Megan Boler
PhD (University of California, Santa Cruz)
Professor
E-mail: megan.boler@utoronto.ca
Tel: 416.978.1231
Professor Bolers Current TPS Courses ( please click below for course information)
TPS 1447 - Technology and Education : Philosophical Perspectives
TPS 1465 - Philosophies of Affect and Emotion
Megan Boler received her Ph.D. from the History of Consciousness, University of California Santa Cruz. Presently Associate Chair of the Department of Theory and Policy Studies, and Coordinator of the History and Philosophy of Education program, at the Ontario Institute of Studies in Education at the University of Toronto (UT), and served as Director of Women’s Studies at Virginia Tech in 2002-03. She is Associate Faculty of the Center for the Study of United States and the Knowledge Media Design Institute also at UT. Megan Boler speaks internationally on social justice in political and cultural contexts, pedagogy of discomfort; race, class, and gender in education and media, explored through cultural, feminist and communication studies. She is currently completing a three-year funded research project, “Rethinking Media, Citizenship and Democracy: Digital Dissent after 9/11,” through interviews and surveys examines the motivations of producers of “digital dissent”--practices of digital media to counter mainstream media. Her web-based productions include a study guide to accompany the documentary The Corporation (dirs. Achbar and Abbott 2003), and the multimedia website Critical Media Literacy in Times of War. She teaches philosophy, cultural studies, feminist theory, media studies, social equity courses in Teacher Education program, and media studies at the Knowledge Media Design Institute at University of Toronto.
Megan Boler’s interdisciplinary research and teaching interests focus on social justice in political and cultural contexts; race, class, and gender in education and media; feminist theories and philosophies; poststructuralism; cultural and communications, and media studies; digital media and democracy. Her teaching and research focus on areas including:
- post-structural and continental philosophy
- cultural, historical and philosophical dimensions of social and educational theory
- educational studies; critical and feminist pedagogies
- philosophies of emotion
- emotions and education
- philosophy of technology; information and communications studies; media and democracy; science and technology studies; digital media studies; feminisms and technologies
Selected Presentations and Publications(*)
(2009 October) Invited Keynote, Association of Internet Research, Milwaukee http://ir10.aoir.org/?page_id=99
Publications(*)
Boler, M. (ed.) (2008). Digital Media and Democracy: Tactics in Hard Times. Cambridge: MIT Press
M. Boler, ed. (2004) Democratic Dialogue in Education: Troubling Speech, Disturbing Silence. New York: Peter Lang.
M.Boler. (1999) Feeling Power: Emotions and Education. New York: Routledge. (Critics Choice Award, American Educational Studies Association 2000)
M. Boler, Guest Editor with Ted Gournelos, “Irony and Politics: User-Producers, Parody, and Digital Publics,” Electronic Journal of Communication (forthcoming July 2008)
Boler, M. “Making Claims: The Responsibilities of Qualitative Researcher,” in Methodological Dilemmas of Qualitative Research, ed. Kathleen Gallagher (forthcoming Routledge 2008).
Boler, M. “Hypes, Hopes, and Actualities: Representations of Bodies and Difference in Text-Based Digital Communication,” New Media and Society (vol. 9, no .1, February 2007)
Boler, M. “Mediated Publics and the Crises of Democracy.” Philosophical Studies in Education, eds. Justen Infinito and Cris Mayo, Ohio Valley Philosophy of Education, vol.37 (2007).
Zorn, D. and M.Boler. “Rethinking Emotions and Educational Leadership for Social Change,” International Leadership in Education, (vol. 10, issue 2, 2007)
Pinto, L., M. Boler, and T. Norris. “Conceptions of Literacy in High-Stakes Testing and its Press Coverage in Ontario,” Policy Futures in Education (vol. 5 no.1, January 2007).
Boler, Megan. “The Daily Show, Crossfire, and the Will to Truth.” Scan Journal of Media Arts Culture. Vol. 3, no. 1 (summer 2006) http://scan.net.au/
Boler, M. “The Limits of Philosophy in an Epoch of Censure” Response to General Session, Philosophy of Education Society 2004, ed. Chris Higgins (Champaign, Il: Philosophy of Education Society)
Boler, M. “Media Literacy Defined,” W. Hare and J. P. Portelli (Eds.), Key Questions in Education. Halifax, NS: Edphil Books, 2005.
Boler, M. and M. Zembylas. 2003. “Discomforting Truths: The Emotional Terrain of Understanding Difference.” In Peter Trifonas, ed. Pedagogies of Difference. NY: Routledge
Boler, M. “The Ethics of Shattering Hope,” In Teaching, Loving, Learning. Jim Garrison and Dan Liston, eds. Rowan and Littlefield (2003)
Zembylas, M. and M. Boler. “On the Spirit of Patriotism: Challenges of a ‘Pedagogy of Discomfort,’ Teachers’ College Record, Special Online Issue on Education and September 11, Fall 2002 Biographical Sketch
Web-Based Projects & Research Projects
Rethinking Media, Citizenship and Democracy
www.meganboler.net
Critical Media Literacy in Times of War
www.tandl.vt.edu/Foundations/mediaproject
The Corporation study guides
(doc. film Dir. By Mark Achbar and Jennifer Abbott, 2005)
Social Justice Resource Database
http://edpsychserver.ed.vt.edu/diversity/index.cfm