Glynda A. Hull University of California, Berkeley USA

1. Transforming Literacy Glynda A. Hull University of California, Berkeley USA

3. “I believe that in this moment in our history we have something of great import to accomplish by exercising an optimism of the intellect in order to open up ways of thinking that have for too long remained foreclosed.” David Harvey, Spaces of Hope (2000) “Just as it looked as if we were about to lose the American democratic experiment—in the face of civil war, imperial greed, economic depression, and racial upheaval—in each of these periods a democratic awakening and activist energy emerged to keep our democratic project afloat. We must work and hope for such an awakening once again.” Cornel West, Democracy Matters (2004) Keeping Hope Alive

4. DUSTY: Digital Underground Storytelling for You(th) Community-based technology center operating in collaboration with university, church, schools Offering access to and meaningful uses of information technologies New technologies that allow multi-media, multi-modal literacy Providing programs for children, youth, adults, and seniors from community and mentoring opportunities for students from university On-going research on participants’ experiences and center’s role in community

5. Conceptualizing Diversity • Racial/Ethnic • Linguistic • Socio-Economic • Generational • Institutional • Spatial • Semiotic

6. Semiotics (in lieu of Linguistics) • Speech and writing are still dominant modes of representation and communication. • But new media (information technologies) make it easier to use and combine multiple modes. • Now we can combine writing, spoken language, images, moving pictures, gesture, song, dance, music.

7. Conceptualizing literacy…. ….a familiarity with the full range of communicative tools, media, and modes (oral, written, visual, gestural, performative), ….plus an awareness of and a sensitivity to the power and importance of representation of self and others, …along with the space and support to communicate critically, aesthetically, lovingly, and agentively

8. Overview • Context: Welcome to West Oakland and DUSTY • Theories: Identity, Geography, and New Literacy Studies/Semiotics • Voices and Literacies from West Oakland • Conclusions about Language, Literacy, and Diversity

9. WestOakland, CA

21. EducationalReform in the US Much urban school reform is concerned with accountability and efficiency, embracing business practices and values Can’t solve problems of schools by focusing on schools alone or just looking within schools, and ignoring poverty, legacies of racism, and economic climates Other models: Community “Development” (e.g., Kevin Johnson’s St. Hope Academy in Oak Park, California) Universities as Responsible to Local Communities

22. DUSTY: Digital Underground Storytelling for You(th) • After-School Programs DST & Homework Programs for Elementary-Age Children and Middle School Youth • Evening Digital Visual Programs for Older Youth/Young Adults • Digital Music Program • Adult Classes/Workshops • Intergenerational Oral History Projects • After-School Programs at School Sites in Collaboration with Teachers, Administrators

23. Prescott-Joseph Center for Community Enhancement

34. Perspectives from Theory • Socio-Cultural Perspectives on Identity and the Ethnography of Personhood • Cultural Geography: The Experience and Representation of Space and Place • New Literacy Studies and Semiotics: Multi-Media and Multi-Modality

35. Identity as… …enacted through and mediated by language and other cultural artifacts; …amalgamated from past experiences, available cultural resources, and possible subject positions in the present and future; …indexing social positions or one’s privilege or lack thereof in relation to that of others; …inseparable from learning and especially mastery or the acquisition of expertise; …continuously revised; and …articulated through story or narrative.

36. A Tellable Self Selves, like cultures, are not so much preserved in stories as they are created, reworked, and revised through participation in everyday narrative practices that are embedded in and responsive to shifting interpersonal conditions. Memories of self and other provide a constantly updated resource that narrators exploit in projecting tellable and interpretable selves” (Miller, 1995, pp. 175-176).

37. At DUSTY, participants…. …use multi-media, multi-modality to articulate pivotal moments in their lives and reflect on life trajectories. …by means of these technologies and modalities and social practices, reposition themselves as agents in and authors of their own lives.

