(click here for more info)
1. Rationale: Explain the significance of your proposed study abroad experience (including the region you selected, its culture, and the language you will study) to U.S. national security, broadly defined. Describe how the country, language, and study abroad program you selected will help you achieve your academic and career goals, including your plans to fulfill the service requirement.
SIT's Durban-based program focuses on social and political transformation in South Africa. I hope to study the use of community arts as a tool of reconciliation, bringing what I've learned back to US cities like Baltimore. I believe community art contributes to non-military national security because it improves our society, culture and economy by fostering an environment of tolerance.
Durban is ideal for exploring art as social change on a global level. The city has had an active community arts scene since the 1970’s, and is now home to organizations like “Art for Humanity” and “Create Africa South,” whose missions are to use art to “promote human rights awareness regionally and globally” and to “develop, preserve and publish, exhibit or market South African creativity, both in the visual and literary arts." These mission statements run parallel with my own academic and artistic interests.
As a community artist in inner city Baltimore, I have become aware of my city’s physical racial divides, as well as the psychological separateness of the “other”. Racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance are finely knit into the fiber of Baltimore. Just outside my window last week, a white man screamed derogatory ethnic slurs and death threats at my black neighbor during an argument. I called the police, and now am being subpoenaed to court as a witness.
Our national security relies on tolerance and understanding between people of diverse ethnicities. Homeland crime is perpetuated by organized hate-groups and gangs, as well as everyday individuals. South Africa's 1995 Truth and Reconciliation Commission inspires my study and work as a community artist. It is my goal to use art to create public dialogue revealing the wide spectrum of oppression, privilege and inequality in our own country in an effort towards reconciliation.
SIT's program will enable me to study in South Africa's townships and stay with a Zulu family, becoming immersed in their language and culture. I feel this cultural and linguistic understanding will greatly enrich my collaborative work with inner city Baltimore communities, especially Baltimore's large population of African refugees. In Durban, I will be able to do research one-on-one with South Africans, allowing their stories to be primary source information for the work made. Collecting oral histories is an academic interest of mine that developed last semester during a class I took Johns Hopkins, titled "Race and Community in East Baltimore." Sponsored by the Center for Africana Studies, the class was part of a five year oral-history project attempting to preserve East Baltimore’s ill-archived history before it was erased by gentrification.
Baltimore's economic class divide is not unlike that of post-apartheid Durban, and although I am no economics major, I am interested in role of the arts in economic development. In his book "Rise of the Creative Class", Richard Florida proposes that cities with high concentrations of artists correlate with a higher level of economic development. Florida suggests that attracting and retaining a "creative class" is the best use of a city's regeneration resources for long-term prosperity. What attracts creative individuals and industries to a city? Ethnic diversity, multiculturalism, and tolerance, Florida states. I believe engaging a community in collaborative art builds an environment of tolerance in which ethnic diversity and multiculturalism thrive.
The arts can also help provide minorities and the urban lower class with access to creative industries and new jobs. The 2007 Research Consortium on the Creative Industries of South Africa stated that "the Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative of South Africa (ASGISA) has now identified the creative industries, and particularly the craft and film sectors, as one of the identified drivers of sustainable economic opportunities and livelihoods for local communities whilst expanding business opportunities for small, medium and micro enterprise (SMMEs)." In his 2010 State of the Union Address, President Obama recently emphasized small businesses and grassroots organizations as crucial to America's economic success. A strong economy is a necessary component of our national security, especially when considering the relationship between poverty and crime.
In the holistic development of a country, however, culture and the arts are equally important as economic and physical needs. By investing in the arts at home and abroad, we invest in a more peaceful, tolerant global society. I am interested in pursuing this effort through my study abroad experience and my career. With interests in the fields of arts and culture, social justice and international relations, I am considering government jobs like museum work (curatorial, exhibition development), art therapy, youth programming, community planning, equal employment, peace corps recruitment, and foreign service.
2. Study Abroad Program Description (both the preferred and alternate program): Describe the study abroad program’s course of study and related cultural activities, as well as the administrative and support services provided (i.e., facilities, housing, resident director, etc.). Describe the language component in as much detail as possible, including the number of classroom contact hours and informal language study opportunities outside of the classroom. Describe your past experience in studying or speaking the language (or another language if relevant), as well as your plans for continuing to study and/or speak the language following your Boren Scholarship.
In this interdisciplinary program, lectures and discussions in the Social and Political Transformation seminar aim to provide students with a solid grasp of the historical background of South Africa's apartheid system, contemporary developments leading to the dismantling of that system, the visions for post-apartheid South Africa, the political, economic and social structure of the future South Africa, and an anthropological and cultural look at South African society. A central premise of the seminar is the interconnected nature of issues of reconciliation and development in South Africa; it is difficult to analyze one without considering its relationship to the other.
