Office Hours

Andrea:
Hi, everyone. I'm Andrea and you're listening to Office Hours. Today I had a conversation with Dr. Christian Hines, who is an assistant professor of reading and literacy here at Texas State. We had a wonderful conversation. We talked about her journey into teaching, representation, using comics and things like fandom culture. I especially loved hearing about how using my interest can turn into something like real academic work and can be used in our professional setting as well. So I really hope you enjoy this conversation and let's get into it.
Hi, everyone. I'm Andrea and you're listening to Office Hours. Today I'm here with Dr. Christian Hines. Hi, Dr. Christian Hines. How are you?

Dr. Christian Hines:
I'm good. How are you?

Andrea:
I'm doing really good. So happy you're here. So for anyone who hasn't met you yet, what do you teach here at Texas State and how long have you been here?

Dr. Christian Hines:
So I have been here since fall of 2023, so about three years. I am in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction in the College of Education. And my program is reading, so I teach a lot of the literacy and literature classes teaching in the 21st century classroom.

Andrea:
Awesome. Thank you. And so before we start Office Hours, we like to start off with a little icebreaker. My icebreaker for you is what have you been reading, watching, or enjoying lately? Any comics or stories that you want to share?

Dr. Christian Hines:
Oh, see, now you might have me go off on a tangent. So I have been watching Frieren: Beyond Journey's End. It has been my favorite anime. I play Dungeons and Dragons, so it's very much like an adventure quest type of anime. So I've been watching that. What have I been reading? I started reading One Piece because of my nieces and because of book talk, because I watched One Piece and I was like, I want to read the manga. So I've been reading One Piece. So it's been a lot of anime and manga type of spring. That's what I've been doing.

Andrea:
So before recording, we talked about how your mom was a teacher and that you spent a lot of time in her classroom growing up. How did watching her influence your decision to enter education? And did you always know that you wanted to fall in her footsteps?

Dr. Christian Hines:
Not always. So before she became a teacher, she was a nurse. So watching her help people and be in service was something that she ingrained in me and my sisters and brothers. And not even just traditional school. She used to do community service, like having literacy classes or doing our children's church. So I watched her do a lot of that. When I was in undergrad, I was a English major. I did creative writing, but a lot of my free time was spent either going to my mom's classroom or volunteering. And I realized the connection I had with kids, watching them want to be interested in reading and literature, things that I was interested in. And so when I graduated, I was like, "Well, I'm not going to write the great American novel right now. I kind of need something to do."
But I also enjoy being with the kids. I kind of low-key, I worked at a credit union and I used to do their financial literacy classes. So that put me in the classroom with the kids and teaching them about spending and saving. But I realized the joy that I got from being in the classroom. So I was like, "Well, let's see how teaching would be." So I started out substitute teaching and then I went ahead and talked with my former English teacher and she was like, "I think you would be great." So then I just went and got my certification and became an English teacher. And that kind of started me on my path to being a teacher.
Now, my mother was very excited when I went to do it because I was one of those kids. I loved school. Well, I loved learning, but I didn't necessarily love school. So she was like, "It's funny to see how you were as a young child to be this person that's a teacher, still being able to relate to kids when they're like, well, I don't like to do tests and I don't like to do homework and you wouldn't understand because you're a teacher." And I'm like, actually, I do understand because I was that kid and finding ways to relate to them, to make it accessible to them, to show them why education is important. And even the things that they may not enjoy now can actually change their trajectory later.

Andrea:
And how did you figure that out, how to relate to your students when you were in those classrooms?

Dr. Christian Hines:
A lot of it started my first year teaching. I was a teacher in Florida. So I taught reading classes and they were 90 minute block classes. So I was nervous about what am I going to do with these very energetic kids for 90 minutes. I can't just give them just essays to read and annotate. So we were talking about things that they enjoyed. And I remember our first unit was about kids and adrenaline and it was an essay about the Fast and the Furious. So we started talking about drag racing in cars. And so I started bringing in clips from the movie. We started talking about Paul Walker. That was when he passed away that year. And then it kind of spiraled off from talking about that movie to talking about things that they were interested in. And it kind of clicked for me that by the second semester, if I bring in things that they can relate to, how they would engage in learning, how they would be more attentive, how it also gave them autonomy and buy-in because now I'm teaching things that they could relate to.
And now instead of being a sage on the stage, it's a transactional, but we're also learning together. We're curating together. And from that moment on, I knew I was like, okay, I have something here. And I think one of my most pivotal lessons, we were talking about leadership, we were talking about community, and one of the kids were talking about Avatar: The Last Air Bender, and I love it. FYI, Korra's my favorite avatar. And we were talking about community and Ang and Katara and Korra. And I did a lesson on building community, but also building community with mental health, building a community through the elements and things of that nature. And the kid, the kids really responded to that. So I started using a lot of pop culture to bring into the classroom to get my kids engaged in their learning.

