Diversity as Contingent: An Intersectional Ethnographic Interrogation of and Resistance Against Neoliberal Academia’s Exploitation of Contingent Faculty in General Education Diversity Courses

Since its inception in the late 1970s, neoliberal academia has increasingly relied in under-paid contingent faculty to carry its teaching workload. During this same time, neoliberal academia began to take up ‘diversity’ as a way to sell its brand. This dissertation stands at the crux between diversity branding and the exploitation of contingent faculty. Specifically, I explore how teaching General Education diversity courses through precarity impacts contingent faculty affectively and emotionally. Michel Foucault (1979) describes those who live in the context of neoliberalism as homo economicus, or entrepreneur of the self. As one becomes stuck in contingency, they begin to question whether they graded fast enough or said the wrong thing. Concurrently, they might begin to see how their contingent position is a bit different from their students or their colleagues. Importantly, I bring Patricia Hill Collins’ (2019) most recent work on intersectionality to help better understand how relationality and power differences impact feelings of precarity while being contingent and also teaching GE diversity courses. Through the lens of Foucault, Collins, and other works on affect and intersectionality, I seek to capture ways these faculty navigate teaching about precarity while being precarious.To this end, I employ feminist and queer ethnographic methods. Through autoethnography, I show how my identities as white, working-class, and neurodivergent pull me in multiple directions, leaving me exhausted as I do my best to navigate my GE diversity courses. With this in mind, I turn to my colleagues to explore how their identities impact their negotiations with these types of courses. While listening to my colleagues, I also realize how contingency molds my ethnographic process. Contingency forces me to interrogate a system that is not structured for my upward mobility. The collective bumps and bruises between my colleagues and I implore us to form a make-shift community of care, where we talk about the difficulties of doing diversity work in the classroom. After reading this work, I hope others better grasp the impact of placing diversity work onto the shoulders of contingent faculty. It is hard to teach students to care within a system that does not care about us. It is hard to care without care

Annotated Bibliography of Research in the Teaching of English

Since 2003, RTE has published the annual “Annotated Bibliography of Research in the Teaching of English,” a list of curated and annotated works reviewed and selected by a large group of dedicated educator-scholars in our field. The goal of the annual bibliography is to offer a synthesis of the research published in the area of English language arts within the past year for RTE readers’ consideration. Abstracted citations and those featured in the “Other Related Research” sections were published, either in print or online, between June 2020 and June 2021. The bibliography is divided into nine sections, with some changes to the categories this year in response to the ever-evolving nature of research in the field. Small teams of scholars with diverse research interests and background experiences in preK–16 educational settings reviewed and selected the manuscripts for each section using library databases and leading scholarly journals. Each team abstracted significant contributions to the body of peer-reviewed studies that addressed the current research questions and concerns in their topic area

“Only if you were in my shoes, you'd see it the way I do!” Reflecting on Professional Identity and Improving Design Practice: An Autoethnographic Phenomenological Study of Disabled Residents in Second Life