38. How Place/Space Shape Identity • Residential segregation in US as a means of creating racial identities • Design and control of space as a means of constructing youth culture “From being able to have a room of one’s own (at least in richer families) to hanging out on particular corners, to clubs where only your own age group goes, the construction of spatiality can be an important element in building a social identity.” (Doreen Massey, 2002)

39. Social Spaces, Social Relationships, and Symbolic Resources “An analysis of the production of social space is an analysis of the production of social relationships, implying an emphasis upon relationships of power that are articulated across material and symbolic resources.” (Leander, 2002) Youth from the community, undergraduates, and a graduate student collaborate at DUSTY

40. Literal and Figurative Notions of Space at DUSTY • Importance of safe space physically • Importance of social and physical space which invites equal access to symbolic and material resources • Importance of social and physical space which arranges collaboration across diversities, but which cultural/ethnic/age-specific groups can “claim” • Importance of conceptions of space and activity that are both local and global

41. Multi-Literacies (New London Group, 1996) Increasing salience of cultural and linguistic diversity Multiplicity of communication channels and media--which differ according to culture and context, and which have different affordances

42. Multi-Media, Multi-Modality “…there are now choices about how what is to be represented should be represented: in what mode, in what genre, in what ensembles of modes and genres on what occasions” (G. Kress, Literacy in the New Media Age, 2003, p. 117) Literacy…. Choosing among and using available technologies, media, and modalities for expression and communication

43. The Pictoral Turn (W.J.T. Mitchell, Picture Theory, 1994) Ours is an age in which the pictoral turn has supplanted the linguistic one, as images push words off the page and our lives becomes increasingly mediated by a popular visual culture. Distinctive contrasts to the primarily linguistic texts and the forms of textual reasoning that predominate in schools and universities Sustained attention to the visual isn’t a customary part of schools’ literacy curricula, and in fact, there is much ambivalence toward it in the US

44. Voices and Literacies from West Oakland • Lyfe-N-Rhyme: Randy’s Critique of Life and Times in West Oakland, California and the USA • Taj’s “Delicate Man” Animation • Cristina’s Journal • From India to Oakland and Back Again • Mo’s “In Memorium” • Undergraduates Reflect on Being Volunteers

45. Introducing Randy • Speaker of AAVE, fluid code-switcher • High school leaver • Didn’t write in school, but wrote a lot outside of school: mostly raps • Required to attend a vocational IT program in lieu of being incarcerated • Works at a warehouse during day; cares for son in the evening • Talented musician, loyal son, social critic, poet

46. Interview Excerpt: Randy and Job Hunting “Frustrated Soul” came from job hunting…. From me being frustrated, turning in application after application. I was working a job at a card board place right there on 8th (Street), and I had 90-day probation, so on my 90th day, I passed the probation. On my 91st day they laid me off….They said “you’ll be back in like two weeks”. They didn’t call me back for like a month and a half. I quit my City of Oakland job for this job. So then they called me back a month and a half later, letting me work for a week, then they laid me off for 4 more months. Then I get a letter that I’m terminated. You know what I’m saying?” (Interview, 10/31/02)

47. DUSTY as Pathway It made a way for me to put this stuff [creative bent, his musical talent in particular] to use, so I can be here [inside his apartment] and not miss anything. I can do what I want to do. I don’t have to be in the street. It [the opportunity to be in DUSTY] was like right on time.” Because that was when the murder rate was getting high. My partner got killed around the corner, another one around here. And it just took me off the street. … And it gave me a chance to use my creativity and tell my story. (Interview, 10/31/02)

48. “Lyfe-N-Rhyme” • Two-minute video narrated by Randy, performing his original poem/rap • Miles Davis tune as background music • Illustrates, complements, or otherwise accompanies the words and music with approximately 80 images • No visual transitions, such as fading

50. What’s Powerful about Lyfe-n-Rhyme? • Striking visuals, many of them photographs taken by Randy • Rhythm, prose/poetry • Word plus beat • Images paired with words • Social critique • Representation of self as agent