The Cultural-Historical Research Special Interest Group (SIG #30) of the American Educational Research Association (AERA) is a diverse grouping of researchers who approach learning, development and social change from a cultural-historical, socio-cultural and/or activity theoretic perspective. Common themes of research and conversation draw on Vygotsky, Luria, Leont’ev, Bakhtin, Mead (and others).
Drawing on these perspectives, members also engage with frameworks that are inclusive to, but not limited to critical, feminist, digital studies, and arts-based approaches to explore sociocultural, educational, pedagogical, and sociopolitical questions at the intersection of theory and practice.
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Co-Chairs: Arturo Cortez, University of Colorado Boulder & Anu Kajamaa, University of Helsinki
Co-Program Chairs: Heeok Jeong, University of Massachusetts, Amherst & José Ramón Lizárraga, University of Colorado Boulder
Secretary/Treasurer: Alfredo Jornet Gil, University of Oslo/ Kalonji Nzinga, University of Colorado Boulder
Website/Communications Chair: Mike Rifino, The Graduate Center
Please see our Officer Profiles Below!
Arturo Cortez Teacher Learning, Research & Practice University of Colorado Boulder arturo.cortez@colorado.edu
Arturo Cortez is an Assistant Professor of Teacher Learning, Research and Practice at the University of Colorado, Boulder. Broadly, his work is animated by cultural historical activity to explore how teachers collectively design for transformative and humanizing learning environments that leverage the everyday cultural practices of nondominant youth in urban settings. In his work with novice teachers, he intentionally designs for equity to understand the learning processes that emerge as teachers learn how to break away from dominant forms of schooling, opening up opportunities for new relationships between teachers, students, school administration, and community members. Click this link for Dr. Cortez's extended academic bio
Selected Publications Gutiérrez, K. D., Espinoza, M., Becker, B., Cortes, K., Cortez, A., Lizárraga, J. R., Rivero, E., Villegas, K., & Yin, P. (co-equal authors). (2019). Youth as Historical Actors in the Production of Possible Futures. Mind, Culture, and Activity.
Cortez, A. , & Gutiérrez, K. D. (2019). Socio-spatial repertoires as tools for resistance and expansive literacies. In M. P. Pacheco & P. Z. Morales (Eds.), Transforming schooling for second language learners: Policies, pedagogies, and practices. Charlotte, NC: Information Age Publishing, Inc.
Anu Kajamaa Faculty of Educational Sciences University of Helsinki anu.kajamaa@helsinki.fi
Anu Kajamaa, PhD, is an Associate Professor and Principal Investigator in the Faculty of Educational Sciences, University of Helsinki, Finland. She is Co-Leader of an expert group called Learning, Culture and Interventions (LECI) and the Vice Director of the Doctoral Programme of School, Education, Society and Culture (SEDUCE) in the Faculty of Educational Sciences. She is also a Visiting Associate Professor at Aalto University, School of Business (Department of Management Studies) and in the School of Arts, Design and Architecture (Department of Media) in Finland. She serves as the Co-Chair of the Cultural-Historical Research Special Interest Group (SIG) at The Americal Educational Research Association (AERA). She has published over 60 papers in international journals and books, and has received several awards for her research and teaching. Click this link for Dr. Kajamaa's extended academic bio.
Selected Publications Kajamaa, A., Kumpulainen, K. (2019). (Eds.) Double Special issue: Young people, digital mediation and transformative agency. Mind, Culture and Activity, Volume 26, Issues 3 & 4.
Kajamaa, A. & Kumpulainen, K. (2019). Agency in the Making: Analyzing students’ transformative agency in a school-based makerspace. Mind, Culture and Activity 26(3), 266-281.
Kajamaa, A., Mattick, K., Parker, H., Hilli, A. & Rees, C. (2019). Trainee doctors’ experiences of common problems in the antibiotic prescribing process: an activity theory analysis of narrative data from UK hospitals. BMJ Open 9(6).
Heeok Jeong Education and Curriculum Studies University of Massachusetts, Amherst jheeok@umass.edu
Heeok Jeong, Ph.D. is a visiting scholar and instructor at the Department of Teacher Education and Curriculum Studies at University of Massachusetts Amherst, USA. Dr. Jeong earned her PhD in Linguistics from University of Utah with a specialization in second language and literacy teacher education. Using cultural-historical methods, her research centers around issues of equity in the education of linguistically and culturally diverse students. Specifically, her work focuses on the formation of and transformation toward culturally sustaining pedagogical practices and the impacts of those practices on the identity construction of raciolinguistically marginalized students in activity systems in and out of classroom contexts. She has published a journal article titled “Agentive Actions for the Education of Adolescent Immigrant Students: Toward Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy.” (in press). She is also a reviewer for the journals “Literacy Research: Theory, Method, and Practice (TMP)” and “Multicultural Perspectives.” She has reviewed proposals for AERA Cultural Historical SIG since 2016, and recently presented a paper titled, “Adolescent English Learners’ Changing Roles and Participation Structures in Expansive Learning Cycles for Language and Literacy Development” at AERA, 2019, Toronto.
