Papers by Stephanie Jones
Critical Studies in Education, 2026
This manuscript argues for the framing of teacher education research and programs through a visio... more This manuscript argues for the framing of teacher education research and programs through a visionary feminist lens. We believe that teacher education serves as an important space for the education of women, yet these spaces have a history of reproducing patriarchal, sexist, and misogynistic ways of thinking and being in the world that are not in the best interest of the very students in these programs, and indeed are harmful to them. Thus, we present the work of Jane Addams, analyzed through the work of bell hooks to illustrate a visionary feminist theory and pedagogy that incorporates: the critique and decentering of patriarchy and patriarchal power through the centering of girls’, women’s, and other marginalized people’s lives; non-hierarchical ways of being in solidarity; and approaching education as a political project grown out of lived experiences. Overall, we argue that the radical, visionary feminist projects of Addams and hooks is one possible combination that can inspire a conceptual lens for designing and studying teacher education that is up for the task of our personal, social, political, and economic lives in 2025 and beyond.
Teachers College Record, 2024
Designing pedagogical spaces that affirm and embody the aesthetic theories that guide practitione... more Designing pedagogical spaces that affirm and embody the aesthetic theories that guide practitioners in art education (and education broadly speaking) isn't always easy. Those theories call for experimentation, creative expression, protest, rejection of repetition, and a collective creation of newness and difference. In other words, these theories call for pedagogues to be comfortable with the unpredictable and emerging ways of being and becoming within specific entanglements of place, children, materiality, discourses, bodies, sound, affect, and so much more. In this graphica piece, the authors illuminate an enduring pedagogical event that was designed for and unfolded at an informal, no-fee, community-based education center for youth [second author] directed for six years. Affectionately called "The Clubhouse," this neighborhood-embedded space centered critical aesthetic, relational ways of being that we have conceived of as a what if world. While James (first author) was aware that their carefully planned sessions with the youth were being carried away by the animated entanglement of children, music instruments, and an affirming space, and was uneasy that the "noise" produced by those participants might be bothering others or distracting from James' own presumed learning objectives, they carried on and lived through theories of aesthetic education joyfully. The piece suggests that constraining forces that push toward compliance keep living theory and living theory joyfully at bay.
Journal of Children's Literature, 2024
From the Introduction of the Special Issue of Journal of Children's Literature:
[The] first arti... more From the Introduction of the Special Issue of Journal of Children's Literature:
[The] first article starts with the story of Katie
Rinderle, a fifth-grade teacher in Georgia, who was fired
for reading the picturebook My Shadow Is Purple (Stuart,
2022) to her class. In “Going Public with Contested Books:
Statewide Read-Aloud Events as a Critical, Feminist
Posthumanist Approach to Advocacy and Activism in
Politically Turbulent Times,” authors Stephanie Jones,
Grace Enriquez, Roberta Price Gardner, and Susan
Flis responded to these events by coordinating a set of
community read-alouds of Stuart’s book. The article details
the laws that shaped the sociopolitical context; the ways
they purposefully drew on the work of scholar and activist
adrienne maree brown to plan and encourage the network
of community-based read-aloud events; the types of spaces
that were created during these events; and the ways that
such open-ended, context-dependent, flexible, and feminist,
posthumanist responses can create spaces that move
critical educators out of what can often be a depleting
attack < > defend binary.
Bank Street Occasional Papers, 2024
The authors use graphica to explore the roles of visual culture in the production of gendered nor... more The authors use graphica to explore the roles of visual culture in the production of gendered norms and the recent proliferation of anti-trans bills in the United States. They present an argument that bodies, gender, and sexuality are always-already among the material-discursive world with which we all entangle and learn with every day. Educators can integrate children’s and youth’s everyday lived experiences with visual culture to analyze and interrogate the bodied impact it has on them as individual people and as a collective society. This kind of body and gender-focused analysis is important all the time in an effort to create affirming spaces for everyone in education, but it is absolutely critical to the well-being of trans and gender nonconforming youth and educators in these dark times.
Leisure Sciences, 2024
The authors in this paper present several storied vignettes to argue for a feminist, posthumanist... more The authors in this paper present several storied vignettes to argue for a feminist, posthumanist orientation to Leisure as a potentially transformative assemblage for healing of trauma. They draw on Peter Levine's Somatic Experiencing alongside quantum understandings of the body and ancient wisdom and practices that inform Levine's work such as breath work, movement, presence, gratitude, energy healing, nonduality, and the interconnectedness of all beings and forces to present the idea that posthuman "assemblages" produce healing and healing practices. They argue that Leisure is uniquely positioned as a space and a field where this transformative work can come to life, advocating for more just, ethical, and healing relational ways of being with the human and more-than-human world. How to listen to a tree Be still. Even stiller. Breathe out one more time to tell your body you're not going anywhere so just stop being ready to move already. Squat down. Sit. Close your eyes. Open them again to see the tree differently. Then slowly, slowly, move around the tree as it guides you to look. Be surprised what you sense, what the tree wants you to notice.
