Annotated Bibliography

This semester I have taken two courses including Multicultural Art Education and Non-Thesis Research. The Multicultural Art Education class comprised various topics including racism, multiculturalism, CRT, Afro-Futurism, etc. However, the most significant aspect of the course involved eliminating racial challenges that exist in minority groups. The challenges faced by minority groups is eliminating stereotypes and predetermined notions that exist within society in order to view key behaviors, physical actions, and written dialogue that constitutes racism and move forward to eliminate it. The most striking concept I learned in this class relate to Art Education itself. Within Art Education a notion exists that focus should only be placed upon white European artist and works, since this is the most commonplace, and persons from Asian, African American, Hispanic, and Native American should be eliminated. Students and artists alike require positive role models, projects, and dialogue that correlate to their social identity, suffering, healing, happiness, and more. Without this connection and only incorporating whiteness, this narrow perspective doesn’t allow everyone to thrive in their environment. The challenges I faced while taking this course was understanding whiteness, learning to live with it, but also, how to advocate, challenge, engage and extend the white-only perspectives.

In my first semester of the Non-Thesis Research course, I came to better understand my self-identity, questions I would address for my future annotated bibliograph at the conclusion if the semester, etc. While researching for my current annotated bibliography, however, I began gaining knowledge regarding answers to my research queries. I’ve decided to investigate: One of them being how Art and digital technology play a key role for blind persons, as well as other disability groups. The two key aspects are the willingness for museums to incorporate new ways for everyone to access its content including tactile, auditory, haptic feedback, captioning, low lighting for autistic individuals, etc. Having access to their online content is crucial also. The challenges I encountered during this course were initially trying to figure out how to explain my teaching philosophy in my second blog post, since for me, I consider working in an art museum to be vastly different than in a classroom. Comprehending the segments of the museum, as well as my role within The Butler, offered me the opportunity to further expand my reach in this Masters program.

The texts I’ve included in this annotated bibliography contain a mixture of themes and ideas relating to racism, whiteness, ableism, Women’s Studies, CRT, Gender Studies, and Colonialism, as well as combining the power of Art and Assistive Technology. These mantras aid in combining Art Education to include various perspectives rather than one perspective alone. For instance, The Color of Law and We Need To Do More Than Survive outline the history and topics surrounding minority groups living in the United States. Love and Rothstein’s work brought about several key questions for me while reading including the two writers discuss a detailed history of the oppression and suffering of the black community, as well as other minority communities intersecting education, housing, employment, etc. Since the beginning of the pandemic, has this oppression increased or lessened and why? In Batina Love’s work, she frequently mentions the Educational Survival Complex in a school setting. However, how can this relate to the Art Education field and museum education? Is this similar or different to the traditional classroom? The other three works underscore the power of Afrofuturism, Assistive Technology, Art, and art museums themselves. Can Afrofuturism be expanded to encompass minority groups such as the disability and blind community? How does this unique perspective challenge and enhance the field of Art Education—an imagined and ever-expanding a new world where the future of technology and art is ever expanding to internalize tactile, visual, auditory, and olfactory perspectives of the visual arts. How can some of the technologies mentioned, and also blind artists discussed throughout two of the articles enhance Afrofuturism in the museum setting?

Kefalidou, A. (2021). The importance of digital art technology for supporting people with vision impairments. Practices for a museum aiming at social inclusion. The case of “Mind’s Eye | Opening Arts to the visually impaired 2019/20” at MOMus – Museum of Contemporary Art in Thessaloniki. International Hellenic University. https://repository.ihu.edu.gr/xmlui/bitstream/handle/11544/29800/paperfinal%20%281%29%20%281%29.pdf?sequence=1

In this article, Kefalidou dives into how art museums have evolved over the years to incorporate Assistive Technology, as well as signage and other key museum elements for the blind. She bases her research through a combination of sources: blind artists, various types of assistive technology, and an initiative in Greece that expands the possibilities of tactile art. Kefalidou provides facts regarding the blind community and other disability groups while stating the negative perceptions of the Social and Medical Models of Disability. Her thesis is most suited for museum staff expanding the possibilities of art and technology. John Bramblitt is one of several blind artists the author mentions specifically to assist in supporting her claim that regardless of being blind or fully sighted, everyone can appreciate the power the visual arts offer, albeit in a different format. Kefalidou’s article offers further guidance regarding the incorporation of various Assistive Technologies into a museum for blind visitors themselves.