Andrea:
And you briefly mentioned that the kids responded to that. So why do you think it's so important to bring in pop culture and fandom into learning?

Dr. Christian Hines:
Because the kids have a lot of background knowledge and we live in very much a visual age and a digital age and stories have so much meaning. And these, I think being able to see these cartoons, to see these books and look at the stories that they're telling when you think about Avatar, when it's talking about community, when it's talking about government, when it's talking about food, or if we're even talking about One Piece, that's another thing about family, that's another thing about community or my favorite one is Demon Slayer, and it's about empathy, it's about forgiveness, it's about family.
So being able to take these themes that are showing up in these stories, and these are the same standards-based themes that we're looking at when we're teaching. We have to teach them characterization, we have to teach them plot, we have to teach them setting. They have to be able to break down a story and deconstruct it and pull out themes and motifs. And they are already doing these things naturally when they are engaging in these TV shows, when they're engaging in these comics. So why not bring the material that they're already familiar with and be able to make it educational based to scaffold their learning?

Andrea:
I love that. I wish I had teachers that did that. I think it would've made learning a lot more fun. So before coming to Texas State, you spent eight years teaching and then you did electives in your high school, like yearbook and social media. What was that experience like and how did it shape your teaching today?

Dr. Christian Hines:
Oh, had I not been a yearbook teacher, I probably would have not been a professor here. How that started was because I worked at a STEM school and if you were not in a STEM program, they did not have a lot of creative arts electives. So as a reading teacher, English teacher, they were like, "We want you to teach yearbook," but I wanted to teach creative writing. So we kind of had a bartering system and they were like, "Well, you could teach creative writing if you teach yearbook too." And I'm like, "Okay, sure. Why not?" I was like, "I don't really know it." And they was like, "We trust you. The kids like you, you'll learn." So they gave me basically this workbook of yearbook stuff. And me, I'm a self-learner. So I started emailing other teachers in the district like, "Can I come sit in your class and see what you're doing to learn this?"
But also, once again, I believe in not being a sage on the stage and learning with the kids. So I was very honest with the students. I'm like, "I know how to be a teacher, but I did not know how to do camera work." I was like, "We're going to learn this together." So we're learning about how to work canons. We're learning about F-Stops. We're learning about a field of depth. We're learning all of these things together, Adobe InDesign. So I think the kids that not only did that build their confidence, but they were able to relate to me like, "Oh, well, adults will know everything, but they're able to talk to us and we're able to be on the same learning level together." And for me as an educator, number one, it taught me how to look for resources because I had to look to other people to kind of help me bring it.
And I learned how to pull from natural resources from my kids because my students were also looking for a place to belong. So they were coming to my yearbook class knowing it was brand new, knowing they wanted to be a part of something. Some of them had me as their reading teacher before, so we already had that foundation of trust. So they were able to come there and we kind of built a family that way. Also, I learned how to build curriculum because I had to learn how to teach lessons around design, around layouts, around production, even business lesson, how to sell yearbooks, how to create ads. So there was so much multi-level learning in that year for me as a teacher, but also for my students and being able to learn alongside them, that kind of shaped a lot of the things that I do now.
So being able to build a class from scratch, being able to advertise my programs from scratch, being able to teach my students how to do these multimedia works with their kids, how to do photo essays, how to do documentaries, because those are things that I had to learn to be able to run this multi-level, multimedia class when I was a teacher with absolutely no training.

Andrea:
And you mentioned something really important that you learned from your students. What is something recently that a student has taught you that surprised you?

