and indigenous rights, not only thereby reflecting the lived experiences of students who are marginalized by systems of oppression, but also assisting readers who may have less knowledge of particular areas. Through reading, students can grow in their understanding and empathy, and potentially be inspired to take action.
In 2009, Steven Wolk connected YAL’s reflection of social issues to its potential to enhance readers’ democratic sensibilities. He avowed “teaching for social responsibility with good books does far more than encourage civic participation; it redefines the purpose of school and empowers all of us—students, teachers, administrators, parents—to be better people and live more fulfilling lives” (p. 672). His notion extends civic learning from the social studies classroom and into the English Language Arts classroom, employing books as a means to help students develop critical literacies and to unpack the world around them. This work is crucial, especially in the contemporary moment, when democratic participation is key to creating change and addressing the multitude of inequities plaguing our society in every state across the nation as well as around the world.
YAL tackles topics such as racism, heternormativity, poverty, and indigenous rights, not only thereby reflecting the lived experiences of students who are marginalized by systems of oppression, but also assisting readers who may have less knowledge of particular areas. Through reading, students can grow in their understanding and empathy, and potentially be inspired to take action.
In 2009, Steven Wolk connected YAL’s reflection of social issues to its potential to enhance readers’ democratic sensibilities. He avowed “teaching for social responsibility with good books does far more than encourage civic participation; it redefines the purpose of school and empowers all of us—students, teachers, administrators, parents—to be better people and live more fulfilling lives” (p. 672). His notion extends civic learning from the social studies classroom and into the English Language Arts classroom, employing books as a means to help students develop critical literacies and to unpack the world around them. This work is crucial, especially in the contemporary moment, when democratic participation is key to creating change and addressing the multitude of inequities plaguing our society in every state across the nation as well as around the world.
We, of course, agree with Wolk, though we continually found ourselves wondering if, perhaps, there was a way to extend his work. How, we wondered, can we provide opportunities for students that build on their learning of social issues through young adult literature, opportunities that go beyond discussion and reflection and allow them to act? This question has motivated our work as English teacher educators, researchers, and collaborators over the past four years, and we have engaged in these multiple contexts to develop and implement a process built around young adult literature that helps readers of various levels undertake social action projects.
When engaging in social action projects, students determine a contemporary problem that exists in their community (local, national, or global), design steps to address it, and implement their action. Our model, which we call COAR, includes four explicit steps: Contextualize, Organize, Act, and Reflect (Boyd, 2017; Boyd & Darragh, 2019). We do not conceptualize COAR as a stringent framework but rather a way to guide students through the process smoothly and with attention to detail.
In the first step, contextualize, students determine a social problem rooted in their understanding from their reading. Through trial and error, we have realized the importance of specifically narrowing from issue to problem. For example, one group of students with whom we have worked limited their topic from ‘racism’ to ‘the stereotyping of Black men’- a topic inspired by their reading All American Boys (Reynolds & Kiely, 2015). We have learned that for students to design a project with tangible actions and results, this initial move of contextualizing and narrowing is key. If students attempt to tackle topics that are too broad, they tend to feel overwhelmed and at a loss for what to do. Additionally, as part of this phase, it is important for students to gather information on their topic of interest. We suggest students complete extensive background research on the problem they name as well as posit why and how this problem is connected to systems of power.
Next, students determine their action related to the problem they identified and organize for it. In this step it is crucial that students contact the correct individuals needed to participate or to provide guidance for their actions. If they were to propose a campus march to support the #BlackLivesMatter movement, for example, they would need to decide how to spread the word, what route the march would take, what permissions must be garnered, and who would speak. In the third step, students perform their planned action and collect evidence, such as images and artifacts, to document the implementation. Finally, they reflect on the process, noting successes and challenges, and plan for next steps. The reflection and next steps portion is key so that students can begin to view change as ongoing and realize that social action should not stop at the conclusion of one event.
When engaging in social action projects, students determine a contemporary problem that exists in their community (local, national, or global), design steps to address it, and implement their action. Our model, which we call COAR, includes four explicit steps: Contextualize, Organize, Act, and Reflect (Boyd, 2017; Boyd & Darragh, 2019). We do not conceptualize COAR as a stringent framework but rather a way to guide students through the process smoothly and with attention to detail.
In the first step, contextualize, students determine a social problem rooted in their understanding from their reading. Through trial and error, we have realized the importance of specifically narrowing from issue to problem. For example, one group of students with whom we have worked limited their topic from ‘racism’ to ‘the stereotyping of Black men’- a topic inspired by their reading All American Boys (Reynolds & Kiely, 2015). We have learned that for students to design a project with tangible actions and results, this initial move of contextualizing and narrowing is key. If students attempt to tackle topics that are too broad, they tend to feel overwhelmed and at a loss for what to do. Additionally, as part of this phase, it is important for students to gather information on their topic of interest. We suggest students complete extensive background research on the problem they name as well as posit why and how this problem is connected to systems of power.
