Mad to the bone: learning outcomes of critical grief pedagogy

ABSTRACT

We outline critical grief pedagogy as a Mad feminist response to the silencing of loss that often occurs in academic spaces. This pedagogical framework creates openings for students to “break open the bone” of their own and others’ losses, particularly through community-engaged learning and research. Using collaborative autoethnography, in this essay we (a professor and her mentees) explore our experiences working with the Scraps of the Heart Project—a community-based research collective focused on empowering families following the loss of a baby—to understand student learning outcomes that were born from our engagement with critical grief pedagogy. Our collective narratives revealed that these learnings included: gaining compassionate communication skills, embracing and unpacking failure as a method of mourning, becoming empowered and empowering others to share their stories of loss, and building a community of Mad grievers. We put these learning outcomes into conversation with cultural discourses surrounding pedagogical and academic norms. Additionally, we offer insight into how loss and mourning can be invited into the classroom so that students learn to engage grief critically, meaningfully, and Madly—and to learn important communicative skills along the way.

KEYWORDS:

• collaborative autoethnography
• community-engaged learning
• feminist pedagogy
• loss
• Mad grief

Notes on contributors

Erin K. Willer (Ph.D., 2009, University of Nebraska-Lincoln) is an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication Studies at the University of Denver.

Emily Krebs (M.A., University of Denver, 2017) is a Ph.D. student in the Department of Communication Studies at the University of Utah.

Nivea Castaneda (Ph.D., University of Denver, 2017) is a Lecturer in the Department of Communication and Media at Boise State University.

April Samaras (M.A., Regis University, 2014) is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Communication Studies at the University of Denver and an Assistant Professor in the Department of Behavioral and Social Sciences at Regis College. The University of Denver's Center for Community Engagement to advance Scholarship and Learning Public Good Fund Grant partially funded this project.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1 “Mad” is capitalized to signal a distinction between the historical medical and disparaging term (“mad”), and the social reclamation of that term (“Mad”) as a broad, resistive, and activist group identity. This term is rooted in the Mad Pride movement that originated in 1993.

2 Pseudonym.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by University of Denver Center for Community Engagement to advance Scholarship and Learning Public Good Fund Grant