Transcommunality and Transformative Learning

I really enjoyed this week’s readings—just as I have, for the most part, all of the other material from the semester thus far.  What struck me this week in Expanding the Boundaries of Transformative Learning: Essays on Theory and Praxis (O’Sullivan, Morrell, and O’Connor, 2002) and Transcommunality: From the Politics of Conversion to the Ethics of Respect (Brown Childs, 2003) was the call to consider larger issues affecting humanity and the planet.  In particular because of the focus we’ve had thus far on individual identities, I’ve found myself thinking a bit myopically, not necessarily in a bad sense, but certainly to the effect of not thinking about how these larger global issues with which I am concerned fit in.  This week’s texts though build upon these notions of self-identity and empowerment toward the project of a more just and sustainable world.

Brown Childs defines transcommunality as “the constructive and developmental interaction occurring among distinct autonomy-oriented communities and organizations, each with its own particular history, outlook, and agenda” (Brown Childs, 10) and traces his interest in such collaborative efforts toward social change back his own roots.  Far from negating the importance of individual and community identities, Brown Childs advocates for using these in concert with those of others toward more a more socially just and ecologically sustainable world.  Borrowing ideas and methods from indigenous communities and cultures and their connections to the natural world, he looks at ways in which we may come together “without simply duplicating the hierarchies of power and domination with which we are contending” (Brown Childs, 10).

 The concerns that Brown Childs has (the human and ecological price of our rapidly globalizing world) are similar to those of O’Sullivan, Morrell, and O’Connor in Transformative Learning.  Transformative learning for them goes beyond the projects of cultural studies and critical pedagogy, which focus primarily on human issues and extends itself to integrate issues of peace, social justice, and ecology in such as was as to present a fundamental challenge to market-driven education (O’Sullivan, Morrell, and O’Connor, xvi).  As a starting point for the volume, they define transformative learning as:

Transformative learning involves experiencing a deep, structural shift in the basic premises of thought, feelings, and actions.  It is a shift of consciousness that dramatically and permanently alters our way of being in the world.  Such a shift involves our understanding of ourselves and our self-locations, our relationships with other humans and with the natural world, our understanding of relations of power in interlocking structures of class, race, and gender, our body-awarenesses, our visions of alternative approaches to living, and our sense of possibilities for social justice and peace and personal joy. (O’Sullivan, Morrell, and O’Connor, xvii)

How do we begin to make connections between our own lives and choices with the lives of others around the world and with the world itself?  How do we begin to integrate consideration of these things into our everyday experience?

NYTimes - Lens

I'm a huge fan of the New York Times' Lens Blog which is their photography blog.  I was pleasantly surprised to see their current feature on the front page of NYTimes.com this afternoon.  They asked high school students from across the country to document their communities and have published the results online here.


I'm just starting to go through the images, but the premise of the project reminded of the work done by photographer Wendy Ewald... I first discovered her through her work with kids in Appalachia (now that I'm reading a bit more about her, it looks like she worked with Appalshop...)

Readings for 9/12/13

I appreciated this week's readings particularly since the identity readings from last week left something to be wanted with respect to practical application.  These texts definitely picked up where last week's left off and addressed some of the practical issues of acknowledging and addressing social identity in learning/teaching contexts.  Opening the Classroom Door (Quinn) asks what a physical classroom might look like to engender a level of comfort for all but what I found more interesting was the section that addressed contradictions.  I think here in particular there was an acknowledgment that regardless of the content and context of the learning environment we as educators are able to provide, it's within these other complex systems that also bear great relevance and influence on the lives and minds of our students.  Given this reality, I think the best we can strive to do is keep these contradictions in mind and empower students (and ourselves) to see these systems at play and then question and challenge them.  

Knowing Ourselves As Instructors (Bell, Washington, Weinstein & Love) through discussions with practitioners, established for me that our identities are always in flux (particularly depending on context) and absolutely affect the conversations we're trying to start or lead.  Building on the awareness that readings from last week call for (specifically the Identity Mapping exercise) I think it's important to keep in mind that these identities we embody and subscribe to aren't concrete.

I was charmed by the format of both The Mystery of Teaching (Ayers & Alexander-Tanner) and Contact (Knight & Schwartzman) and more importantly, it was interesting to be exposed to these three case studies.  It seems obvious that more effective than imposing an agenda on a classroom or community is working with them to achieve universally desired ends.  In some cases, like that of The Mystery of Teaching, the community already had an idea of what they wanted and educators stepped in to work with them towards those goals.  On the other hand, in Contact, through the dance instructor's openness the inmates were able to discover their goals.  I think these show that regardless of the intent of the educator and the level of the educator's awareness, so much of their effectiveness is contingent on the participation of the class/community.   

Readings for 9/5/13: Identity

This week's three readings all address the issue of identity and its role in creating and propagating the status quo.  Whereas Mapping Identity for Curriculum Work (Congdon, Stewart & White) examines the role of identity in a classroom/education context, The Cycle of Socialization (Harro) outlines how identities are inherited and perpetuated within a larger societal context, and finally Ideology, Confrontation and Political Awareness (Piper) explores the ideologies that constitute an individual's sense of self.

