George Hein Lecture - Community Arts

I have been invited to give a brief lecture on community arts-making and participate in a panel discussion at this annual event in honor of Professor Emeritas George Hein, who created the doctoral program at Lesley University, Cambridge, MA.

Visual Art Appreciation Survey

The note and link below is for an arts-based research survey conducted by artist and scholar, Susan Loomis.

Please participate in this survey that I am working on for my doctoral level Quantitative Methods class. My research involves exploring the appreciation of Visual Art. Thank you for your participation!

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/visualartappreciationsurvey

Making Meaning Through Interpretive Explanation

This week, I am challenged to make meaning and coherent sense out of the assignments we have read, viewed and listened to. The textual images from the passage in Geertz’s Chapter 2 attributed to L. V. Helms concerning the self-immolation of three Balinese women in the late 1800’s (Geertz, 1983) and the film documentary based on the mass suicide of the 909 victims of Jonestown, Guyana in 1978 (Nelson, 2007) have frankly, overwhelmed my senses and challenged my thought process. I hardly know where to begin with this reflection. Perhaps returning Geertz’s writings can assist.

In three chapters of Local Knowledge: Further Essays in Interpretive Anthropology (Geertz, 1983) Geertz has given us much to think about interpretation and anthropological inquiry. But his definition of interpretive explanation on page 22 of Chapter 1 Blurred Genres: The Refiguration of Social thought helps me make sense of the words, sounds and images I mentioned in the first paragraph of this reflection.

Interpretive explanation – and it is a form of explanation, not just exalted glossography – trains its attention on what institutions, actions, images utterances, events, customs, all the usual objects of social-scientific interest mean to those whose institutions, actions, customs, and so on they are.

Geertz goes on to suggest that interpretive inquiry, “attempts to formulate how this people or that, this period or that, this person or that makes sense to itself, and understanding that, what we understand about social order, historical change, or psychic functioning in general.”

Geertz has made two points here which I will relate to the Peoples Temple. First, any attempt to conduct an interpretive explanation of the Peoples Temple needs to focus on what the Peoples Temple meant to the members of the Peoples Temple. According to Geertz, an interpretive explanation would attempt to understand what the customs of the Peoples Temple meant to the membership and what the actions, like the mass suicide, meant to the membership. The second point Geertz makes in the above quote is that generalization, can only occur once the meaning of the events, actions, customs to the members of the People’s Temple themselves, is understood.

The film gives insight into the meaning of the action of life-taking by presenting interviews, recorded statements and written communication of several members of the Peoples Temple. I will quote five members here, each one offering a different meaning. Eugene Smith a survivor said, “we wanted to make a change, it never happened but one thing I can say is at least we tried, and we didn’t sit back and wait on the laurels of somebody else, we tried, and yes it was a failure, and yes it was very tragic, but at least we tried.” Another survivor, Stanley Clayton, said, “I ain’t used the term suicide and I ain’t never goin to use the term suicide, that man killed them.”

Jim Jones provided his own meaning when he said, ‘there’s nothing to death, it’s just stepping into another plane…we didn’t commit suicide, we committed an act of revolutionary suicide protesting the conditions of an inhumane world.” Another survivor said, “There was nothing dignified about it, it was nothing to do with revolutionary suicide, it was nothing about making a (profanity omitted) statement, it was just senseless waste, a senseless waste and death.” Finally, in a note left at the scene, one victim said, “let all the story of this Peoples Temple be told… if nobody understands, it matters not. I am ready to die now darkness settles over Jonestown on its last day on earth.”

Despite these individual meanings, all different, expressed by survivors and victims, it is still quite difficult for me to compose any statement that would attempt to generalize their interpretation. Perhaps that is why the film focused on making meaning by interviewing the various people involved as well as the recorded public as a way of telling the story from the viewpoint of the participants.

References

Geertz, C. (1983). Local knowledge: Further essays in interpretive anthropology. New York: Basic Books, Inc.

Nelson, S. (Producer/Director). (2007). Jonestown: The life and death of peoples temple [Motion Picture]. WGBH Educational Foundation and Firelight Media.

Disciplined Inquiry

This post is a reflection of Disciplines of Inquiry in Education: A New Overview - by Lee Shulman

I found this article useful on two levels. First, Shulman provides a clear, concise description of the five dimensions of disciplined inquiry that are present in any research undertaking. They are as follows: research purpose, research problem, research setting, research investigator and research methods. Second, Shulman provides examples of several research questions in the field of education that illuminate how the choice of research question impacts the other dimensions. I intend to reflect on my own research interest by framing my work through the dimensions and questions that Shulman has raised in this piece.

Shulman indicates some research is undertaken, “to improve particular forms of practice.” I am interested in the volunteerism practiced by art-makers because I think something may be learned by understanding their practice which sometimes results in extensive volunteerism. Another general research purpose identified by Shulman is “one may wish to acquire a more complete description or accounting of the conditions associated with particular schools, students or content areas.” I am interested in the conditions that exist within schools and artistic training programs that contributed to the development of art-makers and may have led to their inclination to practice volunteerism. Shulman notes that, “…often, the research is undertaken in the interest of a particular ideology or value system to which the investigators are committed.” My ideology is centered on the role of the arts in empowering individuals, engaging communities and generating constructs such as social and cultural capital.