Dr. Christian Hines:
Well, the kids taught me D&D. So if you haven't noticed, I have this D20 dice, which I wear around my neck to remind me of what I've learned from my students. And not only as a player, because D&D as a role-playing game is a community game and it's an improv game. You're making up stories on the spot, you're trying to problem solve on the spot, you're learning how to work as a team. And that is what I learned from my students because even though we were learning yearbook, they got so comfortable with me that they would spend a lot of time, which a lot of good teachers will tell you this. The kids will come in during lunch hour. So they're sitting there, they're playing D&D, they're creating their own stories. And I used to sit there and listen to them.
And finally, they were like, "Ms. Hines, just come over here." So I would sit there and we would play together and I would learn a lot about them, how they thought, how they saw the world, how they were processing society around them based on this world that they were creating. So when they graduated, it was two things. It was D&D. I had the D&D and then we were doing Game of Thrones. The kids photoshopped me sitting on a Iron Throne in our yearbook and they were like, "You're our Khaleesi." And I was like, "Oh, that's so sweet." Not when she went crazy, but when she was there helping the people.
So I learned a lot about community, about world building, about improv, about problem solving, and working with all different types of personalities because you never know what you're going to get, especially with teenagers. So I learned a lot about that from my students and I wear my D20 dice because I'm always rolling for initiative whenever I'm doing anything now.

Andrea:
So they would be playing during classroom time and you'd be like, "What?"

Dr. Christian Hines:
No, they would be playing on lunch. They would come have lunch in my classroom or if they finished their work, they would do that after. But mostly it was lunch and it was after school while they were working on yearbook, they would play D&D in between those times.

Andrea:
And you thought, why not just ...

Dr. Christian Hines:
Why not?

Andrea:
Why not just give it a try.

Dr. Christian Hines:
I'm always down to try something new.

Andrea:
That's so cool. So was there a moment while teaching in high school that made you realize that you wanted to move into higher education and research? I know you mentioned that yearbook kind of helped you with the curriculums and navigating the formats, but is there a specific moment in your high school teaching?

Dr. Christian Hines:
Absolutely. So not only teaching yearbook, I taught creative writing. And I remember it was 2018, The Hate You Give had just came out and it was a very popular book, very popular movie. And so the kids were talking about it. We did a whole class unit on it talking about social justice. And then I was talking about it online and Angie Thomas, the author, she seen my post and she was like, "We're offering free movie tickets for teachers to take their kids." So we were able to take the kids for free during school. They paid for everything. So we went there and we were talking about that. And I was talking to another teacher because I had built a social justice curriculum around that novel and she was like, "Oh, well, maybe you should think about working downtown at the district to create curriculum." And I was like, "Maybe." And then she was like, "You'll probably need a master's." So I enrolled in a master's program.
And I remember one of my professors, I was doing a unit on young adult fiction and pop culture and he was like, "You are really good at creating this and you're really good at creating community and explaining this in a way that's accessible." He was like, "Have you thought about getting a Ph.D.?" And I was like, "Absolutely not. That is not part of my plan." And he was like, "Well, think about it this way." He was like, "You're a teacher who teaches 150 kids roughly every year." He was like, "What if you took the knowledge that you had and taught it to 150 teachers who would also teach 150 kids?" He was like, "The ripple effect of what you can do in teaching and education would be much larger than what is happening just with the kids." Because that was another thing. I did not want to leave my students.
I was like, I wanted to be there to help them. But he was like, "In essence, think about how many students you're helping when you're teaching other teachers to do the things that you do." So from that, that's how I decided for ... You'll learn this about me. I push hard against destiny. So I was like, I'm only going to apply to one program that I may not get into just to say I did it. And I was like, I don't know if they're going to give me funding. I applied to Ohio State. One of the top programs, I got in and I was like, oh. And I was like, "But I'm coming from out of state." And it was like, "We'll fund you." And I was like, "Oh." And they was like, "We'll give you a job." And I was like, "Okay, so I guess this is a thing." And from there, that's how I started in higher ed.

Andrea:
Yeah, it really shaped your path to going into it. That's so awesome. So fully funded Ohio State.

Dr. Christian Hines:
Yes, fully funded in their education program and everything. And that also is a different path too about how I went in thinking about young adult literature, but how I end up doing comics and graphic novels, which is what I do now that also kind of helped tailor my path to going to grad school.

Andrea:
And it really started with The Hate You Give, right? Which is a great book.

Dr. Christian Hines:
It is. I love it. I have a big poster of the book cover in my office, to remind me of where I started.

Andrea:
That's so cool. I love that. So you mentioned this, that your research looks at comics, young adult literature and representation and storytelling. So what drew you to those forms of storytelling?

