Democratizing Knowledge: Using Wikipedia for Inclusive Teaching and Research in Four Undergraduate Classes

Abstract

In preparation for the spring 2018 semester, the three of us came together to develop a Wikipedia-based project using feminist pedagogies in their teaching practice. With different assignments, students in the four courses collaborated in this effort to improve the diversity, breadth, and quality of information in the free encyclopedia in English. Moreover, the assignments challenged students\u27 research and information literacy skills via an authentic learning experience, specifically editing Wikipedia on art- and diversity-related topics while engaging with the Wikipedia community and teaching other students how to edit Wikipedia on underrepresented topics--the “social responsibility of a collective struggle” for inclusion in knowledge production. The course Creating Wikipedia for the Arts prepared students to host an Art+Feminism Wikipedia Edit-a-thon during which they taught participants about Wikipedia and how to edit it. Leading up to the event, students enrolled in Nineteenth-Century Art, Arts of Africa, and Foundations in Art Education researched notable9 individuals relevant to the topic of their course who did not have an article in Wikipedia or only had a short stub article in need of expansion and improvement. Using this research, they came to the edit-a-thon to create and improve articles, thus making their research freely available to anyone with Internet access

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