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Border pedagogy for democratic practice Item Type text; Dissertation-Reproduction (electronic) Authors Bolt, Julie Elizabeth Publisher The University of Arizona. Rights Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author. Download date 06/10/2021 01:55:02 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/289996 BORDER PEDAGOGY FOR DEMOCRATIC PRACTICE by Julie Bolt A Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the GRADUATE INTERDISCIPLINARY PROGRAM IN COMPARTIVE LITERARY AND CULTURAL STUDIES In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY In the Graduate College THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZON A 2 00 3 UMI Number: 3119933 Copyright 2004 by Bolt, Julie All rights reserved. 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Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106-1346 THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA GRADUATE COLLEGE As members of the Final Examination Committee, we certify that we have read the dissertation prepared by Julie Bolt entitled BORDER PEDAGOGY FOR DEMOCRATIC PRACTICE and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement for the rx.- rf - V "1 • " Richard Ruiz Date Vic Teresa McCarty Date yw' Barbara Babcock Date Date Final approval and acceptance of this dissertation is contingent upon the candidate's submission of the final copy of the dissertation to the Graduate College. I hereby certify that I have read this dissertation prepared under my direction and accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement. Dissertation Director Richard Ruiz Date 3 STATEMENT BY AUTHOR This dissertation has been submitted in partial fulfillment of requirements for an advanced degree at The University of Arizona and is deposited in the University Library to be made available to borrowers under rules of the Library. Brief quotations from this dissertation are allowable without special permission, provided that accurate acknowledgment of source is made. Requests for permission for extended quotation from or reproduction of this manuscript in whole or in part may be granted by the head of the major department or the Dean of the Graduate College when in his or her judgment the proposed use of the material is in the interests of scholarship. In all other instances, h obtained from the author. SIGNE: 4 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Thank you to my advisor Professor Richard Ruiz of Language, Reading and Culture, who continually advocated for me and this project even though I studied in a different department. His support made writing this dissertation while living in another state possible. Also thank you to Professor Barbara Babcock for her commitment to the department of Comparative Literary and Cultural Studies, its important and innovative interdisciplinary approach and to the CCLS students. Professor Terri McCarty also enriched my experience through her instruction, commitment to American Indian issues, and introducing me to The American Indian Language Development Institute, which influenced me greatly. Professor Raul Saba from Latin American Studies also enhanced my experience at the University of Arizona through his instruction and his openness to the interdisciplinary nature of my work. I want to thank Professor Mary Wolf from New Mexico State University who traveled to Tucson to serve on the committee for my qualifying exams. Thank you to Professor Henry Giroux for allowing me to use my chapter on Rigoberta Menchu Turn, previously printed in the Review of Education/Pedagogy/ Cultural Studies. Primarily I want to thank my son Theo for giving my life increased meaning, my parents for their lifelong support and inspiration, and most of all my husband David, for his patience, belief in this project, and willingness to do double father duty during my long nights and weekends of writing. 5 TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT 8 PART I; fflSTORICAL AND THEORETICAL FOUNDATIONS 9 Introduction. The Freedom Paradox—What Is Border Pedagogy? 9 The Freedom Paradox 10 Educators. Their Values, and Praxis 15 What is Border Pedagogy? 