Article Title

Sonic Borderland Literacies: A Re/Mix of Culturally Relevant Education

Authors

Cecilia A. Valenzuela, University of Colorado at BoulderFollow

Publication Date

Fall 2017

Abstract

This paper describes the importance of everyday sounds and silences, and it explores how we might use critical listening practices within educational realms. It considers an arts-based approach that introduces a remix of methods grounded in borderland feminisms, cultural sound studies, and visceral literacies. I call this critical dissonance and I illustrate this methodology through dissonant borderland soundtracks that represent multidimensional, multitemporal and embodied ways of knowing. I also introduce conceptual tools and practices that feel and listen to and for marginalized narratives. When thinking about educational contexts, we must recognize that our lived experiences also include sonic and viscerally rich forms of making meaning. Yet, these are often absent or silent from traditional educational systems. Tuning into audible, cultural, and linguistically diverse resources push us to reinvent our dominant understandings and relationships with those whom we do not fully understand and with places we have only imagined.

Recommended Citation

Valenzuela, Cecilia A. (2017) "Sonic Borderland Literacies: A Re/Mix of Culturally Relevant Education," Journal of Pedagogy, Pluralism, and Practice: Vol. 9: Iss. 1, Article 6.
Available at: https://digitalcommons.lesley.edu/jppp/vol9/iss1/6