Ideas That Changed Literacy Practices

How do ideas change practices and people? In Ideas That Changed Literacy Practices 32 influential scholars in literacy education get personal about how they have worked on ideas and how those ideas have worked on them. Together, the essays offer never-before revealed personal histories of the authors’ published writing about ideas that have shaped the field of literacy education. As a collection, the essays highlight some of the major themes that have guided and changed literacy practices over the last few decades. They also offer a rare glimpse into the complex ways histories of research emerge alongside personal and political influences on policy and practice. 


The volume includes an introductory chapter by Sumara and Alvermann in which they detail the processes they used in creating a context for the significance of this work. They begin with the premise that most literacy scholars rarely, if ever, reveal their personal and intellectual investments in ideas that have animated their research and other scholarly endeavors. That this observation rang true for all of the contributors was evidenced in their responses to the invitation. For example, some replied by saying this was the most exciting project they had engaged in because it required reflection on what motivated them to write the requested 3,500-word essay; others mentioned they were looking forward to reading what their peers would share. 


Ideas That Changed Literacy Practices is a unique collection of autobiographical essays that situates literacy learning and teaching in a rich context of personal and professional knowledge that highlights and celebrates the vibrant complexities of the field of literacy education. It is a unique and valuable resource for researchers and educators, whether in K-12 or higher education. 


Perfect for courses such as: Introduction to Literacy Research ӏ Literacy Research and Methods ӏ Language, Literacy and Culture ӏ Literacy Policy and Practice ӏ Narrative Research ӏ Interpretive Inquiry ӏ Research Methods in Education ӏ Foundations of Literacy Education ӏ Research Methods in Language and Literacy ӏ Popular Culture in Literacy Classrooms ӏ New and Digital Literacies ӏ History of Literacy Practices ӏ Educational Philosophy ӏ Reading and Language Arts ӏ Critical Theory ӏ Poststructuralism ӏ Digital Media Education ӏ Creative Writing ӏ Politics of Literacy


Chapter 1
Challenging the “I” That We Are

Dennis Sumara and Donna E. Alvermann


Chapter 2

Reading and Learning: An Intricate and Inseparable Bond

Patricia A. Alexander


Chapter 3

Entanglements: Searching for Historical Authenticity

Donna E. Alvermann


Chapter 4

Empowerment and Values in School Change

Kathryn H. Au


Chapter 5

Listening Across Differences

Maren Aukerman



Chapter 6

Literacy, English, and Video Games: Challenges and Continuities Through Change

Catherine Beavis


Chapter 7

When You Goin’ Teach Us How to Make That Money?

George Boggs


Chapter 8

The Everydayness of Religious Literacies

Kevin Burke


Chapter 9

Nurturing Communities of Inquiry Across Difference: Decolonial Social Formations in Literacy Research and Practice

Gerald Campano


Chapter 10

On the Failure of Reason in the Face of Belief 

Mark Dressman


Chapter 11

“Where Are You?”: Reading, Repositioning, and Imagining for Antiracist Futures

Patricia Enciso


Chapter 12

Socially Embodied Experience: An Explanatory Model for Literacy Based on Strangeness

James Paul Gee


Chapter 13

Performed Ethnography

Tara Goldstein


Chapter 14

Rich Points on a Reflexive Journey to Understanding Language–Literacy Relationships

Judith Green


Chapter 15

Rhizomatic Cartography of a Literate Life 

Margaret Carmody Hagood


Chapter 16

Land, Language, and Learning: Living in Good Relations

Jan Hare


Chapter 17

Transmediation: Nurturing Imagination Through Abduction

Jerome C. Harste


Chapter 18 

Hybrid Spaces, Design, and Imagination in the Practice of Transformative Literacy Teacher Preparation: A Personal Journey

James Hoffman


Chapter 19 

Naturalizing Literacy: Finding Meaning in the Biology of Language, Thought, and Being

George G. Hruby


Chapter 20

Refusing and Accepting the Hail: Interpellation as a Personally Liberating Concept

Hilary Janks


Chapter 21

Memes and Meme-ing: Research and Meaning

Michele Knobel


Chapter 22

Virtual Shifts: Rethinking Literacies in Home and School

Linda Laidlaw


Chapter 23

Memes and Meme-ing: Rethinking Internet Memes for a Better Future

Colin Lankshear


Chapter 24

Agency and Assemblage in Children’s Literacies

Kim Lenters


Chapter 25

Heteroglossia, Emotion, and the Transformation of Signs

Cynthia Lewis


Chapter 26

The Lyric of Witnessing and the Insight of Resonance

Rebecca Luce-Kapler


Chapter 27

Cultural Modeling on My Mind: Reframing Racialized Literacy Practices, and Reimagining Human Learning

Ramón Antonio Martínez


Chapter 28

Making Meaning, Making Sense

Guy Merchant


Chapter 29

Wahkohtowin: Reading, Writing, and Kinship 

Lorri Neilsen Glenn


Chapter 30

Enacting Critical Race Parenting Through/With a Family Literacies Archive 

Rebecca Rogers


Chapter 31

An Intellectual Path Paved With Emotions and Shaped by Cultures

Peter Smagorinsky


Chapter 32

Restorying My Archive of Deferrals

Dennis Sumara


Chapter 33

Going Public: Literacy Practices that Changed My Ideas

John Willinsky


Author Biographies


Index