Poetics of Curriculum, Poetics of Life: An Exploration of Poetry in the Context of Selves, Schools, and Society

This dissertation explores through the lens of curriculum studies how poetry is situated in the pedagogical world. My research aims to illuminate how poetry is studied in schools and how these practices of studying poetry give poetry its cultural identity. My framework is guided by John Dewey’s Art as Experience, and this leads me to explore opportunities for students to have profound experiences with poetry and art in schools. My purpose is not to write a prescription for teachers to use in their classrooms. I do not outline how someone should include poetry in a lesson plan. Rather, I explore why poetry is important in our lives and how poetry can contribute to opening avenues for new possibilities through imagination and transformation based on phenomenological experience and scholarship. I explore poetry through an aesthetic lens across different aspects of how poetry has meaning in a contemporary context. This dissertation advances the field of curriculum studies by exploring the influences that poetry has on the curriculum of our lives, and the influence that our lived curriculum has on the future of poetry

Turning Dissertations into Books: Works-in-Progress

This is a works-in-progress session where multiethnic practitioner researchers in the Ed. D. in Curriculum Studies Program at Georgia Southern explore creative ways to dive into life, write into contradictions, and turn dissertations into books derived from programs of research on the life of schools, families, and communities in the U. S. South. The book series editors and authors will work with prospective authors from diverse research paradigms on multiple forms of inquiry and representation in educational research. The book series editors will work with prospective authors particularly on the cultural, linguistic, and political poetics of personal, community, and historical narrative to liberate academic writing. The potentials, contributions, concerns, and future directions of various inquiries and representations are also discussed. Specifically, the book series editors and authors will work with the prospective authors chapter by chapter. Published books in the series will be used as examples for the prospective authors as they compose a book prospectus, a mission statement, market questionnaires, book contract, and any other relevant documents for the submission of book manuscripts to the book series editors. The purpose of this work session is to explore creative ways to write about research and to recognize the importance of, and ways of engaging in such writing to embody a particular stance in relation to integrity, beauty, humanity, and freedom, to move beyond traditions and boundaries, and to embed inquiry in school, neighborhood, and community life to transform research into social and educational change

Counternarratives of Curriculum in Schools, Neighborhoods, and Communities in the South

Presentation given at the Curriculum Studies Summer Collaborative Conference. In this interactive curriculum dialogue symposium, a group of multiethnic practitioner researchers explore diverse forms of curriculum inquiry (e.g., oral history, fiction, graphic novels, documentary novels, memoire, poetry, comics, etc.) to dive into the life of schools, neighborhoods, and communities in the U. S. South. We particularly focus on the power of counternarratives to contest metanarratives that often portray the South as backward, deficient, and inferior. We explore how critical theory, Black feminist thought, womanism, Black protest thought, Black liberation theology, critical race theory, critical race currere, multiracial or mixed race theory, and indigenous or decolonizing theories empower us to tell silenced and neglected stories of repressions, suppressions, and subjugations that challenge stereotypes of Southern women, Blacks, and other disenfranchised individuals and groups and to examine the forces of slavery, racism, sexism, classism, religious repression, and other forms of oppression and suppression on the life and curriculum in schools, neighborhoods, and communities in the South. The major purpose of this presentation is to share experience of developing diverse forms of curriculum inquiry and to recognize the importance of, and ways of engaging in such a wide array of forms to embody a particular stance in relation to integrity, beauty, humanity, and freedom, to move beyond traditions and boundaries, and to embed inquiry in school, neighborhood, and community life to transform research into positive social and educational change. This is a continuation of dialogue on curriculum in the South

Counternarratives of Curriculum in Schools, Neighborhoods, and Communities in the South

In this interactive curriculum dialogue symposium, a group of multiethnic practitioner researchers explore diverse forms of curriculum inquiry (e.g., oral history, fiction, graphic novels, documentary novels, memoire, poetry, comics, etc.) to dive into the life of schools, neighborhoods, and communities in the U. S. South. We particularly focus on the power of counternarratives to contest metanarratives that often portray the South as backward, deficient, and inferior. We explore how critical theory, Black feminist thought, womanism, Black protest thought, Black liberation theology, critical race theory, critical race currere, multiracial or mixed race theory, and indigenous or decolonizing theories empower us to tell silenced and neglected stories of repressions, suppressions, and subjugations that challenge stereotypes of Southern women, Blacks, and other disenfranchised individuals and groups and to examine the forces of slavery, racism, sexism, classism, religious repression, and other forms of oppression and suppression on the life and curriculum in schools, neighborhoods, and communities in the South. The major purpose of this presentation is to share experience of developing diverse forms of curriculum inquiry and to recognize the importance of, and ways of engaging in such a wide array of forms to embody a particular stance in relation to integrity, beauty, humanity, and freedom, to move beyond traditions and boundaries, and to embed inquiry in school, neighborhood, and community life to transform research into positive social and educational change. This is a continuation of dialogue on curriculum in the South