Subversive Rabble Rousing: Interrupting School Silencing

Abstract:
Growing diversity in classrooms can lead to an educative atmosphere where critical conversations on topics of sociocultural difference are subverted and silenced. In this presentation, I identify several potential causes for sociocultural silencing within the curriculum and explore a pilot study conducted with secondary school students in an urban setting where students created soundscapes based on lived experiences. Through these soundscapes, students developed dialogue that aimed to interrupt sociocultural silencing. I use this study to examine how students may come to recognize the systemic and institutional oppressions that have led to the inequities in their school, community, and personal lives.