Love, Bettina (2020). We want to do more than survive: Abolitionist teaching and the pursuit of educational freedom. BEACON.

Love’s book emphasizes the power of abolitionist teaching throughout the education system to eliminate challenges such as the educational survival complex, state mandated testing, racism, anxiety, stress, trauma, and most significantly, joy. She also discusses the power of a participatory democracy approach and provides countless examples to back her claim. Love uses factual evidence of events throughout her own life, current events of racial violence, and experiences throughout her educational career to allow for an unbiased approach; this work is best suited for not only Art Educators in general, but also, an educator in any field (university level or secondary education) to eliminate the challenges of teaching whiteness in a white dominated education system. While reading We Want To Do More Than Survive, it truly challenged my perspectives and thought processes. The following quote explores and challenges my perspective of multicultural education: “My mission in life is not merely to survive, but to thrive; and to do so with some passion, some compassion, some humour and some style.” Maya Angelou.

Rothstein, R. (2018). The color of law: A forgotten history of how our government segregated America. Liveright Publishing Corporation, a division of W.W. Norton & Company.

Rothstein’s nonfiction work challenges the perspective of the housing market, the government, and the general public’s ideology of whiteness. Similar to Love’s use of historical examples and events, Rothstein uses this information to support his claim. He begins by discussing several traditional black families during the early 1920s and how they faced countless obstacles including housing, employment, and education. I was unaware of several events that negatively impacted the black community, especially redlining and the passage of Brown Vs. Board of Education. With a further understanding of whiteness and its ripple effect in the black community, reading Rothstein’s book raised several questions regarding my work in the museum field and Art Education. Since the beginning of my Masters in Art Education, I’ve come to understand the significance whiteness and a European Art centered approach play within the field. How does underscoring multiculturalism and learning the history of the black community begin to eliminate stereotypes and perspectives within a museum setting and the artistic community. How can students, adults, and visitors from unique backgrounds come to appreciate and be more engaged within their own perspectives (learning about artists with a similar culture, incorporating these cultural activities into the art making process), etc.?

Dupere, K. (2021, October 29). 5 innovative ways art is becoming more accessible to the Blind Community. Mashable. Retrieved November 18, 2022, from https://mashable.com/article/art-accessibility-blind-low-vision

Dupere’s article outlines a few key technologies that can be incorporated into an art museum including 3D printed works that compliment key paintings within the collection, audio guides, and even allowing blind visitors to touch designated works. For instance, John Bramblitt is a blind painter who uses heavy applications of paint creating further texture and a greater three-dimensional depth to the works themselves rather than traditional painting techniques. She bases her research off of specific technology companies and artists with disabilities who are continuing to innovate new ways to make art more accessible for the blind and low vision community, and this article is best suited for museum educators and staff. Reading this article gave me further information and tips regarding present trends of accessibility for disabled individuals including the blind. This will assist me in my continued research in the 6998 courses as well as my work at The Butler, so I will be able to suggest further innovations for blind visitors.

Acuff, J. B. Afrofuturism: Reimagining art curricula for Black existence. Art Education, 73(3), 12-21.

Acuff’s article underscores the power of Afrofuturism within Art Education and also the artistic community describing the connection between the past, new, and innovative technology, and most significantly, how this perspective can enhance the power and intelligence of the black community. This source is geared toward Art Educators within the K-12 and university level, and she provides evidence of artists embracing this movement with visual and written explanations. Also, Acuff strives to challenge the idea and separation of the Arts and Crafts movement within the United States—mask-making, African rafts, etc. Her claim continues and determines that these types of Art activities separate and alienate this community, and in making this claim, she details several African artists who use natural materials—wood, natural dyes, and weaving patterns to embrace the past and harness future imagination and technology. This Afrofuturism article challenged my perspective on further inclusion of the black community and other minority groups into the museum setting from art exhibitions to workshops and activities and how persons of various backgrounds can experience equity and inclusion in the art field and raises the question: Can Asian Americans, women, the disability community adapt Afrofuturism to bridge their interests, thought processes, and perceptions of art and technology? How is this possible? Acuff’s quote truly demonstrates the power of reason behind Afrofuturism: In 1994, cultural critic Mark Dery coined the term “Afrofuturism” to refer to “speculative fiction that treats AfricanAmerican themes and addresses African-American concerns in the context of twentieth-century technoculture—and, more generally, African-American signification that appropriates images of technology and a prosthetically enhanced future” (p. 180).

 #Annotated Bibliography #Class Reflections