Caucus on Social Theory and Art Educaiton

Column for NAEANews, October 2006

In our August newsletter, we asked our readers to reflect on the following questions: What is a leader? What is a democratic leader? What is an art education leader? What is a progressive arts education leader? These questions were stirred by NAEA’s search for a new Executive Director. They cover broad issues including the process of selection and desired traits of an arts education leader. In this column, we continue our discussion of democracy and ask for a critical introspection from our readers.

The potential benefits of democracy are referred to throughout educational literature. Two common definitions of the term include: (a) majority rule and, (b) social equality and a respect for the individual in a community. Of course, these definitions are not always congruous with each other. For example, demonstrating respect for individuality is challenging when a majority dominates or maintains power without concern for others. Taking a vote, tongue-in-cheek, we assert that the latter definition is of greatest significance to advocates of social justice, CSTAE members, and many NAEA constituents.

Democracy, conceptualized as social equity and a respect for the individual in a community, calls for reflection on relationships. Such attention forefronts the interaction, cooperation, and collaboration of oneself with others. It often suggests a need for reorganizations or transferences of power. As diversified professionals in art education are we willing to open the spaces needed for this type of democracy? How could we give space to those individuals who are infrequently heard and seen? And once multiple voices are heard and visions seen, how might these be amplified, analyzed, and addressed?

Education may be the best way to advocate for and demonstrate the benefits of employing leaders who value social equity and the individual in our society. As K-12 classroom teachers, professors, and museum educators we might question whether and how we are teaching social equity and respect for the individual within a community to our students or patrons. Do we demonstrate it through praxis or only propose it in theory? Engaging students in the practice of this type of democracy involves critically thinking about the attributes that shape identity and cultures. Regardless of our educational role or position, we must consider how we can critically and actively participate in democratic education.

Critical educators and theorists such as Maxine Greene and Kevin Kumashiro have called the process of critical thinking, the challenging of power and its workings, emancipation or empowerment. In our places of power—as teachers, students, principals, artists, and policy makers—we can pass along the histories, bodies of knowledge, and beliefs that have been handed to us, or can we teach and practice critical thinking, empowering individuals in our community to understand the partiality of all knowledge(s). This would require deconstructing and challenging the histories and constructs we take for granted. It would require others in the teaching process to help us recognize the partiality of our values and beliefs.

Perhaps helping others become empowered is not as valued in our North American society as much as empowering ourselves. However, if we truly desire moving toward democracy as defined here, how can we do otherwise? As we share techniques, processes, and knowledge of our disciplines, let us not forget the pedagogy of questioning, multiple contexts, relationships, and alternative possibilities, all of which are viable and revered within the arts.

As individual members of the NAEA community, it is up to us to perform the actions that move us toward democratic equity and social justice. This is an on-going process. We believe these actions will improve us as artists, researchers, teachers, and citizens.

In our December 2006 we will discuss artists and democratic leadership. What lessons can we learn from artists about leadership? That artists do you feel demonstrate socially responsive and responsible leadership? How? What lessons can we learn and share with our students based on these folks’ examples? Please join our on-going critical reflection of our practices and beliefs about democracy and leadership as art educators. Send us your thoughts, questions, and concerns about this column or artists and democratic leadership.

Sincerely yours,

Dan Barney, Debbie Sickler, & Jodi Kushins

As an additional remark, we applaud the efforts of the Executive Director Search Committee and Executive Board for making the search for the new Executive Director of NAEA more transparent. On behalf of the executive search committee, MacArthur Goodwin invited NAEA members to provide input on the types of leadership attributes, experiences, and qualifications our next Executive Director should possess. We thank the committee for acknowledging our input from the last column regarding this search.