David Coogan, dcoogan@vcu.edu
When a university expands into its surrounding community it raises the very question of community. This working group presents the praxis of community literacy from scholars such as Linda Flower, Eli Goldblatt, and Paula Mathieu in order to engage with the Campus Master Plan (CMP)—in particular, with homeless communities in and around the Gateway Precinct. Participants will do engaged rhetorical criticism about homelessness in Reno-Sparks while reading and listening to powerful arguments from homeless communities about the CMP; community organizing, assembling with members of these communities to discern their needs and imagine ways of matching them with the needs of students and faculty at UNR; and intercultural inquiry, dialoguing and writing about the social issues that cohere around homelessness with all stakeholders in practical ways, positioning difference as a catalyst for personal growth and social change and, in the process, creating an ever more generous and inclusive public life.