Literate Bodies: Multigenerational Participatory Action Research and Embodied Methodologies as Critical Literacy

Abstract

AbstractThe recent study Polling for Justice (PFJ) used a multigenerational participatory action research approach with embodied methodologies to document youth experiences of education, criminal justice, and public health in New York City. Through an exploration of the PFJ project, this column demonstrates how participatory action research and embodied methodologies can open up new possibilities for developing critical literacies across difference. Youth and adult researchers in PFJ negotiated with each other, with the literature, and with the public to produce new understandings of the language of criminalization and policing through theatre, images, art, and, most fundamentally, through valuing many kinds of expertise. We found that when we included personal experiences as well as survey data, and when we embodied data, through sculptures, images or scenes, we made room for multiple interpretations of language and data to come into our research collective and enrich the overall analysis.