Genocide Literature in Middle and Secondary Classrooms: Rhetoric, Witnessing, and Social Action in a Time of Standards and Accountability [Paperback]

At the heart of this inquiry into the ethical implications of education reform on reading practices in middle and secondary classrooms, the central question is what is lost, hidden, or marginalized in the name of progress? Drawing on her own experiences as an English teacher during the No Child Left Behind era, the author examines school cultures focused on meeting standards and measurable outcomes. She shows how genocide literature illuminates the ethics of reading and helps teachers and students rethink how literature should be taught in this modern, globalized era and the purposes of education more broadly.

Contents

Preface

Part I: Mandates

1. The Education of a Teacher: The First Year
2. Reading and Meeting a Mandate to Study Genocide

Part II: Rhetoric, Witnessing, and the Witness

3. The Rhetoric of the Word: A Case Study of Bosnia Herzegovina
4. Reading Testimony: Witnessing and the Witness

Part III: Rhetorical Appeals in Fiction

5. The Rhetoric and Aesthetic of Fiction in Genocide Literature
6. The Ethics of a Child Narrator
7. Emotional Appeals, Trauma, and Aesthetic Pleasure
8. Rational Appeals and Didacticism

Part IV: Into the Classroom

9. The Writing Workshop

A Teachers Testimony: Michael Krzysztofiak

10. Whole-Class Reading, Research, and Activism

A Teachers Testimony: Elaine Vogel