{"id":66565,"date":"2021-11-21T16:44:00","date_gmt":"2021-11-21T20:44:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/?post_type=bu-article&p=66565"},"modified":"2023-08-10T22:54:22","modified_gmt":"2023-08-11T02:54:22","slug":"literature-that-reflects-the-world","status":"publish","type":"bu-article","link":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/magazine\/articles\/2021\/literature-that-reflects-the-world\/","title":{"rendered":"Literature That Reflects the World"},"content":{"rendered":"\t
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\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tLiterature That Reflects the World\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/h1>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t

Laura Jim\u00e9nez is working to disrupt the traditional primary and secondary school reading curriculum, \u201cone teacher at a time\u201d<\/h4>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n\t\t\n\t<\/div>\n\n\t\n
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November 21, 2021<\/div>\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
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When Laura M. Jim\u00e9nez finally learned to read at age 11\u2014she\u2019d been held back by dyslexia\u2014she was smitten. She devoured Judy Blume, the Hardy Boys, and Nancy Drew, who \u201cwas always getting conked on the head,\u201d as Jim\u00e9nez recalls. \u201cI worried she was going to get a concussion.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI had a not great childhood,\u201d says Jim\u00e9nez<\/a>, who is Latinx and a lesbian and grew up in Long Beach, Calif. \u201cReading was an escape, a place to hide. I read more than I did homework. I hardly ever read what was assigned in school.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What was missing from the books she was assigned in school, such as The Great Gatsby<\/em> and To Kill a Mockingbird<\/em>, was anyone who looked like her, or shared any part of her identity. Instead, says Jim\u00e9nez, there were soul-crushing negative stereotypes\u2014drug lords, prostitutes, wacky Speedy Gonzales characters, closeted gay people. \u201cThe message is that your story isn\u2019t valued, that you don\u2019t belong in school,\u201d Jim\u00e9nez says. \u201cI learned that school was not my place.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And yet, as Jim\u00e9nez would discover later, school was<\/em> her place. Now, as a senior lecturer and scholar of literacy and children\u2019s literature, Jim\u00e9nez is a leader in a growing movement to bring more diverse writers, as well as books and stories about complex characters who are Black, Indigenous, people of color, LGBTQIA+, and from other marginalized and underrepresented groups, into the nation\u2019s elementary and secondary school classrooms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Laura M. Jim\u00e9nez is part of a growing movement to bring more diverse books and stories to our nation\u2019s classrooms. Dana Smith<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe need to have a literature that reflects the world,\u201d says Jim\u00e9nez, who has a PhD in educational technology and educational psychology from Michigan State University and also serves as BU Wheelock\u2019s associate dean for equity, diversity, and inclusion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The nation\u2019s demographics are changing rapidly, and a majority of public school students are now nonwhite. And yet the standardized English Language Arts curriculum that teachers are expected to follow in schools across the country still relies heavily on white authors writing about white people, say Jim\u00e9nez and other educators and scholars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf you\u2019re still focused on Tuck Everlasting<\/em>\u2014or on Shakespeare or Steinbeck\u2014you\u2019re sending the message that marginalized voices, marginalized history, and marginalized stories aren\u2019t important,\u201d Jim\u00e9nez says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She and other educators aren\u2019t suggesting that the classics be discarded: \u201cWe\u2019re saying there are other great books.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jim\u00e9nez cites research showing that kids who are given a choice of books tend to read more\u2014and read more carefully. That was certainly true for her. She waxes rhapsodic about the card catalogue in her old branch library in Long Beach. \u201cI loved, loved, loved the card catalogue, because you could browse,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A Book is a Window, or a Mirror<\/h6>\n\n\n\n

