Rural Women, Creative Writing, and Resistance

Bibliographic Data

ID21650255
AuthorsHonor B Mcelroy (0000-0003-2807-6851, Salisbury University, corresponding author)
Year2023
Volume55
Issue4
Pages361-382
Publication date2023-12-01
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Reading Behavior (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0022-4111 • E-ISSN: 1554-8430
PublisherSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/1086296x231215759
OpenAlexW4388911703
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited25

Blending narrative portraiture and feminist methods, this study explored the lives of two rural women who are creative writers. The study asked (1) What are their critical purposes? and (2) How did gender and place intersect in their writing lives? The findings were that the women used creative writing to engage in praxis by creating and disseminating knowledge. Their writing critically interrogated and redefined conceptions of womanhood. Additional critical purposes were unique to women's intersectional identities and lived experiences. They ranged from interrogating societal perspectives of gender, sexuality, and race to interrogating rurality and sexual violence. The aesthetic texts they created articulated and advocated for intersubjective truths. Shifting the focus of critical literacy from pedagogy and reading to writing beyond educational spaces, the women drew upon critical literacy not as a means of being taught how to understand the power of texts, but to wield the power of texts themselves

Creative writing · Critical literacy · Human sexuality · Literacy · Literature · Narrative · Pedagogy · Political science · Praxis · Rural area · Rurality · Sociology · Visual arts · Art Education and Development · Gender Studies · Indigenous and Place-Based Education · Literacy, Media, and Education

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