Selected Publications Jeong, H. (2019). Resource vs. deficit views about english language learners in classroom practice. G. Onchwari & J. Keengwe (Eds.) Engaging immigrant families and promoting academic success for english language learners (pp.91-111). Hershey, Pennsylvania.
José Ramón Lizárraga Learning Science & Human Development University of Colorado Boulder jose.lizarraga@colorago.edu
José Ramón Lizárraga is Assistant Professor of Learning Sciences and Human Development at the University of Colorado, Boulder. As a learning scientist, José uses ethnographic, video, and multimodal research methods to investigate the role of social networks, television, and other digital new media in the learning of teachers and youth. Currently, his work examines the collaborative practices of novice teachers and adolescents at the intersection of virtual and in-person terrains of practice. Click here for Dr. Lizárraga's extended academic bio.
Selected Publications Gutiérrez, K. D., Becker, B. L., Espinoza, M. L., Cortes, K. L., Cortez, A., Lizárraga, J. R., Rivero, E., Villegas, K., & Yin, P. (2019). Youth as historical actors in the production of possible futures. Mind, Culture, and Activity, 1-18.
Lizárraga, J.R. & Cortez, A. (2019). #gentrification, Cultural Erasure, and the (Im)possibilities of Digital Queer Gestures. In A. DeKosnik, K. Feldman (Eds.), #identity: Hashtagging Race, Gender, Sex, and Nation.
Alfredo Jornet Gil Teacher Education & School Research University of Oslo a.j.gil@ils.uio.no
Alfredo Jornet Gil's research focuses on cultural, technological, and affective aspects of learning across formal and informal settings, with an emphasis on creativity and pedagogical innovation. Mostly using design-based and participatory ethnography methods, I have conducted research in such diverse contexts as arts-based education, science learning in and outside classrooms, or professional design, with the overall goal of better understanding how people with different backgrounds and interests learn and develop when they work together to imagine and achieve new shared goals. More recently, I work promoting and investigating open-schooling pedagogical innovations as a means to address the needs of school and societal transformation in the current context of environmental crisis and threat to democracy. Click this link for Dr. Gil's extended academic bio.
Selected Publications Damsa, Crina I. & Jornet, Alfredo (2020). The unit of analysis in learning research: Approaches for imagining a transformative agenda. Learning, Culture and Social Interaction. ISSN 2210-6561. s 1- 3 . doi: 10.1016/j.lcsi.2020.100407
Jornet, Alfredo (2019). Experience as Emerging Concept in Contemporary Learning Sciences, In Michael A. Peters (ed.), Encyclopedia of Educational Philosophy and Theory. Springer. ISBN 978-981-287-532-7.
Kalonji Nzinga Learning Sciences & Human Development University of Colorado Boulder kalonji.nzinga@colorado.edu
Dr. Kalonji Nzinga is a cultural psychologist exploring how millennials and post-millennials develop their ethical worldviews. Using methods of validated psychological instruments, clinical interviews, and ethnographic observation he studies how young people come to understand moral concepts like authenticity, loyalty and justice as they grow up. His research illuminates the polycultural process where young people encounter moral discourses from various traditions; in the form of sacred texts and traditional myths, but also in episodes of Law & Order, rap verses, and the comment threads of Twitter posts. From these interactions with ideology, young people craft their own hybridized ethical perspectives. His research has informed the design of various learning environments, multimedia arts exhibitions, and is published in the Journal of Cognition & Culture and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Click this link for Dr. Nzinga's extended academic bio.
Selected Publications Kalonji Nzinga (2020). Exploring Fanon’s psychopolitical project as a theory of learning, Mind, Culture, and Activity, DOI: 10.1080/10749039.2020.1716804
Nzinga, K.L.K., & Medin, D.L. (2018). The Moral Priorities of Rap Listeners. Journal of Cognition and Culture, 312-342.
Mike Rifino Developmental Psychology - PhD student The Graduate Center, CUNY mrifino@gradcenter.cuny.edu
Mike Rifino is a doctoral student in the Developmental Psychology program at The Graduate Center, CUNY. His interest in pursuing an academic career started when he was a LaGuardia Community College student and participated in the Peer Activist Learning Community (PALC), a critical learning community organized with and for LaGCC students. Drawing on a feminist politics of emotion literature, his current research interestes focuses on the ethics and politics of emotions as it relates to learning in community college settings. Mike is currently reserching how the dyanmics of isolation, shame, and individualism are contextuliazed in community college practices such as learning. Additional research interests include exploring how the psychology curriculum enacts oppressive "emotional rules" (Hochschild, 1983) in the context of teaching psychology's contentious classics. Mike’s most recent presentation was accepted by the International Society for Theoretical Psychology titled, “Contesting the politics of emotions in learning as a community college student.
Selected Publications Sawyer, J. & Rifino, M. (2020). Transforming educational alienation into collective agency in community colleges. In T. M. Ober, E. Che, J. E. Brodsky, C. Raffaele, & P. J. Brooks (Eds.). How We Teach Now: The GSTA Guide to Transformative Teaching (pp. 223-237). Retrieved from the Society for the Teaching of Psychology web site: http://teachpsych.org/ebooks/howweteachnow-transformative