RES 5530: Race, Class, and Gender in Literacy Research (Spring 2009)

Text of pleasure: the text that contents, fills, grants euphoria; the text that comes from culture and does not break with it, is linked to a comfortable practice of reading. Text of bliss: the text that imposes a state of loss, the text that discomforts, unsettles the reader’s historical, cultural, psychological assumptions, the consistency of his [sic] tastes, values, memories, brings to a crisis his [sic] relation with language.~Roland Barthes

The past three years have been quite a journey for me. I left a place I knew well, the elementary classroom, and entered a place that initially caused anxiety, fear, and uncertainty. Of course I had been in school before, had excelled in school before, but this new step into the doctoral program felt completely different. It seemed that this new place required a different kind of thinking, a different kind of reading and a different kind of learning. On this end of three years, I realize that it required all of those things and for that I’m quite grateful. The reading and writing that I did in my masters program and continue to do in my doctorate program has changed my thinking as an educator and scholar. It has helped me see the comfort and security in a ‘text of pleasure’ and the struggle and hope in a ‘text of bliss’.

In the beginning reading was always what I did to travel to different places, to learn new things, to get lost in an unusual world. I would curl up on my bed or relax outside under the warm sun and read book after book. Texts of pleasure were always piled on my nightstand waiting for me to make a choice for the night. Those texts did leave me contented, filled with that sense of euphoria that comes after finishing a book. However, what I realize now is that I never challenged myself beyond those books. I never searched out books that might call into question what I believe and push me into a new world of thought and ideas. I never looked for those texts of bliss that made me slightly uncomfortable because it turned upside down beliefs I had held for a along time. However, as soon as I began my masters program, those texts of bliss found themselves in my hands over and over again. IN fact, those texts of bliss have now become what I search for, what I long to read, so that I can think about them, talk about them and grow from them as an individual and as a teacher.

Without a doubt, the pieces we have read in this class are texts of bliss. Each piece was thoughtfully written and filled with meaningful research that has the potential to create educational change. At the same time these pieces promoted change in educational systems and the importance of being informed about what happens in other parts of our world. Two of the pieces from our class seem to reflect all of these qualities: the piece on the Sudanese refuges and Reading Lives. The piece on the boys from the Sudan affected me as both an educator and a human being. First, I was completely in awe at how the boys made it to our country and began to build their knowledge of our language so that they could become active citizens for change. After all that they had been through, after all that they had seen, their main goal was to find a way to help those they had left behind. Learning a new language well enough to use it as a vehicle to support change requires a great deal of dedication and these boys were willing to do that without complaint. As a human being I also began to think about what I do to promote change. With all that I have had and with the little amount of hardship I have lived through, do I give back? Do I work to encourage change in my community, in my classes, with my students? These questions made me realize that while I do seem to encourage and support those around me, I still need to challenge myself to think more about the world around me. I think it is important for me to reflect on how my abilities could be best used to help those who need it.

As I read Reading Lives I also felt myself growing as both a person and a teacher, however, much of what I realized about myself from this piece is focused on the teacher I would be when I enter back into the classroom. So much of who I was as a teacher before I left the classroom has changed - for the better. I think my patience and acceptance for all students has grown in dramatic ways. Before I left the classroom I loved my students and wanted them to do well but I also allowed myself to be pulled into the drama that is an elementary school. I can’t tell you the number of times I was pulled from my classroom, taken from the students who really needed me to work on the yearbook, to plan a party, to attend a mandatory meeting, to calm a teacher who felt slighted by our principal or by a colleague and on and on. Now, with the time I’ve spent reading and discussing texts of bliss like Reading Lives I’ve noticed my weaknesses and have begun the process of building them into strengths. When you read about how teacher alienate students, you can’t help but feel uncomfortable because you know you have been there before. You can’t help but feel unsettled because you have done the same thing before - whether or not you realized it, or whether or not you feel justified in the end. Texts of bliss that create these feelings of discomfort can only serve to challenge us. They have challenged me to expect more from myself and to work hard to reach higher expectations. We have all felt those moments of helplessness like Hicks and the teachers she described. It’s almost a requirement for a teacher to hit rock bottom with a student and not know where to turn, however, it is in that moment of doom where we feel that we have lost the child that we can actually find a way to change things for the better.

Before I ramble more than I should, I’ll end this piece with a reflection on a reflection I’ve made it the past. Texts of pleasure and bliss are both necessary for the development of effective, compassionate teachers. We need the enjoyment of a book that fills our heart with ease and we need the challenge of a book that guides us toward great change. It is in reading books of bliss that we find ourselves, find our purpose and realize in the process our potential. As a teacher I see part of my role is to make sure all of my students know their purpose and work to achieve it. Knowing what you are supposed to give to this world makes it much easier to walk through it. Students like the boys from Sudan and students like Laurie and Jake need help to realize that purpose, so that they know there is a reason for learning and knowing. Asking students to read and answer comprehension questions or to answer 20 math problems does not always show a purpose for learning. We have to work to bring that purpose for learning to the classroom each day so that every child has the chance to figure out who he or she is supposed to be. Again, I have to quote Brian Selznick (2007) in his beautifully crafted narrative of the life of Hugo Cabret,

Sometimes I come up here are night, even when I’m not fixing the clocks, just to look at the city. I like to imagine that the world is one big machine. You know, machines never have nay extra parts. They have the exact number and type of parts they need. So I figure if the entire world is a big machine, I have to be here for some reason. And that means you have to be here for some reason, too.(Selznick, 378).

Maybe the key is to make sure we all have a purpose - because with purpose all things are possible.

Amie Snow