(Re)membering in improvisation as anticolonial ruptures: (un)doing literacy work in puerto rico

ABSTRACT

Grounded in 10 years of critical literacy work in Puerto Rico, the authors engage readers creatively, to share key events in both our experiences as local teachers and as theatre activists in Puerto Rico. Our long-term purpose has been to explore new creative approaches to doing educational research and pedagogies that rupture traditional colonial structures of doing literacy work in local classrooms. After we share these creative stories we explore the idea of improvisation as Anticolonial literacy (un)doings to disrupt colonial imposed ways of inhabiting classroom spaces.

KEYWORDS:

• Critical literacy
• decoloniality
• improvisation
• Puerto Rico

Acknowledgments

Image #1 of el Sí-Dá performance is courtesy of photographer Miguel Villafañes

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. The games presented in this paper are explained in detail in the work of Márquez (1992). Image theatre, specifically, comes from Boal’s work on Theatre of the Oppressed presented in his book Games for Actors and Non Actors (Boal, 2002).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Carmen Liliana Medina

Carmen Liliana Medina is associate professor in the department of Curriculum and Instruction at Indiana University, Bloomington. She does research in the areas of literacy/biliteracy as social and critical practices, drama/performative pedagogies, and Latino/a (bilingual) children’s literature. In collaboration with Dr. Costa, she is the co-creator of the “Proyecto para el desarrollo de la literacidad crítica en Puerto Rico”.

Maria del Rocío Costa

Maria del Rocío Costa is professor of literacy and language arts in the Pedagogy Department at the University of Puerto Rico, Bayamón. Her research focus on critical literacy, social justice pedagogies and children’s literature. In collaboration with Dr. Medina, she is the co-creator of the “Proyecto para el desarrollo de la literacidad crítica en Puerto Rico”.