Towards kinship literacies: attending to place relations in a play-based library program

Abstract

ABSTRACT Kinship relationality understands the world as alive and sentient, and positions humans as participants within interconnected ecological networks. Inherently, this worldview can challenge how many educators and learners have been trained in extractive, transactional, and sedentary cultures; that is, separated out of relationship. This article shares the work of a large urban public library in western Canada, and their ‘Play Professor,’ as they built and facilitated an outdoor play-based literacy program. Following the program, amid subtle and stark reminders of ecological disaster, we noted the possibilities and complexities when moving literacy learning outdoors. Guided by kinship relationality [Donald. 2021. “We Need a New Story: Walking and the wâhkôhtowin Imagination.” Journal of the Canadian Association for Curriculum Studies 18 (2): 53–63. https://doi.org/10.25071/1916-4467.40492], this article centres how conceptions of literacies might be expanded and nuanced to engage languages and stories already alive within the place-based ecologies where the learning occurs. Sharing vignettes of how the program unfolded, we sketch shifts in facilitation as other life forms came into the storied play. To support relational renewal in and through literacy practices we then bring forward the notion of kinship literacies and articulate three catalysts to support its growth: attuning to ecological stories, enhancing holistic practices, and expanding dialogue.