Girls of Color Transforming Media Spaces Through Critical Participation

Abstract

This multisited ethnographic study considers how Girls of Color (GOC) develop critical literacies across informal and formal learning spaces, identifying and resisting systems of oppression and bias through participation in media fandoms. We explore how focal GOC media fandom participants made critical connections across informal and formal media fandom learning spaces. Through collaborative identification of biased practices, critical discussion around new ways of interaction, and embodied resistance and liberatory interactions at a local fandom convention, this research details how GOC used digitally mediated and embodied critical media literacies to transform public fandom life through connected trajectories of critical participation.