Barrio Nerds

"When Pulitzer Prize nominated author Richard Rodriguez published his autobiography, Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez in 1982, he received much criticism due to his views on issues such as assimilation, bilingual education, and affirmative action. Polemically, since Rodriguez’s publication, a book length revisiting of some of his ideas is for the most part non-existent. Inspired by Rodriguez’s work, Barrio Nerds: Latino Males, Schooling, and the Beautiful Struggle presents a compelling window into the schooling trajectories of Latino males, while also providing critical and alternative views. These portraits of working-class students and academics that achieved academic success move beyond clean victory narratives and thus complicate our notions of “success” and “rising up.” Blending versus separating the exploration of street kid/school kid identities, we get a glimpse into the merging and collision of multiple cultural worlds in ways that are liberating and often painful and full of ambivalence. Additionally, we get provocative takes on giftedness, the philosophical and political dimensions of “home,” and masculinities. Ultimately, Barrio Nerds: Latino Males, Schooling, and the Beautiful Struggle is a reminder of how academic achievement is often embedded in gain and in loss and it is a thoughtful meditation on how many Latino males of working-class origins do not reject the past, but instead use this precious knowledge to holistically live out the present."

Contributions by Carolina Alonso, Elena Avilés, Trevor Boffone, Christi Cook, Ella Diaz, Amanda Ellis, Cristina Herrera, Guadalupe García McCall, Domino Pérez, Adrianna M. Santos, Roxanne Schroeder-Arce, Lettycia Terrones, and Tim Wadham In Nerds, Goths, Geeks, and Freaks: Outsiders in Chicanx and Latinx Young Adult Literature, the outsider intersects with discussions of race, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality. The essays in this volume address questions of outsider identities and how these identities are shaped by mainstream myths around Chicanx and Latinx young people, particularly with the common stereotype of the struggling, underachieving inner-city teens. Contributors also grapple with how young adults reclaim what it means to be an outsider, weirdo, nerd, or goth, and how the reclamation of these marginalized identities expand conversations around authenticity and narrow understandings of what constitutes cultural identity. Included are analysis of such texts as I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter, Shadowshaper, Swimming While Drowning, and others. Addressed in the essays are themes of outsiders in Chicanx/Latinx children’s and young adult literature, and the contributors insist that to understand Latinx youth identities it is necessary to shed light on outsiders within an already marginalized ethnic group: nerds, goths, geeks, freaks, and others who might not fit within such Latinx popular cultural paradigms as the chola and cholo, identities that are ever-present in films, television, and the internet.

In this book, Rodríguez uses theories of critical literacy and culturally responsive teaching to argue that our schools, and our culture, need sustaining and inclusive young adult (YA) literature/s to meet the needs of culturally and linguistically diverse readers and all students. This book provides an outline for the study of literature through cultural and literary criticism, via essays that analyze selected YA literature (drama, fiction, nonfiction, and poetry) in four areas: scribal identities and the self-affirmation of adolescents; gender and sexualities; schooling and education of young adult characters; and teachers’ roles and influences in characters’ coming of age. Applying critical literacy theories and a youth studies lens, this book shines a light on the need for culturally sustaining and inclusive pedagogies to read adolescent worlds. Complementing these essays are critical conversations with seven key contemporary YA literature writers, adding biographical perspectives to further expand the critical scholarship and merits of YA literature.

Mentoring Students of Color explores the ways in which race plays a critical role in mentoring youth of color and provides mentors, practitioners and researchers a critical lense for understanding the ways in which cross-racial mentoring impact youth.

This reader introduces students to the variety and complexity of Latinxs′ experiences in the U.S., and prepares them for further study in this interdisciplinary field. The opening essay, written by the editors, offers a broad overview of the approximately 59 million people in the U.S. who identify as Hispanic. The rest of the book will consist of contributed essays from Latina(o)/Chicana(o) scholars on a range of subjects including immigration, citizenship, and deportation; racial identities; political participation and power; educational and economic achievement; family; religion; media and popular culture. Although the essays are written for lower-division undergraduates, they reflect many of the leading theoretical and methodological approaches in the field. The essays are unified by an intersectional approach, demonstrating how experiences and life chances of Latinxs are also shaped by gender, social class, sexuality, age, and citizenship status.

