Writing Counterstories: Ways to Challenge Dominant Narratives in FYCThis chapter draws from Aja Martinez’s concept of counterstories as a rhetorical research methodology in rhetoric and writing studies and encourages you, a first year writing student, to draw upon your experiential knowledge to both challenge and reframe master narratives that are accepted by the majority. In first-year composition classrooms, you can use counterstories to give legitimacy to your diverse background and varied lived experiences by interrogating and challenging the master narrative. Counterstories foster agency, which first year writing students use to build navigational capital as undergraduates. This chapter begins by explaining what counterstory is, followed by an example of a counterstory. Then, you learn the importance of counterstories and how they help you interrogate your own rhetorical decisions in writing. Afterwards, practical applications are provided to understand how counterstory, as a rhetorical approach, helps multilingual learners achieve linguistic freedom and justice.
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