Our Stories Matter ― Liberating the Voices of Marginalized Students Through Scholarly Personal Narrative Writing

Nash (education and social services, U. of Vermont, Burlington) and Viray, a social worker and student services administrator at the U. of Vermont, outline the methodology of scholarly personal narrative writing, which they implemented at the U. of Vermont with marginalized and underrepresented undergraduate and graduate students. They show faculty how to understand and implement this writing; provide examples of it to illustrate how it allows students to express their voices in unique ways, making it liberating and empowering; outline a rationale for encouraging these students to use the method, including explanation of concepts like social location, social situation, and social construction, underrepresentation, marginalization, counter-narratives, individual stories of resistance and resilience, liberation and transformation, and academic memoirs; detail the steps in presenting the method on a college campus; and include vignettes, case studies, and writing scenarios to show uses in a variety of educational settings. There is no index. Annotation c2013 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Robert J. Nash has been a professor in the College of Education and Social Services, University of Vermont, Burlington, for 44 years. Since 1996 he has published 13 books, several of them national award winners, along with over 100 articles, numerous book chapters, and several book reviews. In 2003 he was named the Official University Scholar in the Social Sciences and the Humanities at the University of Vermont, only the third faculty member in the history of the College of Education and Social Services to be so honored.
Sydnee Viray is a highly respected student services administrator at the University of Vermont. She is a social worker, consultant/scholar in the areas of diversity and inclusion and financial management for mission-driven non-profits and for government bodies. She has spent the last 10 years as a community social worker advocating for, and with, economically and racially marginalized community members. She is currently a Scholarly Personal Narrative writing co-instructor (with Robert) at UVM.