Dr. Christian Hines:
Well, me being a nerd, or we call it a blerd because I'm a Black nerd. We have our own little subculture. So I've always been into stories, anime. I was a big Sailor Moon fan, Pokemon fan. I love a good story. I love a good plot. I love character development. And once again, talking about those things with my kids in the classroom, when I thought about comics, especially diversity in comics, it actually started from teaching.
I had a young student, it was when Ms. Marvel came out in 2014, the Ms. Marvel comic, and she was talking about how she never really seen herself in books. And I was like, "There's this new comic coming out." I said, "I think her name's Kamala Khan, she's a Muslim Pakistanian." And that was my student. And I was like, "I'm going to buy it for you and we're going to read it together." And so we read it and she was like, "Ms. Hines," she's like, "I love it." She was like, "She's like me. She goes to mosque. She has this family dynamic." Like she could really see herself. So we're reading this.
And then the other kids were like, "Well, what about us?" And so I was like, "Wait, wait, wait." I was like, "I have you." Miles Morales had came out maybe two years before. I think Miles Morales was 2011-ish, but he was starting to be really big because Across the Spider-Verse hadn't come out or Into the Spider-Verse hadn't come out, but they were talking about putting it into development. And Jason Reynolds had wrote a young adult novel about Miles Morales. So I went and bought the Miles Morales comics. I went and bought Jason Reynolds comics.
And so once again, seeing this young Afro-Latino boy being Spider-Man and being able to talk to the kids about these young superheroes and being heroes in their community and not just thinking about saving the day, like how the Avengers do this whole macro level saving, but how people like Kamala Khan, people like Miles Morales or Riri Williams, they do these micro level things in their neighborhood. They're making sure their neighborhood is safe. They're making sure that if the villain knocks over the bodega, they're coming back the next day to rebuild it because they're like, "People live here, people have to work."
And being able to talk to the kids about what does this look like for you to work in your community, to work alongside the people you see every day, what do you know about your community? How do you build back? And being able to have those conversations with them made me think about comics, particularly young people in comics and being able to have that visual representation and being able to think about how kids are inheriting this world, but what are we giving to them to inherit and what are we instilling in them to be empowered to be able to be proactive in their everyday community. So that's kind of how I started working with the comics and then it branched off into manga because they were telling me about One Piece and My Hero. And so I just started adding different types of texts for them to engage in.

Andrea:
Yeah. And it's so important for students to see or anyone to see themselves represented in media. So I'm really glad that you're bringing that into your classrooms and using that to connect with your students. I think that's so important. So thanks for doing that.

Dr. Christian Hines:
Oh, and I love it. I get to nerd out that is the best part of my job or even I cosplay too. So when we would do certain units, I would come and I would cosplay and the kids were like, "Can I wear my outfit?" I'm like, "Absolutely." Even now, when I was teaching in grad school, my students would come dress up. I had one of my students come dress up as Miles Morales when he was doing a presentation on how he would teach that comic in his classroom. I'm like, "Yes, be who you are, be free." I was like, "Your students will appreciate it. Mine always did."

Andrea:
I love that. What have you cosplayed as?

Dr. Christian Hines:
Oh, so I've done Bulma from Dragon Ball Z. I've done Raven from Teen Titans. I've done Sailor Jupiter from Sailor Moon. I've done Wonder Woman, I've done Beetlejuice, I've done Chucky. I go down a list. I've done a lot. I go to a lot of the comic cons. I go to the Greater Austin Con here. I've been to San Diego to Comic Con International. I've done New York Comic Con. So I present there all my work that I do here, but also as a nerd, I like cosplay and go to panels and stuff like that, which is really, really cool.

Andrea:
Have you met anyone at comic cons that also kind of do the same thing that you do as a teach?

Dr. Christian Hines:
Yes. So they have a whole educator section. Well, I've met other people across the nation and even some international scholars who do different things with comics. Some of them do comics and hip hop, some of them do comics and poetry. So we all kind of work together to talk about the different things that we do. And now we have this whole comic coalition, comic study society where we all talk about the pedagogical things that we do with comics in K-12 and comics in higher education.

Andrea:
That's awesome. So you found a community within your community.

Dr. Christian Hines:
Yes. And a community full of nerds. I'm just like, they were speaking to my heart. I was like, yes. I was like, I found my people. It took a while, but I was like, I found my people. And my mom was like, I can't believe you turned this into a job. I was like, I can't believe I turned this into a job. What do you mean? I get paid to cosplay and talk about comics and still get to interact with kids.

Andrea:
You're living the dream right now.

Dr. Christian Hines:
I am. I really am. And I've gotten to meet people from comics that have written some of the comics that I've loved. The writers from Miles Morales, from Riri Williams, I've met a lot of comic artists. I've met a lot of Marvel artists, so I'm fan-girling and being like, "I use your work in my class."

Andrea:
I'm such a fan girl too. So I'm like, I'm living through you right now through these experiences. That's so awesome.