Next, students determine their action related to the problem they identified and organize for it. In this step it is crucial that students contact the correct individuals needed to participate or to provide guidance for their actions. If they were to propose a campus march to support the #BlackLivesMatter movement, for example, they would need to decide how to spread the word, what route the march would take, what permissions must be garnered, and who would speak. In the third step, students perform their planned action and collect evidence, such as images and artifacts, to document the implementation. Finally, they reflect on the process, noting successes and challenges, and plan for next steps. The reflection and next steps portion is key so that students can begin to view change as ongoing and realize that social action should not stop at the conclusion of one event.
Between the two of us, we have found success using COAR in middle school, high school, and university classrooms. For example, in one middle school, students read All American Boys, a book about an incident of police brutality and the aftermath in the local community. One middle school reader shared that this book allowed them “to see the huge problem we have with racism and how it affects everyone.” They applied their understandings of racism, police brutality, and white privilege to conduct a number of social action projects. For example, the whole class crafted graffiti art in the school courtyard to share messages they learned from the book and felt needed more attention. One small group composed a rap about racial equity and shared it with the local school resource officer, and another group created anti-stereotype posters and hung them around the school (Boyd & Miller, 2019).
In the university classroom, we have challenged students in our own Young Adult Literature courses to complete social action projects with the members of their college campuses as their audience. After reading Ruta Sepeteys Between Shades of Gray (2012), a piece of historical fiction that traces a young Polish girl’s journey to survive work camps during the Stalin era, readers undertook a project to raise awareness of refugees’ experiences. They partnered with our local campus library to create a book display with additional texts and distributed requests to sign a petition related to the United Nations refugee campaign. Of social action projects, one of the group members stated, “I think it’s an enormously valuable perspective shift to show students that they can be the ones making a difference and working for a better world.”
While we allowed our students to choose social justice issues connected to the young adult novels they read in our classes, an overwhelming majority of our university student groups selected mental health as their issue, narrowing their topic to various related problems. One group, for instance, connected their work to the stigma surrounding mental health problems referenced in The Unlikely Hero of Room 13b (Toten, 2015). In the novel, a teenage male diagnosed with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder takes part in group therapy where he meets new friends and embarks on a romantic relationship with one of his fellow members. One cluster of our students designed an action in which they advertised resources available on campus and through student services to assist with mental health. The students connected with a foundation established for a local football player who had recently died by suicide and distributed bracelets with messages of hope and phone numbers for campus resources in a well-trafficked area on campus after publicizing the distribution event on social media.
Another group partnered with a psychology professor to offer a viewing of a film that
they felt inaccurately represented mental disorders and led a critical dialogue afterward with their forty participants. Still another created an interactive display on campus with resources, books, and a space to share coping strategies for stress and anxiety.
Inspired by the novel Darius the Great is Not Okay (Khorram, 2019), one group sought to investigate the ease and barriers connected to accessing mental health supports on campus. Group members identified that the new counseling center was not on current campus maps and did not have signage outside of the building to guide students to its location. This group started a petition for funding to update the campus maps and purchase a building sign.
they felt inaccurately represented mental disorders and led a critical dialogue afterward with their forty participants. Still another created an interactive display on campus with resources, books, and a space to share coping strategies for stress and anxiety.
Inspired by the novel Darius the Great is Not Okay (Khorram, 2019), one group sought to investigate the ease and barriers connected to accessing mental health supports on campus. Group members identified that the new counseling center was not on current campus maps and did not have signage outside of the building to guide students to its location. This group started a petition for funding to update the campus maps and purchase a building sign.
In addition to these projects, students who read Speak (Anderson, 1999) debunked dominant narratives of victim-blaming in instances of sexual assault through visual displays of clothing with accompanying messages in popular spaces on campus; others created a blog related to their reading of The Queen of Water (Resau, 2012) to describe their new awareness of human trafficking and to raise others’; and still others led an open mic event to increase attentiveness to climate change after reading Pitch Dark (Alameda, 2019).
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This community-oriented work made the books come alive for students and gave them a way to express the indignation they felt while reading or a manner through which to share new perspectives. Many articulated in their reflections positive sentiments such as “the greatest reward out of this project was knowing that we made an impact” or shared that the projects “get students thinking about social issues” and allow them to “engage in the world” while “involving higher level thinking to fulfill the requirements.” Many also noted the tendency for young people to not be taken seriously, but felt this project had the potential to change those perceptions. Young adult literature has previously connected to these more additive and complex understandings of youth (Petrone, Sarigianides, & Lewis, 2015), and these projects provide an additional validation of that possibility.
