Rebecca Bourgault

9.3 A Dialogue on Our Journeys to Embody the Spirit and Practice of Decolonization (Panel)

Chair:

Rebecca Bourgault – Boston University, College of Fine Arts, USA

Panellists:

Amanda Alexander – Miami University of Ohio, USA

Manisha Sharma – University of North Texas, Denton, USA

Abstract:

This paper proposal includes Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 of a 3-session proposal. In Part 1: Sharing our journeys, we will present our collaboration, which explores how, as three artists, educators, and scholars, we have experienced writing about, theorizing, reading, and practicing ways to contribute to decolonizing the art education discipline and disrupt the colonial dominance that continues to be dependent on legacies of inequity to operate. Broaching the topic from our different cultural, racial, and class contexts and acknowledging the shifting grounds and discursive changes taking place in our research and discipline, the presentation will take the form of three brief contemplative and conversational papers that account for our evolving individual perspectives on the topic and aim at sharing the trials and tribulations that such research and investigation bring forth. We share these stories from the lens of artists and community educators who have worked in various spaces, regionally, in the US, and internationally. In Part 2 of the dialogue: Inviting co-travellers, we will expand our reflections and experiences presented in Part 1 by extending it to the audience and engage them in a broader conversation by identifying questions from our texts that meet at the crossroads of our inquiry. Through this dialogue, we aim to evoke narratives of audience journeys toward embodying the spirit and practice of decolonization. In Part 3: Considering destinations of this paper, we will invite our audience to engage in brainstorming and mapping potential applications of this understanding in their various venues of practice (K-12 and higher ed classrooms, community, and museum venues) in contexts of curriculum and pedagogy.