Dr. Christian Hines:
It is. I will freak out. I was like, "Oh my gosh, oh my gosh." I'm like, "I love your work. It's so amazing." Yeah, it's wild.

Andrea:
So you really turned your fandom and everything that you love into a job, a profession. What advice do you have for students who love things like that, like anime, fandom culture, but might not realize that those interests could turn into academic or creative work?

Dr. Christian Hines:
I like to say, think about what it is that you love about what you're engaging in your fandom. For my fandoms, I love a good story from Star Wars to Hunger Games to Spider-Man, watching people develop, go through hard times, come out, build community. And so for me, when I think about the same things that we do in education, building community, preparing people for the future, those are the things that I've seen in the story. So for me, it was easy to pull education. I've seen people who love fashion and anime and fandom.
And so they go into the fashion industry or people who love to draw and they tell stories through their artwork or even music. The people who do the hip hop and comics, there are people who love the soundtracks for Into the Spider-Verse and Across the Spider-Verse because that music also tells a story about Miles Morales.
So they think about music and storytelling and lyrics and they do that. So think about what it is that you see yourself reflected in. And also I like to think about the things that I wish I had as a student. And we kind of talked about this because you said the same thing about how you wish you had teachers that would bring that in and thinking about some of the classic literature, not that that doesn't have a place, but also being able to have stories that are reflective of our individual experiences and stories that are relatable to young people. Those are things that I wish I had. So I kind of look at what I wish I would've had and I try to bring that into the classroom. And I even tell my pre-service teachers now, I tell them to reflect on your schooling, reflect on your upbringing, what was great about it, what were some things that you wish you could change.
And then think about those things that you wish you could change and you bring that into your classroom and you bring that into your teaching. And also don't be afraid to ask your students. I feel like there's a lot of pressure to be like, "I have to know everything. I have to keep class under control." It's okay to relinquish some of that to the kids. It's okay to invite them into their learning. What do you want to talk about today? What are some things you wish you'd known or what are some things you're interested in? And find ways to weave that into your curriculum. They'll appreciate you for it.

Andrea:
I love that. Thank you so much. Have there been any students that have done that, that you've seen that have taken their interest into something bigger?

Dr. Christian Hines:
A lot of my yearbook kids have gone into photography or content creation. I've had one that she is doing journalism. She graduated from college. She's doing journalism, but she said when she finishes her journalism career, she wants to do teaching. So she wants to be a journalist teacher like I was. So I've seen them do a lot of things. There are some of them that are writing stories. I have a former student that wants to write a comic, so he's working on his writing. So I have students that do that now, or even when I'm mentoring students or advising students now, thinking about what do they want to do in their profession? What are some things how they want to branch out? And even if they're not sure about education, I'm like, well, do social work or do counseling because you can do bibliotherapy and counseling.
So you can still use books, you can still use stories and pop culture to help people in other ways. So I've seen quite a few of them and that makes me happy. I feel like a proud Mama Bear. Yes, the next generation is okay. The kids are all right, they're going to change things and it's going to be for the better.

Andrea:
Well, those are all the questions that I had for you, but you definitely inspired me to continue honing in on my interests and kind of bring them up in places that might not usually bring them up like the professional setting or something like that. So thank you so much for that.

Dr. Christian Hines:
Am I allowed to ask you a question?

Andrea:
Yes.

Dr. Christian Hines:
What have you been reading and watching?

Andrea:
Oh my goodness. So I've been watching Bridgerton.

Dr. Christian Hines:
I got to catch up on that. I haven't watched the current season.

Andrea:
Yes, I'm on the last season right now. And I thought I wouldn't be into it because I'm not into period pieces, but my friend was like, "No, you'll like it. It's like a modern twist." So I started watching it and it's so good.

Dr. Christian Hines:
Okay. Okay.

Andrea:
You haven't finished it yet?

Dr. Christian Hines:
I haven't watched the newest season with the Cinderella theme, but I'm caught up to the first three. So yes, I'm going to watch that. That is one of my favorite shows, that and Queen Charlotte. I love Queen Charlotte.

Andrea:
I love Queen Charlotte. I love Queen Charlotte a little bit more than I like the original Bridgerton seasons.

Dr. Christian Hines:
Same. Same. We have the same.

Andrea:
Yeah. Well, thank you so much for your time, Dr. Hines. I really enjoyed our conversation.

Dr. Christian Hines:
Thank you for having me, Andrea. This has been a great conversation.

Andrea:
Of course. Thank you.