Search results

A testimonio reveals the bridges and connections created by collective learning. For many Xicanas, the first learning occurs in their home. Studies show that the familia encourages life lessons through daily chores, conversation about school and education, advice from grandparents, sibling interaction, and by watching parents or elders negotiate and interact with the dominant society and among other family members. This research in home-learning practices provides valuable data in understanding the successes and challenges of Xicanas in higher education. Ultimately, testimonio presents a unique method, process, and product that uncovers the many daily challenges that Xicanas confront. The purpose of this chapter is to draw attention to the fact that testimonio and storytelling does and can play an important role in the life and work of Xicanas in higher education. The chapter outlines the framework and theoretical lens of mestiza consciousness and pedagogies of the home as the foundation for storytelling through interviews and platicas identified as testimonio. The study conducted is an autoethnography that details the significance of storytelling through testimonio as a method of survival in higher education. Testimonio and storytelling are central to the field of critical race theory, Xicana feminism, and social justice education which stresses the significance of Being authentic to Self.

Narrative inquiry and life history are privileged methods for studying people's lives, experiences, and identity construction. In this article, I argue that critical life history inquiry is especially suitable for studies of those, who have actively involved in progressive social and cultural movements and have developed an identity as activist educators.

The average woman educator spends more time in the classroom than their male counterpart before ascending to an administrator position. Women educators spends on average 10–11 years as a teacher and as an administrator before becoming promoted to the superintendent position (Kingsberry & Jean-Marie, 2018; Manuel & Slate, 2003; Robinson, Shakeshaft, Grogan, & Newcomb, 2017). However, when they do reach this position, women superintendents lead in a different manner than men. They tend to focus on the well-being of children and families. They bring a strong interest in educating the child as a whole and place those at high risk a priority (Grogan, 2005). Women are finding way(s) to bring women's way(s) of knowing and expertise into this position. Women tend to keep instruction at the forefront and develop relationships with school and wider community members that can help foster the academic and social growth of the student (Grogan, 2005; Robinson et al., 2017; Wilmore, 2008).

Therefore, feminist@ leaders surface from their feminist and cultural knowledge (Sanchez & Ek, 2013) as a form of traditional resistance. They create pathways for other Latinas on their journey to claim Chicana feminism. As such, this chapter highlights the voices of four valiant women of color leaders on the path toward the superintendency whose personal and professional pathways intersect to create a feminist@ leadership identity.

In this chapter, we present critical race theory (CRT) with a focus on Latino critical theory (LatCrit) and its impact on Latinx educators, Latinx youth, and Latinx communities. We focus on identity inclusion and Latinidad as a way to increase critical consciousness of educators and Latinx youth, language rights, and feminist pedagogies of resistance. LatCrit frameworks are used as transformational resistance and afford a productive platform for developing critical understandings of the educational experiences of Latinx youth. We discuss relationships and community through the alignment of LatCrit and critical pedagogy and the application of critical theory and community-responsive pedagogy in increasing equitable outcomes in educational settings that support Latinx youth and families. We provide recommendations to address the challenges Latinx youth face and how Latinx educators can continue to support youth through a LatCrit framework, and a summary of possible solutions to consider. We close with some reflection and dialogue questions.

A great deal of contemporary research in education, and in the social sciences more generally, is conducted through interviews. Interview-derived accounts and narratives have been used as data for many decades. We argue that, despite their popularity and their long history, such data are not always subjected to rigorous analysis. Researchers too often treat interviews as sources of insight about informants’ experiences and feelings, but pay insufficient attention to the forms and functions of such accounts. We argue that they need to be approached through the analytic lens of accounting devices and narrative structures. We exemplify this approach through ‘academic’ narratives: scientists’ discovery accounts and accounts of doctoral supervision. We emphasise how such accounts need to be examined in terms of the discursive construction of reality. Such an approach is an important corrective to the selective reporting of ‘atrocity stories’ about postgraduate education.

