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Full-Text Articles in Community-Based Learning
The Current 'Ban-Demic': School Book Bans In The U.S., Barbara Perez, Jane Caputi
The Current 'Ban-Demic': School Book Bans In The U.S., Barbara Perez, Jane Caputi
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
This essay examines the alarming rise of U.S book. Our stance is grounded in our experiences as educators and academics in Florida, the state with the highest number of book bans and legislation that has significantly impacted education. Book bans infringe on freedom of expression, right to access information, = students’ right to education, and real harm to targeted communities (i.e., LGBTQIA+ and BIPOC communities), as the bans contribute to the ongoing marginalization and stigmatization of these communities. Diverse representation is key in literature and education. Banning popular culture texts from the classroom stifles critical thinking, social dialogue, and, ultimately, …
Escaping The Pedagogical Cabin In The Woods, Tony Kemerly, Davis Ritenour
Escaping The Pedagogical Cabin In The Woods, Tony Kemerly, Davis Ritenour
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
The American educational system, because of its seemingly innocuous yet ubiquitous nature, has become, to borrow a term from Roland Barthes, naturalized. By being naturalized, it has become a system that has somehow slipped beneath the radar of the American populace and operates on an autopilot of sorts that allows it to employ practices that don’t necessarily have the best interests of its constituents at heart. Murray Rothbard (1979) argued that compulsory schooling is not guided by altruism, but rather a desire to coerce the population into a mold that is desired by those possessing power in society. This need …
Ways Of Decoloniality By The Painted Lady: Avatar: The Last Airbender’S Katara Demonstrates How To Revive A Community In Ecological Distress Brought By The Colonial Expansion Of The Fire Nation, Jose Santos P. Ardivilla
Ways Of Decoloniality By The Painted Lady: Avatar: The Last Airbender’S Katara Demonstrates How To Revive A Community In Ecological Distress Brought By The Colonial Expansion Of The Fire Nation, Jose Santos P. Ardivilla
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
In the third episode of Avatar: The Last Airbender’s Book 3: The Book Of Fire, the “Gaang” consisting of Avatar Aang, Toph, Sokka, and Katara chanced upon a fishing village on stilts,ravaged by the pollution of its waterways. The pollution comes from the industrial activity of the Colonial Masters’ Fire Nation which greatly affected the village. This animation is from Nickelodeon, a channel geared for children’s entertainment, thus implicates humorous asides in what purports to be a serious epicurean reclaiming of a lost balance through indigenous visual culture, solidarity, media studies, and ecocriticism. Katara disguises herself as …
Revisiting Paradise Lost Through K-Pop: A Global Approach To Teaching Writing, Nayoung Bishoff
Revisiting Paradise Lost Through K-Pop: A Global Approach To Teaching Writing, Nayoung Bishoff
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
The short film series Wings (2016) by the Korean musical group BTS (Beyond the Scene) revisits John Milton’s Paradise Lost. BTS reinterprets Adam and Eve’s leaving of Eden as youths’ self-discovery process, overcoming a binary mindset. BTS emphasizes how experiences—trials, pains, and the struggle of youths to walk out of black-and-white perspectives—turn out to be “all so beautiful” as resources to grow. Wings demonstrates how the themes and elements in Paradise Lost can be used as a tool not only to explore Biblical concepts, but also to understand what pedagogical environments youths need to fully express themselves as writers. …
The Art Of Inclusion: Theatre’S Contribution To Popular Culture Literacy For Students With Intellectual Disabilities, Catherine R. P. King
The Art Of Inclusion: Theatre’S Contribution To Popular Culture Literacy For Students With Intellectual Disabilities, Catherine R. P. King
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
This essay explores the transformative role of theatre in special education, focusing on its capacity to foster social skills and life navigation abilities in students with disabilities. In light of the fundamental importance of these skills for social inclusion and quality of life, the article highlights the innovative and effective approach to integrating theatre into special education classrooms. It discusses how theatre can empower students with disabilities by enhancing their social interaction, communication, and life navigation skills. In addition, the article delves into the intersection of theatre and popular culture, showcasing how theatre can serve as a valuable tool for …
Don’T Sweat The Technique: Rhetoric, Coded Social Critique, And Conspiracy Theories In Hip-Hop, Josh Chase
Don’T Sweat The Technique: Rhetoric, Coded Social Critique, And Conspiracy Theories In Hip-Hop, Josh Chase
