The theme of the Literacy Research Association’s 72nd Conference is, “Crossing boundaries and borders: In pursuit of equity, solidarity, and social justice.” The theme is influenced by the words of African-American feminist poet, Audre Lorde, who said “It is not our differences that divide us. It is our inability to recognize, accept, and celebrate those differences… I speak these words in an attempt to break that silence and bridge some of those differences between us, for it is not difference which immobilizes us, but silence. And there are so many silences to be broken.”

Louise Wilkerson, author of Caste: The Origins of our Discontent, further challenges us to address the longstanding and powerful issues that divide us and operate in silence in “search for the unseen stirrings of the human heart to discover the origins of our discontents.”

The 2022 theme, “Crossing boundaries and borders: In pursuit of equity, solidarity, and social justice,” is intended to engage LRA in discovering the origins of our collective discontents through civil dialogue and to encourage activism that makes visible the unseen stirrings that act as barriers to pursuing equity, solidarity, and social justice for the diversity of students, families, and communities we seek to serve. To accomplish our goal, we must be prepared for action. Actions that propel us to cross the boundaries and borders that negatively impact literacy research, policies, and practices