According to Shulman, the subject matter of research is made up of either problems, topics or issues. He indicates that research problems or topics historically addressed very general areas however in recent years they have extended into areas of practice and policy. My interest can be framed in the context of a specific research topic or research question associated with the practice of volunteerism. For example, one could ask what is the nature and extent of the volunteerism practiced by art-makers. This question focuses on the act of or experience of volunteering and not specifically on the person. However, one could also ask what does it mean to be an art-maker who practices volunteerism. This question focuses more on the art-maker and less on act of or process of volunteering. This section of the text has helped me see how the phrasing of the question directly impacts the methodology as well as the other dimensions of the research.

The research setting that most interests me is the organization where the art-maker practices his or her volunteerism. I am interested in this setting because I believe the organization plays an important role in the volunteering experience, including the processes of recruitment and retention of volunteers. Of greatest interest are those organizations, which are not performing arts organizations. Shulman discusses the pros and cons of conducting research within a working classroom vs. a laboratory setting. For obvious reasons, I think my research would benefit from observing the real-time experiences of volunteers.

The research investigator, in my case the author of this reflection, is both an art-maker, a volunteer and a scholar with admittedly limited research experience gained through two self-directed pilot survey research projects. I would therefore characterize myself as a practitioner which is consistent with Dewey’s view that, “the practitioner as investigator has become more commonplace in our day.”

The research method that appears to be the most appropriate to me is a mixed method involving both quantitative and qualitative research. The quantitative research could be employed to obtain data concerning the nature and extent of the volunteerism practiced by art-makers. This data could be compared and correlated with existing research to inform the study. The qualitative research could be used to obtain deep insight into the lived experience of the art-makers who volunteer. This research could involve a phenomenological study to fully explore the meaning of the volunteerism as seen through the eyes of an art-maker who practices volunteerism. Interviews, observations and case studies are all techniques that could be used to inquire within this phenomenological study.
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References
Schulman, E. (1997). Disciplines of inquiry in education: A new overview. In R. M. Jaeger (Ed.), Methods for research in education (pp.3-69) Washington: American Educational Research Association

Reflective Thought

This is a reflection of John Dewey's How We Think and the concept of reflective thought. This piece helped me to understand what constitutes reflective thought and I have attempted to apply Dewey's criteria for reflective thought to my own work and in particular, one belief I hold.

I believe that some performing artists are inclined to volunteer significant amounts of their time and energy to support causes that are important to them.

According to Dewey, a reflective operation is, “act of search or investigation directed toward bringing to light further facts which serve to corroborate or to nullify the suggested belief," (Dewey, 1910). So, what is the evidence, facts or truths that support this belief?

First, I have personally witnessed this volunteering behavior by at least 6 performing artists during the past 3 years. The art forms engaged in by these artists include theatre, dance, music and film. The constituencies that have for the most part been the focus of their volunteerism are marginalized individuals including emotionally challenged teens, people living below the poverty level, community members suffering financial setbacks due to job loss and groups of people who have been disenfranchised due to discrimination based on their race, gender, age or socio-economic status. The extent of this volunteerism for these six individuals ranges from 4 hours per week to 50 hours per week.

Second, although there is a paucity of research of concerning the volunteerism of performing artists there is a significant amount of research related to volunteerism. A literature review of volunteerism has identified numerous studies, many of which suggest that the motivation behind volunteerism satisfies the need to help others, also referred to as ‘other-oriented’ behavior. Studies have also reported on a strong association between volunteerism and the organizations involved in other-oriented missions. In other words, people who volunteer frequently and over long periods of time, tend to be actively engaged with organizations that share their viewpoints and passion. While these studies do not specifically reference performing artists or visual artists as a group, and therefore do not support my belief, they have established important links between volunteerism and the characteristics of other-oriented behavior as well as an association with organizations. I find it interesting to note that these characteristics (other-oriented behavior and association with organizations) appear to be characteristics of the performing artists I have witnessed.

Third, a pilot survey study of 240 New England performing artists recently conducted by the author, has identified higher levels of volunteerism with this group than exist with the general public (Cormier, 2010). The average volunteer rate for residents of Massachusetts and the United States, reported by the US Dept of Labor (Corporation for National and Community Service, 2009) ranges from 25% to 27% over the last five years. The volunteer rate of the performing artists who participated in my pilot survey study was 72%, more than two times of that reported in the national study.

In summary, I think the first and third facts referenced above (first hand witnessing and pilot study) support my belief, however the second fact referenced above (existing research) does not support by belief.

References:
Cormier, P. (2010). The volunteerism of performing artists. Unpublished pilot survey study.

Corporation for National and Community Service (2009). Volunteering in America Research Highlights. Retrieved November 3, 2009, from www.nationalservice.gov/about/role_impact/performance_research.asp.

Dewey, J. (1910). How we think. Boston: D.C. Health & Co.