22 Chapter 1 :Historicizing Border Pedagogy as Democratic Practice 27 The Foundations of False Consciousness; Calvinism. Manifest Destiny, and Transcendentalism 27 Calvinism 27 Early Echoes of Emancipation Education 30 Walt Whitman 31 Whitman's Contemporaries Crossing Borders 35 Frederick Douglass 36 Resistance Through the Dominant Discourse 40 Zitkala-Sa 42 Education of Experience: Crossing and Creating Boundaries in the 20"' Century 46 John Dewey 47 Pedagogy and the Latin American Left 49 Gustavo Gutierrez and The Impact of Liberation Theology 51 Leonardo Boff. 52 Ivanlllich 55 Paulo Freire 57 Articulating a Third Country: The Borderlands 62 Gloria Anzaldua 62 After Anzaldua: Rosaldo, Saldivar, Michaelsen and Johnson 65 The Convergence of Mv Influences 70 Chapter 2: Understanding Border Pedagogy as an Apparatus of Critical Literacy and Emancipation Education 75 The Importance of Critical and Creative Literacy 75 The Difference Between Border Pedagogy for Critical Literacy and Multicultural ism 79 Representation and the Nation 84 The Politics of Location 88 The Authorization of Experience 91 The Moral Imagination. Empathy and Its Limits 93 6 Chapter 3: The Praxis of Border Pedagogy 101 Ten Themes in Border Pedagogy 101 Methodological Strategies for Border Pedagogy Ill A Note on Assessment 120 PART H: LITERATURE THAT EXPLORES BORDER SPACES 122 Chapter 4: "Traitor Fictions"; Identification and Subversion through the Works of Sherman Alexie, or "What Is an Indian?" 125 A Borderland of Different Languages 130 Rites of Passage 134 Negotiations Between Myth and Reality 136 Memory and Presence 141 Madness and Reason 146 Revolutionary Experiments in Language and Style 147 Pedagogical Context: "What Is an Indian?" 148 Chapter 5: Towards an Active Utopia: Truth-making in Menchu, Stoll, and the Classroom 153 Testimony as Breakage of the Frame of Death 154 Contestations and a Crisis of Truth 159 Truth-making As Situated Representation 164 Pedagogy: The Critical Encounter 166 Passive Utopia and Active Hope 170 Chapter 6: Disruptures and Indeterminations: The Juxtaposition of Codifiers in Guillermo Gomez-Pena's Border Art 172 Border Art and Artists 172 Juxtaposing the Codifiers of Identity 174 Public Interventions. Reverse Ethnography, and Living Dioramas 175 Disrupting Cultural Reproduction 177 Borderlands of Self: The Pedagogical Encounter 180 PART III: COURSES THAT EXPLORE BORDER SPACES 187 Chapter 7: Straddling the Institution: American Indian Literature and Critical Thinking 188 The Institutional Context 188 Contemporary American Indian Literature 192 Analytical Framework for Contemporary American Indian Literature 192 Course Assignments and Goals for Contemporary American Indian Literature 196 What Happens in Contemporary American Indian Literature 199 Critical Thinking 201 Analytical Framework for Critical Thinking 203 7 Assignments and Goals for Critical Thinking 206 What Happens in Critical Thinking Class 207 Conclusion 208 Chapter 8: Public Voices. Public Space; The Arts in Society 198 The New Town Square as Public Sphere 212 The State, Private Industry, and the Arts 218 Students as Borders Crossers Engaged in Democratic Practice 226 Preparing to Turn Reflection into Action Through Town Squares and Grant Writing 231 Ending/Beginning 240 CONCLUSION: BORDER THOUGHTS 241 APPENDIX A: INCLUSION OF COVER OF PUBLISHED PAPER 245 APPENDIX B: PERMISSION OF USE OF COPYRIGHT 246 REFERENCES 247 8 ABSTRACT "Border Pedagogy for Democratic Practice" articulates a pedagogy that awakens a more nuanced political consciousness, a sense of empathy and agency about social justice, and an increased comfort with ambiguities, for both student and teacher. By combining a theory of border pedagogy (developed by Henry Giroux, Peter McLaren, Renato Rosaldo and others), with tenets from cultural studies, postcolonial literary theory and critical pedagogy/literacy, I argue for a new understanding in the way we teach diverse texts, an understanding that can be applied to the ongoing shifts in history and culture, and local and global politics. The first section historicizes, explores and synthesizes the major theorists and questions from which my framework arises. In the second chapter I analyze the border texts of Sherman Alexie, Rigoberta Menchu, and Guillermo Gomez-Pena, which I find useful in classroom exploration of border theory. In the final section, I offer models of courses each designed with the intent of facilitating an environment for critical literacy, political agency and "border thought," including the courses "Contemporary American Indian Literature," "Critical Thinking" and

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