The Political Nuances of Narratives and an Urban Educator\u27s Response

Theorists have begun to explore the ways in which the narratives our children read influence the democratic ideals we wish to impart. In a nation so stratified along both racial and socioeconomic lines and with a long history of various forms of systemic oppression, this issue is particularly relevant to how children in the most inequitable learning environments, situated in the most marginalized communities, come to see and know how to affect social change.This paper interrogates the narrative space of children’s literature with particular focus on the American civil rights movement. Based in Bell’s (2009) story type framework, it conceptualizes different story types as integrated pedagogical, philosophical, and curricular extensions that are produced, consumed, and regulated with specific political purposes in mind