Karen Sharkey will be defending her PhD research proposal from 3:00 – 5:00 PM on Tuesday, June 16th, in Room 1306, PCOH (6445 University Boulevard).
All are welcome to attend.
Supervisory Committee:
Dr. Maureen Kendrick (co-supervisor), Marlene Asselin (co-supervisor), and Dr. Jim Anderson (Committee member)
Title: Beyond Story time: Public libraries as sites of early literacy-in-action.
Abstract:
The public library, as government funded institution dedicated to lifelong learning that provides a free space for early engagement with literacy, is a rich site to explore young children’s literacy practices. However, there has been little research done on the work of children’s librarians to support early literacy or about the literacy practices and interactions of the thousands of children and their families who visit public libraries each year in British Columbia alone.
Through a case study grounded in socio-cultural approaches to literacy (Health, 1982, 1983; Street, 1984), with attention to its material and spatial aspects, I will examine a children’s area of a public library in Western Canada as a site of literacy-in-action (Brandt & Clinton, 2002), in which the mainstream discourses of early literacy interact and influence the local social practices occurring within the space. Children’s services in public libraries are strongly influenced by a skills-based approach to early literacy, with an emphasis on school-based reading readiness. (Nichols, 2011; Stooke & McKenzie, 2009; 2011). Children’s librarians, who can be viewed as sponsors of literacy with the ability to support or promote specific discourses within their institutions and communities, have taken up this skills-based model with little awareness of different theoretical approaches to early literacy (Stooke & McKenzie, 2011). Using ethnographic and multimodal approaches, I will explore children’s experiences and practices of literacy in the library space, their interactions with the objects of literacy in the library, such as books, computers, toys, and the building itself, and the early literacy discourses taken up by caregivers and librarians. I will also examine the often hidden work of children’s librarians to create welcoming spaces for early literacy and play.
Conducting research with children through participatory, multimodal methods will provide a window to understand their literacy practices and interactions within the physical space of the public library. This can be used to create new strategies for this work, building programming and services which incorporate different ways of learning, positioning public libraries as relevant institutions for the 21st century that provide open and inclusive community spaces for early literacy.
This event will take place on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) people.