The papers and activities in this panel explore the role of visual language and alternative visual texts in supporting embodied learning. Each presenter will offer a classroom activity related to a graphic novel that helps students process their social environment, navigate pathways through trauma, and appreciate diverse ways of thinking and knowing, ultimately empowering individual subjectivity and agency. Examining embodiment is crucial to understanding one’s identity and the broader network of family and community.

David J. Nguyen and Jay B. Larson argue that “embodied learning... facilitates perception and disruption” of “oppressed and oppressor” roles, making it crucial for “feminism and critical race theory.” They echo John Dewey’s caution in The School and Society (1899) and Democracy of Education (1916) that passive instruction leads to compliance with authoritarian structures. Conversely, an embodied approach promotes autonomous, reflective students who discover critical and ethical truths. This indicates that embodied pedagogy is not only a more effective teaching method but also anti-fascist. The renewed interest in Dewey’s pragmatism and embodied pedagogy aligns with the global rise of authoritarian regimes.

Sheila Macrine and Jennifer Fugate note in “Embodied Learning: Translating Embodied Cognition Research” (2024) that embodied pedagogy has not achieved the anticipated greater impact on educational theory and policy, despite evidence of its benefits for educators. The session panelists support Macrine and Fugate’s goal to enhance embodied pedagogy and bridge the “research-to-practice” gap by showcasing activities that empower student-embodied learning and challenge dominant narratives.

Jenessa Kenway’s paper examines how aesthetic engagement—viewing and creating art—serves as a powerful tool for feminist pedagogy in composition classrooms. Using Alison Bechdel’s The Secret to SuperHuman Strength, students explore Bechdel's panel composition and character embodiment to represent gender and emotion. Students then sketch simple comic-inspired panels representing their own experiences and rhetorical embodiment. This approach aligns with Dewey’s view of art as a participatory experience that transforms both creator and audience. Luca F. Ticini et al. explain in Aesthetics and the Embodied Mind that aesthetic experiences “activate shared brain mechanisms” influencing cognition, sensation, and empathy. This principle supports feminist pedagogy, emphasizing knowledge construction through sensory engagement. Drawing allows students to explore rhetorical and physical embodiment, using visual narratives for meaning-making and activating cognitive and emotional processes.

Shoshana Magnet’s presentation explores how images enter the body and how the process of visual description helps metabolize images disrupted or fractured by trauma. Magnet analyzes the role of visually representing the therapeutic process in Alison Bechdel’s autographic memoirs. This paper stems from earlier work (Magnet and Diamond, 2008) aimed at theorizing the pedagogical challenges of addressing difficult material in feminist classrooms, including how individual students expressed their struggles in metabolizing the ongoing realities of a world shaped by homophobia, racism, sexism, ableism, classism, and other forms of systemic discrimination. As feminist professors have long observed, students frequently seek resources to help them manage these feelings. While counseling services are often suggested to students, Magnet found that many did not understand how therapeutic services might benefit them. Her presentation examines the embodiment present in Fun Home and Are You My Mother? and how comics can be used to demonstrate the therapeutic process works and its benefits.

Kelleen O'Connell Mock decolonizes academia using visual texts like Bechdel’s Fun Home and N.D. Stevenson’s Nimona to help students analyze body and gender identity. These texts are “Gynotopias," which Bonnie Zare describes as tools for envisioning change (2003). Research indicates that trans students often fear negative outcomes when revealing their non-binary identities (Randolph et al., 2008). Understanding trauma from hiding or experiencing violence is crucial in college teaching and student writing (Clinnin, 2020). These alternative texts foster safer environments for exploring gender identities and challenge conventional writing (Graff, 2010). Autographic novels illustrate personal embodied rhetorical situations, enhancing students' awareness and ability to confront colonized gender norms (Mintz, 2021; Parker et al., 2017).O'ConnellMock’s activity involves drawing and AI to create personal rhetorical situation monsters inspired by Nimona to empower marginalized students.

Each 15-minute presentation connects practical applications of embodied feminist pedagogy with one graphic novel. Each presentation includes a 5-7minute activity demo for participants to complete. The panel includes insights from early, mid, and late career scholars from different locations and institutions who arrived at embodied visual pedagogy in different ways: visual art, therapy, and composition. Each paper uses graphic narratives to foster interactive, embodied aesthetic learning experiences that promote critical thinking and civic engagement.