We have built on our students’ work in Reading for Action: Engaging Youth in Social Justice through Young Adult Literature (2019). In the book, we focus on one social justice topic per chapter and one young adult novel. Amongst other topics, we include bullying, global poverty, the gender spectrum, and women’s rights, and we offer myriad before, during, and after reading strategies as well as ideas for social action projects for each. As former secondary teachers ourselves, we know how busy teachers are, so we tried to provide as many resources as possible, including other young adult and canonical texts connected to each issue, music, film, and electronic resources. Although we emphasize that ideas for action should come from the students, we hope to provide samples to illustrate the kind of work we envision that students can accomplish.
We have built on our students’ work in Reading for Action: Engaging Youth in Social Justice through Young Adult Literature (2019). In the book, we focus on one social justice topic per chapter and one young adult novel. Amongst other topics, we include bullying, global poverty, the gender spectrum, and women’s rights, and we offer myriad before, during, and after reading strategies as well as ideas for social action projects for each. As former secondary teachers ourselves, we know how busy teachers are, so we tried to provide as many resources as possible, including other young adult and canonical texts connected to each issue, music, film, and electronic resources. Although we emphasize that ideas for action should come from the students, we hope to provide samples to illustrate the kind of work we envision that students can accomplish.
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Given the current predicament of schools, we feel it important to provide a brief note about the potential of these projects in a virtual space. As much of social action projects is self-directed and relies on research and communication via the Internet, email and telephone, we believe that such work fits well in this era of online education. Furthermore, many of our students’ projects relied on social media to advertise or to complete the action itself, as several created websites, blogs, or Twitter and Instagram accounts to raise awareness. Even open mic nights could be held through online platforms such as Zoom and community film viewings through arenas such as Netlix Party provide a way to chat collaboratively while watching from different places. Therefore, this work can still be undertaken in the context we now face, and we hope that it is.
Young adult literature gives us a medium through which to read, think, and talk about issues that may be uncomfortable for some or discerned as controversial in society. It provides us with insight, perspective, and experience; the rich texts we have now develop readers’ empathy and afford for a depth of personal connection. We believe that harnessing this capacity of YAL and channeling it into action is key for addressing inequities and building communities. As we have said before, “Reading is important. Discussions can be valuable. But reading for action- that is something that can empower, inspire, and ultimately change the world for the better” (Boyd & Darragh, 2019, p. 195). Certainly, in these unpredictable times, we need that more than ever.
Young adult literature gives us a medium through which to read, think, and talk about issues that may be uncomfortable for some or discerned as controversial in society. It provides us with insight, perspective, and experience; the rich texts we have now develop readers’ empathy and afford for a depth of personal connection. We believe that harnessing this capacity of YAL and channeling it into action is key for addressing inequities and building communities. As we have said before, “Reading is important. Discussions can be valuable. But reading for action- that is something that can empower, inspire, and ultimately change the world for the better” (Boyd & Darragh, 2019, p. 195). Certainly, in these unpredictable times, we need that more than ever.
References
Boyd, A. & Darragh, J. (2019). Reading for action: Engaging youth in social justice
through Young Adult Literature. Rowman & Littlefield.
Boyd, A. & Miller, J. (2020). Let’s give them something to talk (and act!) about:
Privilege, racism, and oppression in the middle school classroom. Voices from the Middle, 27(3), 15-19.
Boyd, A. & Darragh, J. (2019). Critical literacies on the university campus: Engaging
pre-service teachers with social action projects. English Teaching: Practice & Critique, 19(1), 49-63.
Petrone, R., Sarigianides, S.T., & Lewis, M.A. (2015). The youth lens: Analyzing
adolescence/ts in literary texts. Journal of Literacy Research, 46(4), 506-533.
Wolk, S. (2009) Reading for a better world: Teaching for social responsibility with
young adult literature. Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 52 (8), 664-673.
through Young Adult Literature. Rowman & Littlefield.
Boyd, A. & Miller, J. (2020). Let’s give them something to talk (and act!) about:
Privilege, racism, and oppression in the middle school classroom. Voices from the Middle, 27(3), 15-19.
Boyd, A. & Darragh, J. (2019). Critical literacies on the university campus: Engaging
pre-service teachers with social action projects. English Teaching: Practice & Critique, 19(1), 49-63.
Petrone, R., Sarigianides, S.T., & Lewis, M.A. (2015). The youth lens: Analyzing
adolescence/ts in literary texts. Journal of Literacy Research, 46(4), 506-533.
Wolk, S. (2009) Reading for a better world: Teaching for social responsibility with
young adult literature. Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy, 52 (8), 664-673.
Until next week.
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