Postcards from the Edge: Exploring Multimodal Strategies for Reconciliation Pedagogy
The work reported on in this paper is one aspect of a South African research project which explores ways of teaching reconciliation in post-apartheid classrooms. Part of our strategy was to engage young people meaningfully with the work of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), adopting a multimodal approach which allowed for alternative means of engagement and expression. In this paper, I argue for the importance of opening up the range of semiotic resources available to students as receivers and producers of texts in subject English classrooms. My argument is made by means of an analysis of a set of multimodal texts in the genre of the postcard which students produced in response to their research of the TRC process. The multiple semiotic modalities of the postcard genre enabled students to draw on a variety of intertextual resources and speak with several, sometimes contradictory, voices. The ‘edginess’, or tensions, generated by this multimodal work are explored as potentially productive resources for reconciliation pedagogy. Preliminary analysis suggests that the semiotically rich mode in which students were working opened up spaces for them to express complex and multiple positions, locating themselves as young people in relation to both history and the present.
Keywords: Reconciliation Pedagogy, English Teaching, Multimodality, Semiotic Resources, Intertextual Resources
Ana Ferreira
Languages Division |
Ref: L07P0758