Skip to Main Content
 

Global Search Box

 
 
 
 

Files

File List


Corwin_Dissertation_2021.pdf (1.68 MB)

ETD Abstract Container

Abstract Header

Rural, white youth identity work: Language and style at the intersection of whiteness, class, and geography.

Corwin, Meghan E
http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1406-629X
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1637605688167546

Abstract Details

2021, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, Teaching and Learning.
Rural communities face concentrated poverty, geographic isolation, and infrastructural challenges that constitute a myriad of complex issues like low population density and growth, dependence on stagnating and narrow employment sectors, and limited access to crucial resources like healthcare and transportation. Even more pressing, rural children are more likely to be poor than nonrural, or even the overall population, of US children and are at greater risk for health and mental health problems with less access to sufficient healthcare. These concerns compound when we consider that schools often serve as central sites of community connection, development, and well-being in rural and small-town communities, yet they struggle due to uniquely situated issues, including a lack of representation in scholarly research, a lack of funding and support from federal policies and initiatives, mandated standardized curriculum that doesn’t fit the context of the community or needs of the students, fewer curriculum options, lower teacher expectations, and a lack of educational technology, difficulty in retaining qualified teachers, and the out-migration of a young workforce. A wide range of scholarship has been employed to examine these issues and provide recommendations, but examination of whiteness, racism, and class difference among white rural folks, especially inquiry that centers youth voices, is sorely missing from the conversation about rural communities’ and schools’ issues, concerns, strengths, and possibilities. Here, I explore how youth can offer a uniquely situated insight into these conversations as they navigate life-worlds that include substantial culture and identity work as well as interaction with both adults and other youth. I conducted a year-and-a-half long ethnography in a small, public high school in a rural community in the Midwest, seeking to explore the ways in which youth engage in cultural and identity work in their social and school life-worlds. This project seeks to fill a gap in the literature at the intersection of whiteness, class, and geography in majority-white, low-income, rural schools and communities by examining a particular, under-researched intersection of identity, exploring youth culture and identity work through language and style practices at this intersection; and by capturing and centering student voices and perspectives.
Mollie Blackburn (Advisor)
Stephanie Power-Carter (Committee Member)
Michiko Hikida (Committee Member)
222 p.
Education; Language; Multicultural Education; Secondary Education
rural education; whiteness; intersectionality; rurality; language practices; style practices; youth; identity studies; youth studies

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Corwin, M. E. (2021). Rural, white youth identity work: Language and style at the intersection of whiteness, class, and geography. [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1637605688167546

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Corwin, Meghan. Rural, white youth identity work: Language and style at the intersection of whiteness, class, and geography. 2021. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1637605688167546.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Corwin, Meghan. "Rural, white youth identity work: Language and style at the intersection of whiteness, class, and geography." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2021. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1637605688167546

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu1637605688167546
399
© 2021, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.