Author ORCID Identifier
https://orcid.org/0009-0002-2246-5573
Abstract
The purpose of this research is to use queer of color critique (QOCC) as an analytical framework to explore rural K-12 educators’ epistemic agency. The research focuses on educators’ engagement with a national initiative by an advocacy organization to distribute LGBTQ+ and racially diverse books to K-12 schools. The analysis centers on the educators’ praxis of epistemic agency against settled expectations associated with including queer and trans People of Color’s (QTPOC’s) stories in their schools. Our findings on educators’ epistemic agency center on three areas of knowledge and activity. First, educators demonstrate their ability to be aware of their local political context when navigating policies and decision-makers to create safe spaces and heterogeneous knowledge. Second, rural educators generate a range of curricular opportunities and activities despite structural constraints on their epistemic agency. Third, educators are agentive and resourceful in building epistemic communities of allies and co-conspirators. Overall, this research finds rural educators disrupting settled expectations of white rurality by engaging with the politics of knowledge, intersectionality, and (in)visibility.
Methodological Approach
Qualitative
DOI
https://doi.org/10.60808/v9kf-xj27
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.
Recommended Citation
Langerud, C., Adelman, M., & Liou, D. D. (2026). Queer of Color Critique and the Politics of Epistemic Agency: Rural Educators Desettling Curricular Expectations. Journal of Queer and Trans Studies in Education, 3(1). https://doi.org/10.60808/v9kf-xj27
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Included in
Curriculum and Social Inquiry Commons, Educational Leadership Commons, Gender and Sexuality Commons, Law and Society Commons, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Studies Commons, Race and Ethnicity Commons, Social and Cultural Anthropology Commons, Social Justice Commons