All three articles acknowledge the role of identity in perpetuating accepted norms by situating one group or view in a privileged position with respect to a constructed other; each article also goes on to propose, in varying degrees of specificity, a means to subverting the ways in which we've all been conditioned to subscribe to and further these identities.

Of the three approaches, I'm most drawn to Piper's.  Early in her article Piper posits, "usually the beliefs that remain most unexposed to examination are the ones we need to hold in order to maintain a certain conception of ourselves and our relation to the world."  After exploring some of the ways in which these beliefs are tested and maintained she concludes that, "the result is blindness to the genuine needs of other people, coupled with the arrogant and dangerous conviction that you understand those needs better than they do; and a consequent inability to respond to those needs politically in genuinely effective ways."  Whereas Harro merely suggests that subversion is possible and Congdon, Stewart & White outline an activity through which personal biases might be identified with one's educational practices, Piper proposes a largely introspective review and critique of the self.

I think there's obvious validity to points made in each of the three readings, but am left wondering:  How does this awareness and these acknowledgements of particular biases infiltrate popular culture  to impart change on a societal level?  Are there examples of this? How do you create and consistently maintain a society in which myriad views are accepted and none is privileged?

Reflection 1: What is your learning foundation?

Influences

There are a number of factors I considered when deciding to pursue a degree and ultimately a career in art education.  Most notably there are three influences that weighed heavily on my decision to interrupt my trajectory with a return to school to further explore and expand my relationship to art and education.

My artistic interests and sensibilities began taking root at young age: I spent many of my earliest summers exploring my own potential and that of various media with Kathleen Frye, an artist and art educator.  Kathleen taught art classes out of her home and I remember being so taken by the possibilities that lay within her studio/classroom.  These classes offered an escape from the real world that ultimately shaped my relationship to it.  I've known Kathleen nearly my entire life though the nature of our relationship has changed:  After graduating from college, I was invited by Kathleen to spend a semester in Bali, Indonesia at an international K-8 school where she was the principal.  It was under Kathleen in Bali that I had the opportunity to work with middle school students teaching art.  This classroom experience, but also my evolving relationship with Kathleen, was an important juncture on my path to pursuing art education.

As a student in Providence, RI I had the opportunity to work as an artist mentor at New Urban Arts, a community-based art organization that works with urban high school students.  Teaching a photography workshop I had the opportunity to think about my own practice and values outside of the academic context that I primarily existed within.  But it has been the consideration of this experience and New Urban Arts after the fact (with more perspective) that has been really interesting and revealing.  Their model of engagement, activism and empowerment is one that I admire and am eager to explore in other contexts.

I spent some time working at Denver Art Museum, an institution that as I was growing up certainly informed my interest in art.  When I reengaged my relationship to the museum upon my return to Denver from the east coast, I was delighted by the family programs and activities I found offered by the museum.  These programs and activities make more accessible art and ideas that otherwise may have initially seemed alienating.  The work that this entailed is definitely of interest to me and in line with some of the contexts I see myself working in in the future.


Texts

Robert Adams - (images) This link shows selected work from photographer Robert Adams.  His formally simple and beautiful images explore the American West through impact of humans on the land.  I am drawn to his work because of its restrained but poignant commentary on our relationship to the natural world.  His work embodies important questions and critiques that are presented visually as opposed to verbally, something particularly important when considering art as a force in society and education.

Taryn Simon - (video) Photographer Taryn Simon talks about her two of her projects and I'm interested in particular in the second one she addresses, The Innocents.  This body of work consists of images of individuals who were convicted of crimes they did not commit and explores the role of photography in their respective convictions.  Her work examines the blurred lines of fact and fantasy in photography and photography's relationship to memory.  I am drawn to Simon's use of photography to explore and question such issues.

Adam Brock - (video) Permaculturist Adam Brock is a co-founder of the GrowHaus, an organization in Denver, CO that collaborates with its community to provide food production, distribution and education.  In this talk, Adam outlines his vision for bio-regional agriculture that is embodied in the work done at GrowHaus.  The talk provides just a brief summary of the work done and advocated by GrowHaus, work which I find exciting in its mission engaging of its immediate, under-privileged community with sustainable and accessible food options.

Intro

I've always been drawn to making things.  This interest was reinforced several times over in high school when I was given an old 35mm camera.  Through photography, I discovered not only my voice but also an interest in the world around me.  My excitement for photography lead me to study Art Semiotics in college, a concentration that gave me the freedom to create my own work while considering critically visual practices and texts.  

Spending several years working at large cultural institutions prompted me to examine more closely aspects of the work I was doing/promoting that I enjoyed.  This, in concert with a more introspective look at my interests and values, has lead me to Art Education and more specifically, the MAAE program at SAIC.  I am interested in the educational role that large institutions play in their communities and in working with populations that for a variety of reasons don't have the same access to these institutions that their more privileged counter parts have.  Within the MAAE program in particular, there's a focus on the "variety of reasons" previously referred to, which though I have little experience addressing am very interested in confronting.