The Program is overseen by Academic Director John Daniel. Daniel is a South African citizen and holds a B.A. (1964) in political science from the University of Natal, South Africa and an M.A. and Ph.D. (1975) in political science from the State University of New York at Buffalo. The program includes four other staff members and eleven guest lecturers from the University of KwaZulu Natal.
SIT's coursework includes "Social and Political Transformation Seminar," "Field Study Seminar," "Independent Study Project," and "Introductory Language Study: Zulu."
1. "Social and Political Transformation Seminar":
-Resources utilized include PEACE Foundation, Phoenix Zululand, and The Valley Trust.
- Module 1: South Africa: The State of the Nation
Lectures and activities will take place at four sites in South Africa - Johannesburg, the Pretoria, Durban, and the KwaZulu Natal South Coast.
-Module 2: Development in South Africa
The module takes place in both a rural and an urban setting. We will begin the module with some conceptual and theoretical underpinnings of development in Durban, and then we will move on to
Amacambini, a rural community just north of the Tugela River in KwaZulu Natal. Here we will live in
homestays and visit a number of development projects within the community. In Amacambini, we will
work in partnership with the P.E.A.C.E. Foundation, a local non-governmental organization.
-Module 3: The Challenges of Reconciliation in South Africa
This module will be taught in Durban and on excursion in the Western Cape.
Module 4: Putting Theory into Practice: Chatsworth and Wentworth
Students will spend some time exploring the history and current
challenges facing South Africans of Indian origin. We will also spend some time living in homestays in
the “Coloured” community of Wentworth, where we will work with organizations involved in community
development.
-Module 5: Focused Study: Development, Gender, and Reconciliation.
Students will be asked to select one area of specialization and focus (mine will be reconciliation) based upon interest and possibly on plans for ISP field study.
2. "Field Study Seminar"
A course in the concepts of learning across cultures and from field experience. Introduction to the Independent Study Project. Material includes cross-cultural adaptation and skills building; project selection and refinement; appropriate methodologies; field study ethics and the World Learning/SIT Human Subjects Review Policy; developing contacts and finding resources; developing skills in observation and interviewing; gathering, organizing, and communicating data; maintaining a field journal.
3. "Independent Study Project"
Conducted in Durban or in another approved location appropriate to the project. Students may choose to complete either an Independent Study Project or a practicum paper resulting from an internship with an affiliate organization working in social and/or political transformation. Students will meet with an Academic Director and Advisor, and have actual hands-on work with their organization.
4. “Introductory Language Study: Zulu."
A significant highlight of the program is Zulu language instruction, complemented by discussions of Zulu history and culture. This two credit (30 hours) course is immersive - students will stay with a Zulu host families, gaining cultural insight and understanding alongside beginning speaking comprehension skills and development of conversational abilities in Zulu. A Language Coordinator will lead the language course, working with a team of language instructors and tutors. Classes will be held primarily in the SIT program center in Durban. The major course objectives include enhancing student interaction with Zulu society and to build a foundation upon which further studies in Zulu can be undertaken, mine of which include community arts projects (possibly murals) with Zulu and other African refugee populations in Baltimore. Students will be assigned exercises and tests (both written and oral) by the instructor, and will be expected to complete a final exam (oral and written).
Monday, February 15, 2010
SIT Application Essays
1. Articulate your academic and personal reasons for selecting SIT Study Abroad's field-based experiential format and your preferred program location. Demonstrate the connection between your interests and the program's theme and academic content.
SIT Study Abroad’s field-based experiential format is essential for a community artist like myself. The stories of the community must be the primary source information in the artwork made. Collecting oral histories is an academic passion of mine that developed last semester during a class at Johns Hopkins University. Offered by their Center for Africana studies, the class was called “Race and Community in East Baltimore,” and aimed at using oral histories to preserve the neighborhood’s ill-archived past before it was erased by gentrification.
SIT’s format is also ideal because it will allow for a collaborative art and research project to grow organically, meeting the needs specified by those it will serve. Durban is ideal for exploring art as social change on a global level. The city has had an active community arts scene since the 1970’s, and is now home to organizations like “Art for Humanity” and “Create South Africa,” whose missions are to use art to “promote human rights awareness regionally and globally” and to “develop, preserve and publish, exhibit or market South African creativity, both in the visual and literary arts." These mission statements run parallel with my own interests. As a minority at my high school, and a community artist in inner city Baltimore, I have become aware of the physical racial divides of my surroundings, as well as the psychological separateness of the “other”. Racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance are finely knit into the fiber of Baltimore. In fact, just outside my window last night, a white man screamed derogatory ethnic slurs and death threats at my black neighbor during an argument.
