Week Six: Extended Analysis Review

For this week, I decided to review Will Flores' podcast series on Victor Villanueva. I went with Will's project because I have shamefully never heard a podcast before (I know, I know) and I also know next to nothing about Victor Villanueva, aside from his being one of the authors/editors of Cross-Talk. Therefore, I figured it would be a good introduction to both areas!

Will's podcast series was split up into three installments:

• Episode One: Villanueva's personal and scholarly background
• Episode Two: Villanueva's principles, theories, and pedagogy
• Episode Three: Villanueva's impact on the field

One thing that I learned listening to the podcasts from purely a production standpoint is that there must be a ton of work that goes into talking for ten minute installments. Will designed an icon/logo for his series (which turned out great!), made a theme song/intro, and kept his audio clean (no background noise, his delivery was clear and rehearsed and didn't seem to be overly scripted), and for a (I assume) unfinanced project there was definite #ProductionQuality. I imagine that it's no easy task to try and sum up a scholar's entire body of work in roughly 30 minutes, especially someone who has been as Prolific™ as Victor Villanueva. 

Episode One: Background
One thing I appreciated about Will's podcast was how he chose to frame it. The language he used was accessible, aware of a potential audience of new graduate students to the field. It was introductory in the best way, didn't rely on heavy jargon, and as someone with no background on Villanueva I was able to follow the content without any obstacles. I think Will's delivery works on a meta level too, as he goes on in Episodes 2 & 3 to discuss English(es), and the importance of having students bring their environments in to the academic conversation.

Episode One mainly focused on Villanueva's personal background, his career history/awards, and a brief overview of his main research areas. I learned that Villanueva's research is geared toward a more social epistemology, inclusive of multiple backgrounds and perspectives, as well as one that is non-Western focused. Villanueva also studies race and racism, particularly their relation to and within the academy.

Episode Two: Theories/Pedagogy/Principles
Episode Two opens with a recording of Villanueva, which I thought was an awesome touch, and helped humanize him. There was a lot of content in episode two, so I'm just going to share the bullet point notes I took while I was listening on Villanueva's perspectives:

• Colorblind racism ("I don't see color...") = oppression through disregarding/silencing the differences of life experiences for people of non-white races
• Literacy should connect to life backgrounds
• Uses the example of a near-illiterate football player to highlight diversity of education levels when coming in to the composition classroom as well as the power of external motivation
• Writing should bring in the personal to the political
• The world/social environments are not static
• Will places Villanueva in the same school of scholars as Gloria Anzaldua, Antonio Gramsci, Paolo Freire, among others
• Education should be used to better sociey
• "Knowing where we come from can help us know where we are going"
• We should critically engage with the world through writing
• Use personal backgrounds/experiences/cultures to educate, having more than one English (Englishes)
• Critical consciousness allows us to engage with the world in a transformative way

Episode Three: Impact in the field

• In the recording Villanueva regards the use of "Developmental" as an insult, which I dug
• Reiterates the importance of understanding English in the plural
• Students should be allowed to have their own dialects in the classroom
• Villanueva's school of comp theory started gaining traction in the 90s
• We should combat racism and society in critical ways
• We should also knock it off with "stupid ass infighting" and "oppression olympics"

Overall, I think Will did a fantastic job. Victor Villanueva's pedagogy is very similar to what I believe in, and as someone who has read a lot of Gramsci, I was excited to find another scholar to read up on. Thanks Will!