Focused Discussions
For work that is best discussed or debated, rather than reported on through a formal presentation, these sessions provide a forum for an extended “roundtable” conversation between an author and a small group of interested colleagues. Summaries of the author’s key ideas, or points of discussion, are used to stimulate and guide the discourse.
The Marginalization of American Country Music: Renewing Academic Inquiring into the Music of the Rural White Southern Diaspora
Focused Discussion Vicki Purslow
The cultural identity of America is deeply entrenched in the history of country music. Beginning as an oral tradition most associated with rural hillbillies, American country music is often seen as the music of the conservative, white, poor, rural, working and middle class. K–16 education often reinforces a hierarchy of music deemed most worthy of study. While many schools and universities offer courses in western European and rock and popular music, including hip hop and rap, country music courses are sparse. The 2007 discontinuation of the Journal of Country Music further marginalized the importance of the genre as a subject of serious academic study. Perhaps it is the simplicity of the music and lyrics that lead to a perception that country music lacks depth and seriousness. The purpose of this focused discussion is to renew the argument for high schools and universities to break down the hierarchy of musical genres. Mainstream country music artists and their record labels aggressively pursue multiplatinum record sales, which leaves the classic and alternative country at a substantive disadvantage. Broadcast radio and video do not have multiple formats for the country as is done in other popular music genres. America’s country music deserves serious academic inquiry because it may provide K – 16 students with opportunities for cultural engagement while exploring diversity in thought as the history of the music of a marginalized diasporic population is told.
Counteracting the Cult of Self: Eco-Social Practice
Focused Discussion Laura Ann Donkers
Art does not have to be separate from ordinary life and ordinary activities, and can be a supportive tool catalysing shared societal actions that can improve lives. Artists who work in this way use their art as a relational activity to advance personal and social transformations. This involves changing how everyday practices are perceived so that they are no longer seen as just inconsequential aspects of daily living. The role and function of art is moving towards one of Eco-Social Practice created by artists working in the public realm of politics, environment and social life. These artists develop understandings of ‘how to’ work with their communities by living with them and learning from them: joining in the web of group life. This requires adopting a listening paradigm so that the voices of others can be heard, aiding the recognition and airing of complex issues from an insider’s perspective and spawning a sense of empowerment in those who are listened to. Through this affiliation a new kind of self emerges that is intertwined with the other: A dialogic relationship that acknowledges interconnectedness and interdependence. Through projects that promote interconnectedness across the whole ecosystem, communities with long-standing relationships to their surroundings are able to co-create meaningful futures where sustainability of both the environment and its inhabitants are enhanced. This facilitates long-term regeneration, challenging the politics of social isolation to find the means to build more liveable futures.
Singing Indigenous Stories: Cultural Rescue in the Indigenous Reserve Parque das Tribos in Manaus, Brazil
Focused Discussion Vanessa Benites Bordin
I bring here an account of the work that I carry out in the Parque das Tribos Indigenous Reserve located in the urban perimeter of the city of Manaus. This work is linked to the extension project that I coordinate as a professor at the State University of Amazonas, titled "Storytellers: the popular theater of lively forms in the community," which relates directly to my doctoral research in progress in the ECA PPGAC - USP. I speak about my experience with indigenous women with whom I have worked in two cultural spaces advised by the Indigenous School Education Management (GEEI / SEMED) that operate in the Parque das Tribos where about one hundred and thirty-two families live, totaling thirty five ethnic groups.
The Poetry Project: Engaging our Creativity through Words, Paint, Chant, and Collaboration
Focused Discussion Claudia Reder
Teachers are highly self-reflective to ensure that their own prejudices and assumptions won’t interfere with their professionalism. In class, poetry is used as a way to reflect on their own cultural and language identities as well as to reflect and study texts used in class. Further, some of the poems are used as springboards to discussion/analysis of social issues. Collaborative reflection and stickies allow participants to create poems of social action, a way to raise questions and multiple points of view that arise. Robert J. Sternberg writes, “The most powerful way to develop creativity in your students is to be a role model. Children develop creativity not when you tell them to, but when you show them.”
Interactive, New Media and Creative Approaches for Community Building, Education and Advocacy: Envisioning Social Justice
Focused Discussion Betty Yu
The discussion will focus on practical hands on new media platforms, video, digital tools, and phone applications that can be incorporated into community-based creative placemaking projects with participants that have little to no experience with technology. The educational and advocacy project is a collaboration with CAAAV Organizing Communities’ Chinatown Tenants Union, highlighting their organizing history and building campaigns. In addition, workshop participants will have an opportunity to create their own QR code or Augmented Reality-based online experience. The discussion also aims to spark a discussion about the ways in which technology and new media platforms can be used to unleash the imagination of community members. Can it be a tool to help us envision social justice now and into the future?
Finding Balance: Training Dancers
Focused Discussion Laurie Abramson
Although access to technology creates genuine benefits, for example making it easy to view dance works that are not otherwise accessible, the prevalence of technology in dancers’ daily lives creates complications that should be addressed in dance instruction. Examples follow. The deluge of information delivered through technology has weakened students’ ability to make human connections. The tunnel vision that is used for mobile devices is far different from the peripheral vision that is required to maintain lines and spatial patterns and gauge distances to be traveled. It is necessary to have daily reinforcement in class by continually rotating lines, changing fronts, and organizing groups of varied numbers traveling together. Budgetary restraints, when combined with inexpensive video technology, often force choreographers to limit their time in the studio with dancers. That has shifted responsibility to the dancers to see quickly to be able to reproduce and then manipulate the choreographer’s movement using reversals, retrogrades and direction changes. These practices can all be emphasized and practiced in class. Character limits imposed by Twitter, texts and similar technologies limit the user’s ability to explore almost any matter in depth. The arts provide a way to avoid these limitations, and in the dance studio students can learn to explore complexity and detail without interruption. One technique that I use with my pre- professional students is requiring them to maintain a weekly journal in which they take the time to consider and write out what they are learning and how that learning is affecting them.