How to best create public dialogue revealing the ugly underbellies of both the oppressed minority and privileged white experiences in an effort to reconcile them? Baltimore and Durban have begun to use community art as the catalyst for deep personal, social, and political change, and I am interested in furthering this effort during my studies.
2. Describe a significant intercultural experience, issue, or event and its impact on you.
My class met up with Donald and Kflu outside of an old Catholic school building in Middle East Baltimore. A room on the top floor acts as the headquarters of the Save Middle East Action Coalition (SMEAC). The coalition was created nine years ago by neighborhood residents who learned about the East Baltimore Development Initiative from the newspapers. EBDI is a fourteen year comprehensive plan to revitalize Baltimore's East side, turning it into an internationally prestigious biotech park and mixed income residential neighborhood. To do this they are evicting current residents, promising replacement housing, and bulldozing their homes. Donald is a displaced resident, and Kflu is SMEAC's community organizer, helping residents fight for fair housing rights.
Donald walked us through his neighborhood, and as I passed an old eviction notice stapled to a boarded up door, I remembered the early 1900's, when this city was the first to bring about legalized segregation and a sentiment of racialized urban reform. I thought of the promises of urban renewal and "serving the greater good" that surrounded slum clearance in 1911. Donald spoke of his love for his neighborhood, and the pain and anxieties of being displaced. Two black and white photos are stapled to the plywood of another abandoned building. One depicts a riot in the 1960's, when the Jim Crow laws were overturned. The other is of Martin Luther King Jr. speaking to a crowd. On a wall a few blocks away, a spray paint tag cries out "I wonder if heaven got a ghetto!"
Returning to the catholic school building, my class and I pass Sunday school signs saying "Love one another," and posters of a black Jesus and a black Last Supper. As everyone sits and talks, I ask Kflu what he did before he came to Baltimore. He told me he used to do similar community organizing work in the Bronx. I told him I was interested in getting more involved in SMEAC's efforts, and he called a few weeks later with a project. Remembering I was an art student, he asked if I could help him design a photo collage documenting SMEAC's history as a holiday gift to supporters. We spent all Monday going through hundreds of photos and arranging them in a final poster on a computer. Kflu told me about SMEAC's history and a little of his own. His family is from Eritrea and lives around D.C.'s large huge population of Eritrean refugees. Kflu and I are continuing to work together, now on a photography project documenting his community organizing experience here in the states. I'm learning about Eritrea, grassroots organizing and how the little guy stands up against big business and government. Most importantly, however, East Baltimore, Donald, and Kflu are teaching me how to step outside of myself and look at my world through the eyes of another.
3. Please write a friendly letter to your host family for your homestay
To those I love without knowing,
Thank you for graciously opening your home to me. I can not wait to meet you all! My name is Stephanie, and I'm a student at an amazing art school in Baltimore, Maryland. I am studying painting, but also enjoy writing, photography and book-making. My siblings are interested in the arts as well. My older sister, who is 22, is a theater student, and my younger sister, who is 19, is a dance student. My younger brother, 18 and still in high school, enjoys playing the guitar. My father teaches athletics at an elementary school and my mom is an administrator at a vocational school for refugees in Florida. My family is very close and treasures holidays and summers when we are all home in Florida. I grew up close to the beach and have a deep love for the ocean. I swim as often as possible, and have even been making paintings of water lately. I'm sure my stay with you will also inspire many future paintings and works of art!
Sincerely,
Stephanie McKee
4. Independent Study Project Proposal
The Independent Study Project (ISP) is a key component of SIT Study Abroad programs. Your ability to propose an appropriate project with a single focus is an important factor in admission. A successful ISP aims to increase knowledge in a field of study that contributes to the host culture. Once on-site, you may develop or change your proposal based on additional knowledge of local realities and resources. Your Academic Director will approve and supervise your final project proposal, and you will identify a local expert to act as your project advisor. The culmination of an ISP is typically a 20-40 page paper and an oral presentation. Your topic should be relevant to the theme of the program and host country.
Institutional Review Board
Human Subject Review Policy - In keeping with federal regulations, ethical guidelines for scholarly research, and the mission of SIT/World Learning, all SIT Study Abroad student ISP research involving human subjects must receive SIT's Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval and adhere to standards in SIT/World Learning's Human Subjects Review Policy available online.
The policy is designed to help students develop and implement ISPs that are ethically grounded, culturally sensitive, and respectful of research participants. This process includes local review boards at program sites, with an additional IRB at SIT's Vermont campus. Both will be available to act on any student ISP proposals that raise concerns or questions that cannot be resolved by the academic director and student together.
The SIT IRB has been registered with the Office of Human Research Protections of the US Department of Health and Human Services.
Students should be sure to understand the parameters of their home school's transfer requirements early in the ISP planning stages. We strongly encourage students to also discuss any IRB/Human Subjects Review requirements that the home school may implement for credit transfer, especially if they hope to use their ISP research for future projects.
