Education Commons^™

The Inevitability Of Collision: Creating Empathy Through Fiction, Danielle Beckman

Regis University Student Publications (comprehensive collection)

While the stigma for mental illnesses has greatly declined in the last decade, there is still a disconnect between individuals without neurological illnesses and those with neurological illnesses, especially those that cause individuals to lose contact with reality. The goal of this interdisciplinary paper is to create empathy for these individuals, specifically people with schizophrenia, Alzheimer disease, and post-traumatic amnesia. Through a collection of four stories told from the perspective of these unreliable narrators, I used fiction writing techniques from the field of cognitive literary studies such as gapping and defamiliarization to create more empathy in the reader. In reading …

The Performing Arts: An Equalizer In Education For All Students, A Teaching Artist’S Perspective, Annalisa Ledson

Graduate College Dissertations and Theses

This thesis explores the topic of performing arts integration in public education from the perspective of a teaching artist. The writing is comprised of a series of personal narratives woven together with scholarly references addressing education policy, applied behavior analysis, inequities in exclusionary practices and Autism Spectrum Disorder research. The intention is to draw awareness to the accessible role of teaching artists in public schools, the benefits of performing arts integration in education, and potential education policy shifts that could allow for students to learn empathy, vulnerability and sense of belonging. These narratives are used to support my position that …

Cultivating A Pedagogy Of Empathy: Teaching Science Fiction In A Changing Biotechnological World, Kathy L. Avery

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

CULTIVATING A PEDAGOGY OF EMPATHY: Teaching Science Fiction in a Changing Biotechnological World

By

KATHY L. AVERY

(Under the Direction of John Weaver)

Abstract

I argue that science fiction affords us the ability to think past our anthropocentrism, opening up a space for us to consider our relationship to burgeoning biotechnologies and the other. I provide critical interpretations of science fiction film and literature, which I believe stimulate the power of the narrative imagination to envision the “netherworld experience of the other”. I believe science fiction provides a site of speculation, a means to better understand and consider the role …