Merging Print and Digital Literacies in the African American Literature Classroom

Abstract

Tisha Brooks writes about a digital anthology assignment in her 200-level African American literature survey in which students act as “knowledge curators.” Brooks’s assignments use literary and visual texts to “bridge multiple literacies and historical gaps,” and to encourage students to think critically about representations of violence against black bodies. Student work culminates in a group digital anthology project that helps them “move from mere consumers of knowledge to critical thinkers who use the archive to make meaning of its artifacts and the history and literature connected to them.” By selecting multimedia artifacts across periods, students become adept at representing the historical continuities between past and present.