“We're all stories in the end”: on the narratives that (un)make us

Narratives, and the public discourses that they feed into, shape how we think about ourselves, the work we do and both shape and are reinforced through the institutions we are submerged in.Narratives allow us to construct our identity and find our place within our particular context (Bruner, 1996).In this sense, narratives are inextricable from power (De Fina & Georgakopoulou, 2011).Rather, narratives are imbued with the power relations from which they rise, who can tell a story, who can claim it, and how the story can be told.As De Fina and Georgakopoulou assert, narratives are often an exercise in power relations and serve to perpetuate social inequalities.Narratives hold a special place in the discourse practices that shape ideologies (Jacobs, 2000).The public discourses that shape our social life are often fed by narratives about how this work is done and who does this work.These narratives are expected to conform to a certain motif, which effectively dictates which voices get heard more often or louder than other voices (Blommaert, 2005;Ehrenhaus, 1993).In education, the discourse around the work done in schools is often in contention with discourses around accountability, or resource allocation.The articles in this issue of Curriculum Inquiry (CI) all touch upon this relationship between narratives, discourse and power, particularly within the context of the United States.This includes exploring how narratives shape the way we see ourselves as educators and as citizens (Hochman and Lamb), examining how these narratives impact the work happening inside the classroom (Sherry), and unpacking larger discourses around what knowledge is deemed critical to a course, how the content is selected and what this means in the larger context of high stakes testing and short course durations (Parker and Lo).These public discourses, which play out in the public space, through the media, political rhetoric and policy making, directly affect the work that happens within the walls of the school.The narratives used often shape how we think of practice or how we construct our social roles.In her piece exploring nostalgia as a "limiting cultural force" (p.132) on school librarians, teacher educators and school administrators, Jessica Hochman illustrates the ways in which public narratives about school librarians directly influence how the profession is regarded by both those who practice it and those with power to dismantle it.Using Boym's (2001) distinction between restorative and reflective nostalgias, Hochman's "School Library Nostalgias" analyses the ways in which the school librarian's role is misperceived by school leaders, often invisibilizing the work they do and falling into stereotypes about their CONTACT

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