In pursuit of democracy, John Dewey argued that public education should be the driving force. As educators strive to address issues of social justice and create inclusive academic environments, they must address the inequalities that are perpetuated in our educational system. Higher education (HE) plays a pivotal role, as it has the potential to shape those who will go on to become future educators, lawmakers, and politicians. Recognizing the importance of HE, we have the responsibility to address inclusivity in and out of the classroom. This chapter examines how critical pedagogy can be used as a tool to promote social justice in HE. In doing so, it will challenge educators to begin to address socially constructed ideas that are agents of oppression. Utilizing critical pedagogy, faculty and students can learn together and critically challenge these educational and social injustices. This will have a rippling impact on our educational system and society as a whole. Successfully implementing this pedagogical approach can lead to diverse and inclusive classrooms that foster learning for all students.

Using the concepts of resistance, identity construction, and communicative democracy, I explore the possibility that older women's life histories create and occupy a potentially transformative space within global research on gender. First, such narratives challenge existing hierarchies of age and gender that systematically disadvantage older women. Second, older women use them to assert their own more complex identities (in opposition to those limiting identities assigned to them by others). Third, through their life stories, older women can contribute to democratic dialogue in society at large. I use life history interviews conducted with older women in Cuernavaca, Mexico from 1995 to 1997 as a specific case that supports my overall argument. I contend that the first two processes are already taking place through the act of storytelling and life history narration itself. The more radical methodological claim of this paper is that the act of constructing and communicating life stories is a legitimate and valuable exercise of (political) power.

The Remain in Mexico Policy, also known as the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), forced asylum-seeking children into seemingly untenable situations and conditions across the United States’ South Texas border. This case study examines stories told by the children of Tent Zero and their parents about the conditions and experiences they faced as a result of MPP. Their stories reveal that the conditions asylum-seeking children at the South Texas border faced have been severe and include, but are not limited to, a lack of adequate food and water, extreme weather, inadequate sanitation, and a lack of appropriate or consistently available schooling. Prior research has not fully investigated how educators can and should work with students who have experienced such severe conditions, which often result in compounded emotional suffering. By examining the effects that the MPP, which was instituted during the Trump administration, has had on youth and families staying in Matamoros, Mexico, as a result of this policy, this case study not only provides a glimpse into the lived experiences of asylum-seeking children and families at the South Texas Border, but also provides insight and guidance for educational policymakers, educators, and communities where these youth transition to and continue in school in the US. As a starting point, all of the asylum-seeking children who participated in this study expressed their interest in and longing to go to school demonstrating both the practical and symbolic importance of formal education in asylum-seeking communities like those at Tent Zero.

In this study, the authors investigated the academic and social experiences of first-generation undergraduate Latinx students who participated in a Latinx student-focused organization at a large, research-intensive, Predominately White Institution (PWI) in the Midwest. Our results revealed three major themes. First, participants considered the Latinx student organization to be a significant resource for their social integration into the university; however, it was less significant as an academic resource. Second, the participants recognized that while the university “tries” to promote diversity, they felt that the university could do more in promoting ethnic student groups and their interests across campus. Third, participants perceived that the university treats all Latinx students as one homogenous group, ignoring the diversity that exists between different Latinx groups. These themes suggest that efforts to make PWIs more diverse and inclusive may benefit from the formation and maintenance of minoritized ethnic student organizations. PWIs would also benefit by incorporating the diverse Latinx student perspectives into institutional diversity policy, and prioritizing higher-quality initiatives for greater visibility of Latinx student issues across campus. Moreover, programming that does not aggregate or homogenize Latinx identity, but embraces and values the multifaceted Latinx identities, would also benefit PWIs.

In 1992, a Kaq’chikel woman, Vera, told a tale of shapeshifting and dreams to me and the woman with whom she was staying while teaching weaving classes in Northern California. Laughingly, we were exploring the question of power between man and woman. Asked why she, a young woman, was the first to leave her town, Santa Catarina, to travel to North America, she cited a “lineage of power” back to her grandparents that turns on gender and reproductive roles. The following is a synopsis:The Nawal (Shapechanging) WifeHer grandfather had first a bad wife. This wife had no children. She was a woman who went out into the night and ran wild as a lion. The husband grew to be afraid and suspicious, even though she gave him something to make him sleep as if he were dead. One night he awoke anyway; his wife was not beside him. He went out of the house, taking his machete. He waits and he waits, and then it is big, crying “aieee”…“aieee” in the night and it is coming close, it is coming closer and he slashes with his machete, he slashes his machete and she dies. He knew and yet did not “know” that it was his wife. The head of the animal, which was now human, uttered words. She did not finally die until she was returned to the house of her father the next day.