ABSTRACT Reflecting on professional identity and improving design practice: An autoethnographic phenomenological study of disabled residents in Second Life Antonia Tzemopoulos, Ph.D. Concordia University, 2015 A limited number of studies have examined e-learning environments for people with disabilities. Essentially, these studies place emphasis on descriptions pertaining to the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) standards and highlight interface design theory. Much has been said regarding interface design but little has been said regarding the interrelationship between the virtual environment, user emotions and the disabled learner. As spaces of learning are changing, going from the once traditional classroom environment to that of the virtual space, there is a growing need to understand how people with disabilities feel within the “pixelated” environment, thus allowing instructional designers to obtain a better understanding of what is a “good design” for people with disabilities. Virtual environments allow people with disabilities to participate in activities which would not be possible in real life, exploring regions that are bound by diverse aesthetical experiences, various stimuli and sociality. However, a number of questions still remain unanswered and can equally contribute to the improvement of the instructional design practice while fostering the idea of “doing good” for the disabled user. In this study, which extended over a period of one year, research was conducted on adults with various real life disabilities (visible or non-visible) who are active residents within Second Life, a 3D online environment. The researcher, also a resident of Second Life, had an opportunity to interact with members of Virtual Ability Island, an online environment that enables users with a wide variety of disabilities to obtain support, access to health information and develop mastery of navigation of the online world using different tutorials. Resulting from her multiple visits, friendships emerged prior to commencing the research journey. Reflecting as a researcher, she sheds light on some of the challenges she encountered during the research process and how interacting with people from Virtual Ability Island altered her perception of the meaning “designing for people with disabilities”. The methodology used is unique: a fusion of autoethnography, phenomenology, and narrative research combined with Tillmann-Healy’s Friendship as a Method. Using reflective journaling, casual conversations, field notes and virtual snapshots, the researcher’s thoughts parallel those of the disabled residents of the Second Life community. The Virtual Ability Island residents took the researcher on a visual, emotional and textual journey, sharing their experiences of Second Life. Although, the purpose of this study was intended to create dialogue, as well as evoke emotions, the underlying purpose was to demonstrate that alternative research methods can be considered as professional tools. These tools highlight active listening, emphasize ethical reasoning, and encourage critical self-reflection, while focusing on empathy, compassion and relationship building with the participant(s). They also aid in the interaction and gathering of data from people with disabilities in virtual environments such as Second Life

Therapeutic Autoethnography: From Epiphany to Catharsis

A large percentage of the U.S. population has been directly or indirectly affected by sexual violence. The Rape, Abuse, and Incest National Network (2020b) reported 433,648 victims annually, and Dillinger (2018) reported 747,408 registered sex offenders living in the United States. As a victim-survivor of sexual violence, I have a unique narrative in that I chose to work therapeutically with sexual offenders. Reactions from my family, friends, and colleagues have varied from surprise to alarm, but I hope this dissertation inspires readers to take a second look. Readers who are mental health professionals may consequently be motivated to work with this population and work differently with victim-survivors of sexual violence. Readers who are not in the mental health field may find that this dissertation is relevant in terms of challenging their biases pertaining to sexual offenders as well as victim-survivors. Still others who are victims of sexual violence may see themselves in my raw stories and find healing the way I did. Since there is no published research on victims who work with sex offenders, my autoethnography addresses a current gap in knowledge. Yet my research also contributes something new to autoethnographic research itself. My initial question, “How did I overcome challenges as a victim to work with sexual offenders?” evolved to a new question, “Who am I regardless of these relationships?” In exploring this latter question, epiphanies led to catharsis, which resulted in a new kind of research—a Therapeutic Autoethnography

The Walled Fortress: An Autoethnography Of An International Student Who Became An Esl Educator

Through autoethnographic research, I conduct an intimate investigation into my experience as a sojourner college student in West Germany to see how my emotive response to that experience and its associated sense of self work to generate a deeper and more empathetic understanding of my role as an English as a second language (ESL) professional. I employ a layered account whereby I weave personal narrative, poetry, and sketching into academic writing so as to reach the emotive core of the research. I explore complex discriminatory relations in the classroom and beyond and learn how I as an ESL professional have played an active role in perpetuating power imbalances. I demonstrate the emotional process of noticing my privileged position and how a fresh mindfulness of power relations in the classroom can affect teacher instruction and reflection

A retrospective narrative of the social and emotional experiences of growing up with a unilateral hearing loss

A thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in the Faculty of Humanities at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa. December 2017.Unilateral hearing loss (UHL), commonly known as 'single-sided deafness,' constitutes an ignored and under-researched population group. The limited existing research has established that persons with UHL tend to experience challenges in various social, emotional, language and academic areas, and thus persons with UHL experience more problems than previously realised. This study aims to address this gap by exploring the socio-emotional experiences of three persons with UHL. In addition, the researcher’s personal narrative as a person with UHL is included to provide another perspective. The participants were interviewed which provided narratives The theoretical framework of Bronfenbrenner's Bioecological model (1977-2009) and Vygotsky's (1962-1998) theories of language were used to interpret the influence of a child's surrounding social and cultural environments, and their interactions. The narrative data were analysed and interpreted using coding and categorising processes. Findings from the personal narratives revealed themes of anger, isolation, frustration as well as, indicated that children with UHL require assistance regarding disclosing their hearing loss. Additionally, topics such as ‘teasing’, ‘disturbing experiences during hearing loss diagnosis’ and ‘feelings of loneliness’ were also revealed. This study established that a child's surrounding social and cultural environments play a significant role in shaping their attitudes and perceptions of their unilateral hearing loss, and not all of the participants experienced disabling social challenges. Those who have intervention opportunities such as counselling, develop more effective communication and coping skills required for persons with UHL. In addition, links between interventions and coping skills were also revealed. Recommendations for future research include investigating the links between a child with UHL, intervention and coping skills, with a particular focus on their quality of life experiences. Significantly, there is a need for intervention programmes that address the social and emotional needs of children with UHL on an individual basis. Keywords Unilateral hearing loss; hearing related quality of life; Coping skills; Expressive Language; Stories; Autoethnography; Narrative Inquiry.LG201

Obstacles, Transitions, & Perspectives: An In-Depth Look at the Spectacle of Deviant Bodies

This autoethnographic study is an attempt to humanize the deviant behaviors and bodies of eating disordered and physically disabled persons in Western culture. The narratives included within are from the author’s own personal experiences as a heterosexual, eating disordered, disabled man. The narratives unfold chronologically in ways that explicate the transitions between identities and the onset and acceptance of each. The goal of this study is to unveil aspects of both eating disorders and disabilities as they relate to the locus of attention surrounding individuals that experience them. The researcher argues that the attention a deviant body draws from others may form the deviant body as a spectacle that can be either eagerly sought after, or reluctantly ascribed to, the individual that holds it

Critical Aspirations: Disability, Education, and Community Cultural Wealth in a Sanctuary City

This study explores the needs and experiences of refugee parents of emergent bilingual students labeled as disabled (EB/LADs) and their networks of interpreters and community-based educators. This investigation focuses on the relationships (and disconnects) within these networks related to language, migration, culture, race, disability, and special education experiences in formal and community-based schooling contexts. The bulk of extant scholarship regarding parental experiences in special education typically centers school-based experiences rather than community- and home-based experiences, such as daily acts of nurturing and communication (e.g., Cioè-Peña, 2018). However, school-based spaces, processes, and resources are in many ways inaccessible to EB/LAD families because they implement and uphold expectations and protocols which are rigidly defined by white, Western, middle-class norms for participation and discourse (Ijalba, 2015). As such, this project centers the home- and community-based experiences of refugee EB/LAD parents and community-based educators of EB/LADs through exploring how and under what circumstances they cultivate and engage Community Cultural Wealth (Yosso, 2005) in support of their children labeled as disabled, as well as their needs related to the formal schooling context.Using an integrative theoretical framework, this study addresses the following research questions: (1) What are the needs and experiences of refugee parents of EB/LADs as they navigate disability, education, and institutional processes; and (2) How do community-based education networks assess and address the needs and experiences of refugee parents of EB/LADs? By addressing these questions, this study contributes to the field of education at the crossroads of emergent bilingual education, special education, and critical culturally sustaining practice through qualitative case study. Further, by focusing on the perspectives of members of a refugee community in a sanctuary city in Upstate New York, this study sheds light on the lived realities of the educational programs in which most EB/LADs are enrolled in New York State, as well as the dark patterns which suspend parents and families in surreptitious, proxemic interactions with educators and policymakers. Finally, this study offers recommendations for cultivating supportive critical partnerships between schools and parents of EB/LADs through engaging in a critical reflexive praxis of sanctuary for EB/LADs, their families, and communities