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
Conspiracy theories are once again a topic of heated debate in both popular and scholarly media. Critics on one side of this debate often take for granted an “underlying assumption that conspiracy theories should be subdued if not eliminated” (Uscinski 444). Other scholars have expressed concern over the ways the “conspiracy theorist” pejorative stifles dissent and regulates political rationality (Rankin; deHaven-Smith). Bratich argues that social anxieties about issues like emerging technology and race “get managed” through the public debate about conspiracy theories as an “object of concern” (160–61). This paper asks, what are the consequences when “conspiracy panic” spreads beyond …
A Touch Of Grey: Personal Reflections On Teaching The Grateful Dead To Seniors, Robert Trudeau
A Touch Of Grey: Personal Reflections On Teaching The Grateful Dead To Seniors, Robert Trudeau
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
This essay reflects on several occasions in which I was a facilitator introducing the music of the Grateful Dead to groups of senior citizens. Several themes emerge: First, there is the need to separate the facilitator’s feelings as a convinced Deadhead from the inclinations of older individuals who know little about the Grateful Dead. Second, an indirect approach that emphasizes lyrics and accessible songs seems to have the best impact, if the goal is to encourage individuals to want to learn more about, and listen to, the Grateful Dead’s music. Third, one should let students construct the framework of the …
Collaborative Pedagogy: Teaching (With) The Grateful Dead On Tour, On Campus, And Online, Rebecca G. Adams
Collaborative Pedagogy: Teaching (With) The Grateful Dead On Tour, On Campus, And Online, Rebecca G. Adams
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
This essay describes my experiences teaching with the Grateful Dead “on tour” in 1989, on campus in the early 2000s, and online in 2019. Using a life course framework, I discuss how my own development as a teacher, Deadhead, and Grateful Dead scholar and the changing context over time shaped these experiences and how teaching with the Grateful Dead opened a pedagogical space for experimentation that allowed the students and me to take risks and to collaborate despite status differences. Rather than unpacking these experiences entirely, my goal here is to focus on how these three experiences of teaching with …
What We Owe Our Students: The Good Place, Pedagogy, And The Architecture Of Engaged Learning, Shala A. Mills, Darrell Hamlin
What We Owe Our Students: The Good Place, Pedagogy, And The Architecture Of Engaged Learning, Shala A. Mills, Darrell Hamlin
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
Pedagogy is the architecture of a learning environment. The discipline of philosophy has often operated according to a pedagogy of conversation, clarity, and reflection, certainly since the era of Socratic dialogue in the streets of Athens. We argue that The Good Place occupies that space, re-setting this pedagogy as an architecture of learning through entertainment associated with ultimate matters of eternal disposition. A critical character driving conversation, clarity, and reflection across four seasons of the story’s arc is a philosopher – doomed by their own indecisive flaws – who teaches deep understanding of ethical development through a variety of relevant …
Society Doesn’T Owe You Anything: Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas & Video Games As Speculative Fiction, Marc A. Ouellette
Society Doesn’T Owe You Anything: Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas & Video Games As Speculative Fiction, Marc A. Ouellette
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
Since Donald Trump’s election in 2016, popular and scholarly commentators have been looking for speculative and/or dystopic literary works that might provide analogues for the Trump-era. Perhaps the most famous of these was the renewed popularity of Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. In this regard, though, video games remain an underexplored fictional form. With its exaggerated and parodic satire of an America ruled by the corruption and greed of extreme right-wing populism, Grand Theft Auto (GTA): San Andreas (2004) offers a speculative fiction that players can enact as well as imagine, and simulate as well as prepare. …
The Power Of Cool: Celebrity Influence In The Ivory Tower, Jena L. Hawk
The Power Of Cool: Celebrity Influence In The Ivory Tower, Jena L. Hawk
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