Progressive Neoliberalism in Education, 2022
United States President Joe Biden ran on a platform that included support for unions, racial just... more United States President Joe Biden ran on a platform that included support for unions, racial justice, youth rights in schools, and public education. He has assembled the most diverse cabinet in history with appointments of the first indigenous woman, first openly gay man, and has surrounded himself with women and Black and Latinx people. These moves reflect what Fraser (2017) calls progressive politics of recognition, but she asserts that hegemonic neoliberalism prevents both parties from critiquing capitalism resulting in the perpetuation of economic inequality and persistent crises. In other words, progressive neoliberalism may sound like a contradictory phrase, but it illuminates the way neoliberal ideologies and policies have infiltrated progressive leadership and undermines the very aims they claim to pursue. In this chapter I present one decision that Biden made to uphold the K-12 mandate for state testing as a way to illustrate progressive neoliberalism in action. Specifically, I argue that this decision reveals unwavering support for capitalism that likely guided his decision-making and thus undermined any potential for justice or equity. I draw upon Marx's (1990) and Harvey's (2018) arguments that the capitalist mode of production creates a system in which decisions are made either on the side of capital or labor to indicate Biden's choosing the side of capital.
International Journal of Education Through Art, 2022
English Teaching: Practice and Critique, 2023
The purpose of this paper is to provide a transcript of a dialogue among literacy educators and r... more The purpose of this paper is to provide a transcript of a dialogue among literacy educators and researchers on the impact of generative aritficial intelligence (AI) in the field. In the spring of 2023, a lively conversation emerged on the National Council of Research on Language and Literacy (NCRLL)'s listserv. Stephanie initiated the conversation by sharing an op-ed she wrote for Atlanta Journal-Constitution about the rise of ChatGPT and similar generative AI platforms, moving beyond the general public's concerns about student cheating and robot takeovers. NCRLL then convened a webinar of eight leading scholars in writing and literacies development, inspired by that listerv conversation and an organizational interest in promoting intergenerational collaboration among literacy scholars. Design/methodology/approach-As former doctoral students of two of the panel participants, webinar facilitators Grace and Victoria positioned themselves primarily as learners about this topic and gathered questions from colleagues, P-16 practitioners and those outside the field of education to
Bank Street Occasional Papers, 2023
Anthropology & Education Quarterly, 2007
This article draws from a three-year ethnographic study of girls and their mothers in a high-pove... more This article draws from a three-year ethnographic study of girls and their mothers in a high-poverty, predominantly white community. Informed by critical and feminist theories of social class, I present four cases that highlight psychosocial tensions within the mother-daughterteacher-researcher triangle and argue that white, middle-class female teachers and ethnographers need to be particularly reflexive when working with children across the social class divide.
Atlanta Journal Constitution, 2023
This essay asserts that the Cobb County School District is incorrectly interpreting Georgia's 202... more This essay asserts that the Cobb County School District is incorrectly interpreting Georgia's 2022 ban on divisive concepts to fire a teacher for reading the children's picture book "My Shadow is Purple." They argue that the teacher's pedagogical decisions are actually affirmed by the Georgia "divisive concepts" law named Protect Students First Act and that misconceptions about the law are fueling fear and self-censorship of teachers. However, the authors believe these misconceptions are informed by polarizing rhetoric and not the text of the law itself.
Atlanta Journal Constitution, 2023
Artificial intelligence is already entangled with children's and youth's lives. ChatGPT is just a... more Artificial intelligence is already entangled with children's and youth's lives. ChatGPT is just another iteration of artificial intelligence in our lives, albeit a worldchanging one. While this model has caused a panic about students "cheating" on assignments, I largely stand with folks who have written about the importance of teaching with the program and rethinking what it means to be together in a shared classroom space. Children and youths are already living their lives with artificial intelligence. The very presence of artificial intelligence like Alexa, Google, TikTok video creation, voice-to-text, autocorrect, Snapchat filters, Spotify playlists, drawing apps, and Siri fundamentally alters their existence. But this is not what I'm panicking about. Artificial Intelligence changes work and replaces workers while making billions. ChatGPT is an artificial intelligence model created by Open AI that claims to be "creating safe artificial general intelligence that benefits all of humanity." ChatGPT is only one model created by a company that is projected to generate $1 Billion in revenue in 2024. Benefitting humanity is a lofty claim that many technology companies make, but we should be very skeptical and critical about such claims.
Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 2007
A critical approach to the writings by and about Anne Frank leads to a better understanding of cr... more A critical approach to the writings by and about Anne Frank leads to a better understanding of crucial historical events. Misconceptions about Frank's life and death are discussed, leading to greater knowledge. Knowing Anne, she was happy in the concentration camps. She didn't have to be quiet anymore; she could frolic outside. She could be in nature. She loved nature. I think this was a welcome relief for her. (Charlotte, a student in the study) Every generation frames the Holocaust, represents the Holocaust, in ways that suit its mood. (Novick, 1999, p. 120) There are few ambassadors of the Holocaust more deeply embedded in American adolescent consciousness than Anne Frank. Partly because of the uplifting Goodrich and Hackett (1956) play based upon her diary, Anne Frank has become an American icon of optimistic thinking and individual triumph (see Doneson, 1987; Novick, 1999; Ozick, 2000). In keeping with the Americanization of Anne Frank, students in this study liked to think of her as being hopeful, in love, frolicking, and-perhaps most surprising-still alive. Spector teaches at the University of Alabama. She may be contacted there
Reading Research Quarterly, 2009
"When I work with teachers who teach poor and working-class children, the first thing I often enc... more "When I work with teachers who teach poor and working-class children, the first thing I often encounter is their expressions of anger: these children whom my lessons do not reach, and who fail their proficiency tests at such high rates; these parents who do not support my professional work or share my values; this community-and so on. What has to occur for things to change is not simply an intellectual [italics added] shift... Rather, change also has to entail a moral [italics added] shift, a willingness to open oneself up to the possibility of seeing those who differ from us. This is very hard work, but work that lies at the heart of teaching."-Deborah Hicks (2002, p. 152) H icks has argued that in addition to intellectual shifts necessary for teachers to effectively teach children who are different from themselves, it is also necessary to experience a moral shift that positions teachers as able and willing to see children differently. Seeing students differently, from Hicks's perspective, would entail recognizing children and their families as sociocultural beings who live full lives outside traditional institutional spaces, which tend to devalue their experiences. We situate Hicks's "shifting" in dispositions within Bourdieu's (1984, 1990, 1994) construct of the habitus and the theoretical and practical possibilities for improvisation and modification of the habitus through interactions with various fields. As teacher educators and researchers, Hicks's argument is one we take seriously and through which we can imagine implications for educators at all levels, preschool through
Journal of Cultural Research in Arts Education, 2021
This is a graphica (cartoon/comics) piece exploring some of the revolutionary pedagogies and educ... more This is a graphica (cartoon/comics) piece exploring some of the revolutionary pedagogies and educational philosophies that have emerged through extremely difficult and oppressive historical contexts. It's a pep talk for all of us as we live through the global coronavirus pandemic and uprisings against systemic racialized violence.
The Reading Teacher, 2010
Rethinking Education for the Pandemic Age
On Point Radio Show, 2020
On Point Radio Show, WBUR Radio on education 7 months into the pandemic in the U.S. Teachers, stu... more On Point Radio Show, WBUR Radio on education 7 months into the pandemic in the U.S. Teachers, students, families, and finding ways to be innovative in a system that is easily swayed by private corporation's interests (e.g. big tech companies).
On Point Radio Show: Covid 19 Learning: How Parents, Teachers and Professors are Adapting their Approach
On Point, WBUR Radio, 2020
Interview on On Point, WBUR Radio about education in the early months of the pandemic.
School in a Coffeeshop? A Different Approach to Teaching and Learning in a Pandemic
Washington Post, 2020
Now is the time to create outdoor and community-based education that connects youth to place, inc... more Now is the time to create outdoor and community-based education that connects youth to place, incorporates their interests and current events, and pushes for social, political, and environmental justice. We can do this.
Only Through the Lens of High-Stakes Testing is Virus a Dire Education Crisis
Atlanta Journal Constitution, 2020
A critical response to the national editorials repeating the mantra that students will be "behind... more A critical response to the national editorials repeating the mantra that students will be "behind" because of the pandemic.
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Papers by Stephanie Jones
[The] first article starts with the story of Katie
Rinderle, a fifth-grade teacher in Georgia, who was fired
for reading the picturebook My Shadow Is Purple (Stuart,
2022) to her class. In “Going Public with Contested Books:
Statewide Read-Aloud Events as a Critical, Feminist
Posthumanist Approach to Advocacy and Activism in
Politically Turbulent Times,” authors Stephanie Jones,
Grace Enriquez, Roberta Price Gardner, and Susan
Flis responded to these events by coordinating a set of
community read-alouds of Stuart’s book. The article details
the laws that shaped the sociopolitical context; the ways
they purposefully drew on the work of scholar and activist
adrienne maree brown to plan and encourage the network
of community-based read-aloud events; the types of spaces
that were created during these events; and the ways that
such open-ended, context-dependent, flexible, and feminist,
posthumanist responses can create spaces that move
critical educators out of what can often be a depleting
attack < > defend binary.
Link: https://www.bankstreet.edu/research-publications-policy/occasional-paper-series/ops-50/making-kin-with-trees/