Subjects
critical information literacy, first-year instruction, primary sources, counterstories, historical silences
Document Type
Innovative Practice
Abstract
During a first-year engagement program, a librarian and a cohort of students worked towards a shared understanding of dominant narratives, historical silences, and creating counterstories through research to center marginalized stories and complicate existing narratives. As information literacy professionals, we should design interactive lessons that demonstrate critical search and evaluation skills through topics that are relevant to students and encourage them to work with issues that impact their communities. Incorporating critical information literacy, feminist pedagogy, and critical race theory, this two-day micro-seminar introduced first-year students to the legacy of youth community activism in the neighborhoods around their university. They practiced centering marginalized voices and experiences in their scholarly output and used a critical lens to reanalyze dominant interpretations. Seeing individuals of their own age group lead community change and create lasting historical objects encouraged their own ability to advocate through their scholarship and community involvement.
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 4.0 License.
Recommended Citation
Varela, A. (2025). Searching for Change: Exploring Historical Silences and Counterstorytelling Through Youth-Led Social Justice Movements. Communications in Information Literacy, 19 (2), 271–288. Retrieved from https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/comminfolit/vol19/iss2/7