Jim\u00e9nez teaches literacy and children\u2019s literature to undergraduate and graduate students who are aspiring teachers, or teacher candidates, as they\u2019re called, and classroom teachers who come to BU Wheelock for additional training and certification. She approaches teaching\u2014and her critical analysis of literacy and children\u2019s literature\u2014through what she and other educators describe as an intersectional social justice lens.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Explaining how the term applies to elementary and secondary school classrooms, Jim\u00e9nez writes in a January 2021 article for Language Arts Lessons<\/em><\/a>, the journal for the National Council of Teachers of English, \u201cTeacher candidates must learn to recognize, appreciate and celebrate identities that are different from their own across multiple matrices of race, ethnicity, language, gender, sexuality, ability, religion and class.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIntersectionality\u2014the term was coined by scholar Kimberl\u00e9 Crenshaw<\/a>\u2014recognizes that we all have multiple facets to our identities,\u201d she writes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Books that authentically represent diverse characters are valuable for all young readers, says Jim\u00e9nez, and can teach white children about people who are different from them. In her article, Jim\u00e9nez cites the work of Rudine Sims Bishop<\/a>, an Ohio State University professor emerita, who, in a 1990 article about the lack of authentic representation of African Americans in children\u2019s literature, suggested that books can be windows for readers into real or imagined worlds, sliding doors allowing readers to visit those worlds, or mirrors reflecting the reader\u2019s world. \u201cReading, then, becomes a means of self-affirmation,\u201d Bishop wrote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The metaphor is more relevant than ever today, says Jim\u00e9nez. \u201cBecause readers bring their identities and life experiences into their transactions with texts,\u201d she writes, \u201ca book can be a window for one reader and a mirror for another.\u201d It follows, she adds, that \u201cteachers\u2019 expertise and understanding of the students and the literature is essential.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cBecause readers bring their identities and life experiences into their transactions with texts, a book can be a window for one reader and a mirror for another.\u201d\u2013Laura Jim\u00e9nez<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Jim\u00e9nez teaches and recommends children\u2019s books referred to as #OwnVoices, which was developed on Twitter and promotes kidlit by authors from marginalized or underrepresented groups writing about people like themselves. Such books include The Parker Inheritance<\/em> by Varian Johnson and Ivy Aberdeen\u2019s<\/em> Letter to the World<\/em> by Ashley Herring Blake.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jim\u00e9nez has her own requirements for these books: They must show \u201cmarginalized individuals as whole people, leading complex lives that do not adhere to the dominant white narrative,\u201d she writes in her article. They must also push back against biased narratives about marginalized communities, be relevant to the students reading them, promote deep engagement, and address literacy skills and standards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s a lot to ask from a book, says Jim\u00e9nez. However, when she brings a book into the classroom,  she writes, \u201cI\u2019m using the most precious resource there is in education\u2014time,\u201d and she wants to be sure the book is worthy of everyone\u2019s time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Disrupting the Reading Curriculum<\/h6>\n\n\n\n

The nation\u2019s teachers are 80 percent white and, says Jim\u00e9nez, the majority of her BU Wheelock students are white, middle-class women. \u201cThese are people who want to be teachers because they loved school,\u201d she says. \u201cThe system is literally made for them. How do I convince them that this thing that was really good for them needs to change, and that they\u2019re the ones who have to change it?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Her students, especially the millennials, end up embracing the literature she introduces to them. \u201cThey\u2019ve grown up in a world where, although they were not taught in school about oppressive systems, they\u2019ve lived through it,\u201d she says. \u201cThey grew up with Ferguson. They saw it on social media.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jim\u00e9nez wants to disrupt the traditional whiteness-centered reading curriculum \u201cteacher by teacher. We\u2019re asking them to teach anti-oppression in the classroom,\u201d she says. \u201cIt\u2019s a really scary time for teachers to be doing that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She is referring to the latest culture wars playing out in Texas, Virginia, Washington, D.C., New Hampshire, and other states across the country, with conservative Republicans at the national, state, and local levels taking steps to block curriculums in primary and secondary schools that emphasize systemic racism. Their targets include books and teaching they deem focused on identity, and the nation\u2019s racist history.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe\u2019re trying to figure out if these things go through, how can teachers work around them,\u201d Jim\u00e9nez says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Changing or even just expanding the reading curriculum has long been an uphill battle. When her students enter their own classrooms, they often experience pushback from the school bureaucracy, Jim\u00e9nez says. \u201cThey\u2019ll say they don\u2019t have time for new books\u2014that if you\u2019re going to add something, then you have to give something up,\u201d she says. But teachers have some autonomy in individual classrooms, and Jim\u00e9nez sees part of her role as helping her former students navigate bureaucracies and avoid \u201cgetting swallowed up by a system that doesn\u2019t support their ideas.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Students at 826 Boston, a widely admired nonprofit youth writing program in Roxbury, Mass., show off their projects. Jim\u00e9nez and other Wheelock faculty members are exploring a partnership with the organization. Photo courtesy of 826 Boston<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

