Reimagining the Canon

Source:

Worlds, M. & Miller, H. (2019). Miles Morales: Spider-Man and reimagining the canon for racial justice. English Journal, 108(4), 43-50.

Gist:

The authors argue that racial hierarchies and oppression in the English classroom will continue as long as teachers continue to hold the literary canon as the standard for what must be taught. They conclude that "reimagining the canon with books like Miles Morales: Spider-Man can begin to splinter the racial hierarchy that reigns over English curricula.

What is sacred:

When left unchallenged, the canon is a weapon of the colonial project, which perpetuates Eurocentrism and violence against people of color (Durand and Jimenez-Garcia)

English language arts classrooms must be sites to name, challenge, and ultimately dismantle oppressive systems.

Connection to current/future work:

The EDSE 428, which is my secondary English/language arts methods course, was able to have conversations around this article as a way to talk then about incorporating suggestions in the article (like side by side pieces) to create bridges for their students instead of border walls.

What I realized about myself as professor versus myself as teacher, is that although my aim to decolonize and push back against oppressive, colonizing curriculum has not changed, my strategy has mellowed when I am now responsible for other teachers. The teacher in me was ready to do what I felt was necessary to blow up curriculum because the only job I was willing to lose was my own. However, when I have these young teacher candidates under my wing, I need to teach them how to work within the system so that they can get tenured before they are encouraged to blow up the "system." That will be for the graduate level courses.

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