Notice Board

The Institute for Child and Youth Studies
along with 
Women Scholars' Speaker Series
presents:

Pop (Culture) Remix: Amplifying Play(giarism) in Children’s Compositions
Dr.  Cassie J. Brownell

October 8, 2024
10 a.m.
TH141
Refreshments provided

Many K-12 literacies researchers have reported on the complex ways children incorporate superheroes (Dyson, 2003), Disney princesses (Wohlwend, 2009), and Star Wars (Yoon, 2016) into their school-based writing. Likewise, scholars of post-secondary literacies have long highlighted remix as a rhetorical tool (Edwards, 2016). However, in both settings, there lingers a desire for authors to generate only “original” messages, despite decades of calls for a paradigmatic shift in how composing and its seemingly persistent nemesis – plagiarism — are understood (​​Johnson-Eilola & Selber, 2007). Particularly in our contemporary era, wherein “writing is now no longer the central mode of representation” (Bezemer & Kress, 2008, p. 166), such changes are all the more critical (Syverson, 1999). 

In this paper, I amplify how instances wherein elementary and middle school children actively engaged in play(giarism) in an array of compositions. In doing so, I examine their techniques to make intertextual tracings (Prior, 2004; Wynhoff Olsen et al., 2018) across their compositions while invoking a personal flair or style. Further, I identify how these personal productions afforded them new opportunities to engage in play, even as some discussed serious social issues. 

Cassie J. Brownell is an Associate Professor at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE) at the University of Toronto. In her child-centered, qualitative studies, Dr. Brownell aims to amplify children’s voices and perspectives to shift how adults conceive of and engage with children in schools and society. She has received several early career awards, including one from AERA’s Early Education & Child Development Special Interest Group in 2023, for her research into children’s lived experiences as raced, classed, and gendered individuals. Dr. Brownell has established a substantial funding record, including grants from the Canadian government (e.g., New Frontiers in Research Fund, Social Sciences, and Humanities Research Council) and U.S. granting agencies (e.g., National Academy of Education, Spencer Research Foundation).