For Jim\u00e9nez, some of the opposition has become personal. She analyzes and recommends graphic novels for children on her blog, Booktoss<\/em><\/a>. Her followers include teachers, children\u2019s librarians, and other scholars. Writing about being a Latinx lesbian who wants to disrupt the status quo, she has grown accustomed to getting bashed and bullied on social media. But in 2018, after she criticized a new graphic novel for being overtly racist and Islamophobic\u2014the publisher subsequently pulled the book amid the loud outcry\u2014a letter loaded with obscene, hate-filled death threats against her arrived via snail mail in her BU mailbox. BU administrators and security officials responded immediately, says Jim\u00e9nez, and went to great lengths to ensure her safety.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jim\u00e9nez shut down her blog for almost six months, but eventually decided she was not going to be silenced. \u201cYou can just say, \u2018Fine, it\u2019s not worth it, I\u2019m going away,\u2019 or you can take all the precautions you need and keep moving forward,\u201d she says, adding that she has been strongly supported by her colleagues, other scholars, and teachers, as well as her family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Among several other projects, Jim\u00e9nez and other BU Wheelock faculty members are exploring a partnership with 826 Boston, a widely admired nonprofit youth writing program in Roxbury, Mass. \u201cThey teach writing like nobody\u2019s business,\u201d says Jim\u00e9nez. The idea is for BU Wheelock students to learn from 826 Boston about teaching creative writing, and for 826 Boston to learn more about reading children\u2019s literature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It fits with Jim\u00e9nez\u2019s mission, for kids from marginalized and underrepresented groups to have access to the literature she believes they deserve: high-quality books that will help them become lifelong readers, like her. Kids might love a book because it surprises them, Jim\u00e9nez writes on Booktoss<\/em>, \u201cor because it reflects them in ways that they have never seen before, provides them respite from their everyday lives, or shows them things they never knew or imagined.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
1. Green Lantern: Legacy<\/em><\/a> by Minh L\u00ea, illustrated by Andie Tong (Elementary\/Middle Grade)<\/h6>\n\n\n\n
2. Long Way Down<\/em> by Jason Reynolds<\/a> (Elementary\/Middle Grade)<\/h6>\n\n\n\n
3. An Indigenous Peoples\u2019 History of the United States for Young People<\/em><\/a> by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz, adapted by Jean Mendoza and Debbie Reese (Young Adult)<\/h6>\n\n\n\n
4. When the Moon Was Ours<\/em><\/a> by Anna-Marie McLemore (Young Adult)<\/h6>\n\n\n\n
5. With the Fire on High<\/em><\/a> by Elizabeth Acevedo (Young Adult)<\/h6>\n\n\n\n
6. Akata Witch<\/em><\/a> series by Nnedi Okorafor (Young Adult)<\/h6>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Laura M. Jim\u00e9nez finally learned to read at age 11\u2014she\u2019d been held back by dyslexia\u2014she was smitten. She devoured Judy Blume, the Hardy Boys, and Nancy Drew, who \u201cwas always getting conked on the head,\u201d as Jim\u00e9nez recalls. \u201cI worried she was going to get a concussion.\u201d \u201cI had a not great childhood,\u201d says Jim\u00e9nez, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9090,"featured_media":55901,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"bu_prepress_billboard":"","_bu_prepress_primary_term":"","_bu_prepress_primary_term_manual":""},"tags":[],"bu-publication":[6613],"magazine-article-category":[],"magazine-topic":[],"news-article-category":[],"news-topic":[],"bu_edition":[6618],"media_type":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/66565"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/bu-article"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9090"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66565"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/66565\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":66566,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/66565\/revisions\/66566"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/55901"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66565"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66565"},{"taxonomy":"bu-publication","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-publication?post=66565"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-article-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/magazine-article-category?post=66565"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/magazine-topic?post=66565"},{"taxonomy":"news-article-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-article-category?post=66565"},{"taxonomy":"news-topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-topic?post=66565"},{"taxonomy":"bu_edition","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu_edition?post=66565"},{"taxonomy":"media_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-kayla.cms-devl.bu.edu\/wheelock\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media_type?post=66565"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}