The kids and I had a lot of fun over the years putting this compilation together. It is said somewhere that character is built by the union of intellect and heart. Enjoy!

All too often, defining a discipline becomes more an exercise of exclusion than inclusion. Disrupting the Digital Humanities seeks to rethink how we map disciplinary terrain by directly confronting the gatekeeping impulse of many other so-called field-defining collections. What is most beautiful about the work of the Digital Humanities is exactly the fact that it can't be tidily anthologized. In fact, the desire to neatly define the Digital Humanities (to filter the DH-y from the DH) is a way of excluding the radically diverse work that actually constitutes the field. This collection, then, works to push and prod at the edges of the Digital Humanities - to open the Digital Humanities rather than close it down. Ultimately, it's exactly the fringes, the outliers, that make the Digital Humanities both lovely and rigorous. This collection does not constitute yet another reservoir for the new Digital Humanities canon. Rather, our aim is less about assembling content as it is about creating new conversations. Building a truly communal space for the digital humanities requires that we all approach that space with a commitment to: 1) creating open and non-hierarchical dialogues; 2) championing non-traditional work that might not otherwise be recognized through conventional scholarly channels; 3) amplifying marginalized voices; 4) advocating for students and learners; and 5) sharing generously to support the work of our peers. TABLE OF CONTENTS // Cathy N. Davidson, "Preface: Difference is Our Operating System" Dorothy Kim and Jesse Stommel, "Disrupting the Digital Humanities: An Introduction" I. Etymology Adeline Koh, "A Letter to the Humanities: DH Will Not Save You" Audrey Watters, "The Myth and the Millennialism of 'Disruptive Innovation'" Meg Worley, "The Rhetoric of Disruption: What are We Doing Here?" Jesse Stommel, "Public Digital Humanities" II. Identity Jonathan Hsy and Rick Godden, "Universal Design and Its Discontents" Angel Nieves, "DH as 'Disruptive Innovation' for Restorative Social Justice: Virtual Heritage and 3D Reconstructions of South Africa's Township Histories" Annemarie Perez, "Lowriding through the Digital Humanities" III. Jeremiad Mongrel Coalition Against Gringpo, "Gold Star for You," "Mongrel Dream Library" Michelle Moravec, "Exceptionalism in Digital Humanities: Community, Collaboration, and Consensus" Matt Thomas, "The Trouble with ProfHacker" Sean Michael Morris, "Digital Humanities and the Erosion of Inquiry" IV. Labor Moya Bailey, "#transform(ing)DH Writing and Research: An Autoethonography of Digital Humanities and Feminist Ethics" Kathi Inman Berens and Laura Sanders, "DH and Adjuncts: Putting the Human Back into the Humanities" Liana Silva Ford, "Not Seen, Not Heard" Spencer D. C. Keralis, "Disrupting Labor in Digital Humanities; or, The Classroom Is Not Your Crowd" V. Networks Maha Bali, "The Unbearable Whiteness of the Digital" Eunsong Kim, "The Politics of Visibility" Bonnie Stewart, "Academic Influence: The Sea of Change" VI. Play Edmond Y Chang, "Playing as Making" Kat Lecky, "Humanizing the Interface" Robin Wharton, "Bend Until It Breaks: Digital Humanities and Resistance" VII. Structure Chris Friend, "Outsiders, All: Connecting the Pasts and Futures of Digital Humanities and Composition" Lee Skallerup-Bessette, "W(h)ither DH? New Tensions, Directions, and Evolutions in the Digital Humanities" Chris Bourg, "The Library is Never Neutral" Fiona Barnett, "After the Digital Humanities, or, a Postscript" Conclusion Dorothy Kim, "#DecolonizeDH or A Practical Guide to Making DH Less White"