1. Intersections of Teachers’ Life Stories: Awakening Spirit Toward Emancipatory Education Luz Carime Bersh, Ph. D. National-Louis University AERA May 3 rd, 2010 Luzcarime.bersh@nl.edu

2. HOW DOES THIS EXPERIENCE PROJECT ITSELF INTO TRANSFORMATIVE, EMANCIPATORY EDUCATIONAL ACTION? Purpose: Explore individual and collective impact of autobiographical project with ten female graduate students (intersections of cultural diversity). (IDS- NLU- Tampa, FL). Individual stories: Understanding of individual selves and as teachers. Others’ lives: Broader understanding of social context. Our lives intersect with others: Connection at spiritual level.

3. Theoretical Framework: Methods for Data Collection and Analysis: Feminist Critical Pedagogy (Weiler, 1988) Feminist Textual Analysis (Moi, 1985; Reinharz, 1992) Life Histories and Pedagogy (Middleton, 1993)

4. Preliminary Findings: Individual Transformations: Physical changes Emotional changes Career changes

5. Stories: Snapshots of U.S. Society Expanded understanding of social context Themes: Immigration/geographical moves Struggles Losses of significant people Religion and identity formation Shifts in family structure Impact of education in either reproducing or breaking cycles of inequality

6. Critical step toward emancipatory educational action: When the individual experience intersects with the collective at personal and professional levels our relational connections cross boundaries of classroom setting. It becomes the ethereal “space” where spirit unfolds in the flow of collective consciousness toward emancipatory education.

7. We become spirit manifested as emancipatory educational action: We are support for each other and as collective force we break cycles of injustice and violence within our own learning communities.

8. References Bruner, J. (1986). Actual minds, possible worlds. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Gottfried, H. (1996). Feminism and social change: Bridging theory and practice. Chicago, IL: University of Illinois Press. Lindholm, J. (2008). Spirituality and Pedagogy: Faculty’s Spirituality and Use of Student-Centered Approaches to Undergraduate Teaching. Review of Higher Education, 31(2), 185-207. Middleton, S. (1993). Educating feminists: Life histories and pedagogy. New York: Teacher’s College Press. Moi, T. (1985). Sexual textual politics: Feminist literary theory. New York: Methuen & Co. Ltd. Reinharz, S. (1992). Feminist methods in social research. NewYork: Oxford University Press. Tisdell, E. (2008). Spirituality and adult learning. New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 119, 27-36. Tisdell, E. (2006). Spirituality, cultural identity, and epistemology in culturally responsive teaching in higher education. Multicultural Perspectives. 8(3), 19-25. Tisdell, E. & Tolliver, D. (2001). The role of spirituality in culturally relevant and transformative adult education. Adult Learning, 12(3), 13-14. Walters, S., & Manicom, L. (Eds.). (1996). Gender in popular education. London: Zed Press. Weiler, K. (1988). Women teaching for change: Gender, class and power. South Hadley, MA: Bergin & Garvey Publishers, Inc.