The global discourse on diversity and inclusion makes it imperative for educational researchers to revisit marginalization in education settings. Marginalization in education is a form of acute and persistent disadvantage rooted in underlying social inequalities involving cultural differences, knowledge gaps, and socio-economic status (Akin & Neumann, 2013). It can affect students’ academic performance, peer-to-peer interaction and sense of belongingness in school (Benner & Wang, 2014; Pendergast et al, 2018). Despite the call for inclusive and equitable quality education (SDG4) that promotes lifelong learning opportunities for all, children from rural and urban poor communities, ethnic and linguistic minority children, and children in displaced situations in Ghana and many parts of Sub-Saharan Africa have experienced marginalization in education for decades (Mfum-Mensah, 2018). Thus, to ensure inclusive and equitable quality education for all, it is essential for stakeholders in education to create learning environments that address educational inequities among students by empowering students to speak up and become actively involved in the teaching and learning process, particularly, those historically marginalized. Consequently, educational researchers advocate for better-informed practice with research that seeks to achieve social impact (García-Carrión et al., 2020).

Along these lines, research shows that dialogic learning has transformed classrooms and schools to provide high-quality education for all students (Flecha & Soler, 2013). This approach, according to Flecha (2015) increases academic performance, improves social cohesion, and enables participants to overcome educational inequality in diverse contexts. It dismantles deficit thinking and creates opportunities for participants to be confident and freely express themselves (Flecha, 2000; García-Carrión & Allotey, 2023).  Thus, drawing on the social-cultural theory of cognitive development (Vygotsky, 1978) and grounded on the theory of dialogic learning (Flecha, 2000), research shows that Dialogic Literary Gatherings (DLGs), foster learning and inclusion of vulnerable populations (Soler, 2020). This approach to teaching and learning has been acknowledged by the European Commission for achieving social impact and benefiting historically marginalized communities in many diverse contexts (European Commission, 2011).

DLGs are an interactive dialogue-based learning environment where participants share and discuss the greatest literary works through egalitarian dialogue that fosters respect towards diversity, solidarity, freedom, and overcomes inequalities (Flecha, 2000). Implemented in over 7,000 schools in fourteen different countries across Europe and Latin America (Soler, 2020), the efficacy of DLGs has been studied in various contexts where positive impacts have been observed in reading and students’ prosocial behavior. DLGs encourage relations of friendship and respect, it fosters a sense of community and self-confidence (Díez-Palomar et al., 2020) and encourages participants to speak up and share their experiences in an egalitarian dialogic atmosphere (Flecha, 2000; Soler, 2020). Nonetheless, little is known about DLGs in Africa, particularly in Ghana. Thus, granted that the call for diversity is also a call for voice, influence and power (Biesta et al, 2022), the objective of this paper is to explore how the Dialogic Literary Gatherings empower historically marginalized students to speak up while they participate in DLGs in an 8th-grade classroom in southeastern Ghana. 

Qualitative Ethnographic case study (Rhoads, 1995; Schwandt & Gates, 2018) research methodology was adopted for the study. This is part of a bigger project funded by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska Curie grant agreement No. 847624. DLGs were implemented for the first time with 8th-graders in a school in the southeastern part of Ghana from October 2021 to February 2022. During this time, participant observations and semi-structured interviews were conducted by the first author. Eleven DLG sessions lasting approximately one (1) hour were observed and audio recorded. These took place once a week during the students’ English Literature classes. In accordance with the dictates of the syllabus of the Ghana Education Service concerning mandatory literature books to be read by students from seventh to eighth grade, participants together with their English literature teacher, agreed to read the classical book Oliver Twist. Additionally, the students agreed to read Oedipus the King, one of the teacher’s supplementary teaching materials and The Odyssey, another book proposed by the researcher. Hence, during the DLGs, participants interacted with each other based on previous reading of age-appropriate versions of the books Oliver Twist, Oedipus the King and The Odyssey by choosing a piece of the text, reading it aloud and sharing their thoughts and feelings about aspects of the text that intrigued them (Soler, 2020). In all, seventy-nine students participated in the DLGs with seventy-one participants giving the researchers their assent and parental consent. However, for this paper, we focused on the experiences of six students who felt marginalized and their contributions in four DLG sessions as well as the semi-structured interviews conducted with all six participants. Since one facet of marginalization is the experience of interaction with members of dominant groups (Given, 2008), these students were selected because their contributions during the DLGs indicated that they had experienced some sort of discrimination and marginalization. These included five girls and one boy aged thirteen to sixteen years. This was a heterogeneous group where the students had mixed academic abilities and belonged to five different ethnic groups in Ghana. The data was transcribed verbatim and analyzed thematically (Braun, & Clarke, 2006) during which the following themes emerged: egalitarian dialogic space, platform to share grievances and boosting participants’ confidence. The research followed ethical principles approved by the Institutional Review Board (IRB) of the authors’ University.

The research demonstrated that participants experienced marginalization as a result of their cultural and ethnic differences, knowledge gaps, physical appearance and poor status in society. However, despite feeling marginalized and discriminated against for these reasons, findings from the study indicated that the DLGs created affordances for historically marginalized students to be empowered to speak up by granting participants an egalitarian dialogic space. Thus, the DLGs created an interactive space for students to share their views and opinions without fear of judgement. In addition, the gatherings empowered participants to speak up by boosting their self-confidence. Finally, the DLGs provided marginalized students with a platform to share their grievances with their classmates during which they felt not simply heard but listened to. Resonating with previous research within the field (Díez-Palomar et al., 2020; García-Carrión et al, 2020; Flecha, 2000), our findings show that Dialogic Literary Gatherings indeed provide high-quality education for all, especially those historically marginalized and enables educational practitioners to engage all students in the teaching and learning process thereby ensuring an inclusive quality education for all (SDG-4). These findings are promising for educational practitioners in Europe and across the globe, seeking to encourage marginalized students to speak up for themselves. Besides, granted that little is known about Dialogic Learning, particularly Dialogic Literary Gatherings in Africa despite its success worldwide, this study contributes to science by replicating this approach in Ghana. Nonetheless, due to time constraints, the study was limited by its inability to measure the impact of the DLGs on marginalized students’ academic performance. Future research could delimit this setback by exploring this option.

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