Quitting out loud: The agential realism and emergent phenomena of quit lit

Quit lit (public resignation) appears to be an increasingly popular rhetorical choice for resigning K-12 teachers. However, neither the genre features of quit lit or its rhetorical activity have been adequately interrogated. In this research study, I use a material-ecological approach to understand what quit lit is, what work it accomplishes, and how it might accomplish that work. Through a practice of diffractive reading, a quantum-rhetorical and material approach which accounts for agential realism, emergence, and perturbations, I argue that teacher-resigner quit lit is an emerging genre that allows teachers to create public arguments about education, their institutions, and the systems in which they work. Additionally, diffractive reading allows me to demonstrate the entanglement between quit lit and genre theory, affect theory, and publics/circulation theory. This research first identifies the broad genre characteristics of K-12 teacher-resigner quit lit. Then, the results of this research suggest that K-12 quit lit is an inclusive and still-evolving genre. In order for quit lit to be truly effective, the genre will need to develop further genre features, namely a call to action. At the same time, this research also introduces quantum rhetoric and argues its importance, particularly in respect to agential realism, entanglement, and materiality, as a frame for engaging with rhetorical ecologies. My argument is framed, stylistically, within an entangled mosaic that attempts to perform the theories it discusses.