Since the earliest of times, student orations and student debates served as the main attractions at college and university commencement ceremonies. However, these elements faded over time, and commencement speakers, specifically politicians or academics, eventually replaced student performances. Often, the commencement speaker emphasized the students’ rite of passage into adulthood as well as the development of their moral character. During the 1800s, celebrities began to receive invitations to serve as commencement speakers, and since then, celebrity influence has increased greatly in higher education as celebrities now teach classes at colleges and universities. The use of celebrities allows colleges and universities …
Pop Culture And Politics: Engaging Students In American Government Through Art, Music, And Film, Laura Merrifield Wilson
Pop Culture And Politics: Engaging Students In American Government Through Art, Music, And Film, Laura Merrifield Wilson
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
Strategically and thoughtfully employing popular culture in teaching political science can enable students to better understand, analyze, and relate to the material. In a discipline that can be viewed by students as too boring, too distant, and too polarizing, the use of relevant music, TV/film clips, toys, memes, and other popular culture artifacts can engage otherwise unengaged students in a meaningful way. This paper argues that using popular culture in teaching political science can demonstrate relevance, serve as a generational translator, expose the bias of experience, and enable an expression of self. In demonstrating relevance, popular culture makes material fresh …
A Heartbeat Away: Popular Culture’S Role In Teaching Presidential Succession, Jay L. Wendland
A Heartbeat Away: Popular Culture’S Role In Teaching Presidential Succession, Jay L. Wendland
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
The role of popular culture in civic education is important. Many television viewers learn about the American political process through various dramatized depictions. The 25th Amendment has often received much attention from Hollywood, as it provides writers, directors, and producers a tool with which to further dramatize presidential succession. Through the television shows West Wing, Designated Survivor, Commander in Chief, Madam Secretary, and Political Animals, viewers are exposed to storylines revolving around the 25th Amendment. By viewing these dramatized versions of presidential succession, viewers are better able to understand the process and political science instructors …
D&D Beyond Bikini-Mail: Having Women At The Table, Daniel Carlson
D&D Beyond Bikini-Mail: Having Women At The Table, Daniel Carlson
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
Dungeons and Dragons represents a space that is often treated as an echo chamber for young (usually white) men to act out fantasies of power and control, which makes up for their inability to perform such actions in the real world. Using the work of Sherry Turkle and Michelle Dickey, I posit that this game is a nuanced location acting as a safe space for people to act out different aspects of their identity or life experiences in a low-risk environment enhanced by the connections made between the players and their characters. In this work, I have utililzed feminist frames …
Visuality Of Race In Popular Culture: Teaching Racial Histories And Iconography In Media, Joni Boyd Acuff, Amelia M. Kraehe
Visuality Of Race In Popular Culture: Teaching Racial Histories And Iconography In Media, Joni Boyd Acuff, Amelia M. Kraehe
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
The repetition of racist imagery from historical to contemporary popular culture is indicative of a lack of visual culture education among artists, designers, and other creative cultural producers working today. This paper addresses the dearth of resources for teaching visual codes and conventions of racial iconography that are recycled in popular media and contribute to the fabrication of racial differences, maintenance of racial hierarchies, and normalization of white supremacist ideology. Inspired by Critical Race Theory in art and visual culture education, the essay proposes teaching tactics and sites/sights that can support students in developing visual understandings of race in popular …
Hell You Talmbout: Mixtapes As Method For Online Environmental Justice Pedagogy, Elspeth Iralu, Caitlin Grann
Hell You Talmbout: Mixtapes As Method For Online Environmental Justice Pedagogy, Elspeth Iralu, Caitlin Grann
Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Popular Culture and Pedagogy
This paper takes on the mixtape as a pedagogical method for approaching urgent and critical topics within the undergraduate online classroom. Drawing on two case studies from different sections of an introductory course on environmental and social justice taught in an American studies department, we demonstrate how mixtape-inspired assignments offer a method for theorizing and enacting the connections between popular culture and critical scholarship around injustice in the humanities and social sciences while also altering the space of the classroom to promote deeper student engagement, comprehension, and reflection. We argue that introducing popular culture as both content and method within …