Candace R. Kuby

Rebecca C. Christ

In Speculative Pedagogies of Qualitative Inquiry, the authors discuss what "inquiry" is and how we teach it — and if it is even possible to teach. With a proliferation of how-to manuals for doing qualitative research, the time is ripe for a discussion not only on what we teach (curriculum) but also how we teach (pedagogy). This book seeks to teach students to become qualitative inquirers, not with a formulaic recipe but rather by showing them how to think from a place of uncertain, (w)rest(full), relational liveliness. The authors seek to create qualitative inquiry courses that create spaces that consider our abilities to respond to, come to know (epistemology), be (ontology), and do (axiology) qualitative inquiry. Thus, a main thread of this book is (re)thinking and (re)imagining inquiry that they come to conceptualize as (in)query. The authors use both data from graduate level research courses and theoretical concepts from poststructuralism, posthumanism, and feminist "new" materialism. This book is timely in the face of a growing neoliberal academy that values prescription and repetition over innovation, thinking differently, and engaging with research. It will be an invaluable resource for graduate students looking to use qualitative inquiry in their research.

Speculative Pedagogies of Qualitative Inquiry

Tara Gutshall Rucker

This book provides an introduction to poststructural and posthumanist theories in order to imagine new possibilities for expanding literacy education. The authors put to work these theories in the context of an elementary school classroom, examining literacy-based activities that occur as students participate with materials in a multimedia writers' studio. Focusing on literacy processes, the book emphasizes the fluid and sometimes unintentional ways multimodal artifacts come into being through intra-actions with human and nonhuman materials. Because these theories emphasize the unplanned, nonlinear aspects of literacy, the authors demonstrate an approach to literacy that works against the grain of standardization and rigid curricular models. Go Be a Writer! reveals that when educators appreciate the value of unscripted intra-actions they allow for more authentic learning.

Expanding the Curricular Boundaries of Literacy Learning with Children

Go Be a Writer!

Karen Spector

Jaye Johnson Thiel

Covering key terms and concepts in the emerging field of posthumanism and literacy education, this volume investigates posthumanism, not as a lofty theory, but as a materialized way of knowing/becoming/doing the world. The contributors explore the ways that posthumanism helps educators better understand how students, families, and communities come to know/become/do literacies with other humans and nonhumans. Illustrative examples show how posthumanist theories are put to work in and out of school spaces as pedagogies and methodologies in literacy education. With contributions from a range of scholars, from emerging to established, and from both U.S. and international settings, the volume covers literacy practices from pre-K to adult literacy across various contexts. Chapter authors not only wrestle with methodological tensions in doing posthumanist research, but also situate it within pedagogies of teaching literacies. Inviting readers to pause, slow down, and consider posthumanist ways of thinking about agency, intra-activity, subjectivity, and affect, this book explores and experiments with new ways of seeing, understanding, and defining literacies, and allows readers to experience and intra-act with the book in ways more traditional (re)presentations do not.

Candace R. Kuby

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