As you develop your Independent Study Project Proposal, please take into consideration the following:
a one-month time frame
the theme and location of your selected program
the field-based nature of the project
the potential of the project to expand the knowledge base of a particular field of study
What focused question would you like to explore? (Your scope should be narrow so as to allow in-depth study.
I would like to explore how community arts is used as a tool of social reconciliation in Durban. Durban has had an active community arts scene since the 1970’s, and is now home to organizations like “Art for Humanity” and “Create Africa South,” whose missions are to use art to “promote human rights awareness regionally and globally” and to “develop, preserve and publish, exhibit or market South African creativity, both in the visual and literary arts." I have contacted Jan Jordaan, the founder of "Art for Humanity," asking if he needs an intern or assistance with any projects. He responded saying he could use help developing a school program that works with students and teachers to make banners featuring artwork and poems about human rights. The banners are hung around schools in Durban. Mr. Jordaan could also use help managing/promoting their exhibitions. Either of these options could become a practicum based ISP. Another option is working with Zulu women who make art in Durban. The organization "Create Africa South" began a project called "Amazwi Abesifazane, Voices of Women" in 2004. Women share intimate memories expressed in embroidered, appliquéd and beaded cultural documents. I have contacted the organization's founder and chairman, Andries Botha, about working with Create Africa South, and am waiting to hear back from him. In addition to strengthening culture, I'm interested in how the arts can provide minorities and the urban lower class with access to creative industries and new jobs. The 2007 Research Consortium on the Creative Industries of South Africa stated that "the Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative of South Africa (ASGISA) has now identified the creative industries, and particularly the craft and film sectors, as one of the identified drivers of sustainable economic opportunities and livelihoods for local communities whilst expanding business opportunities for small, medium and micro enterprise (SMMEs)." What other doors might community arts open for Durban's urban lower class?
What methods would you use to gather information from local sources?
If working with a community arts organization, I would attend their workshops and events. As locals work on collaborative art projects, I would participate, help where needed, observe, and interview. I might ask willing locals if they would at another time share their oral histories, which could be used in collaborative artwork and a final practicum-based ISP paper as primary source information.
What previous coursework on experience has prepared you for this project? Please include previous research experience.
Previous related coursework includes a class I took in Fall 2009 at Johns Hopkins University, titled "Race and Community in East Baltimore." Sponsored by the Center for Africana Studies, the class was part of a five year oral-history research project attempting to preserve East Baltimore’s ill-archived history before it was erased by gentrification. In addition to learning about middle-east Baltimore's racialized development, I found a resident who shared her oral history and allowed it to be posted online as a public document. As a final project, I worked on a mural for the new East Baltimore Community School. I researched the school, interviewed the principle and teachers, and helped teach four after school art classes in which the students worked on the mural. In Spring 2009 I took a "community based murals" class that required collaborating with the residents of a senior citizen's apartment building in west Baltimore. After connecting and talking with residents, I painted a mural for them on the walls of their lobby. In Spring 2009 I took a class at Johns Hopkins called "The African City: Art and the Politics of Place," where I learned the unique cultural make up of countries and cities across the continent. In my final research paper (titled "Ndebele Wall Paintings and Community Murals in South Africa: Affirming Identity Through Process") I argued that it is not imagery, but the process of making community murals in South Africa that links this genre to traditional Ndebele wall painting. Other related coursework includes the community arts internship I've held in Baltimore for three years now. The first year was spent teaching an art class at an art center in east Baltimore, and for the past two years I've been teaching students ages 6-13 at a Recreation center in west Baltimore.
SIT Study Abroad’s field-based experiential format is essential for a community artist like myself. The stories of the community must be the primary source information in the artwork made. Collecting oral histories is an academic passion of mine that developed last semester during a class at Johns Hopkins University. Offered by their Center for Africana studies, the class was called “Race and Community in East Baltimore,” and aimed at using oral histories to preserve the neighborhood’s ill-archived past before it was erased by gentrification.
SIT’s format is also ideal because it will allow for a collaborative art and research project to grow organically, meeting the needs specified by those it will serve. Durban is ideal for exploring art as social change on a global level. The city has had an active community arts scene since the 1970’s, and is now home to organizations like “Art for Humanity” and “Create South Africa,” whose missions are to use art to “promote human rights awareness regionally and globally” and to “develop, preserve and publish, exhibit or market South African creativity, both in the visual and literary arts." These mission statements run parallel with my own interests. As a minority at my high school, and a community artist in inner city Baltimore, I have become aware of the physical racial divides of my surroundings, as well as the psychological separateness of the “other”. Racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance are finely knit into the fiber of Baltimore. In fact, just outside my window last night, a white man screamed derogatory ethnic slurs and death threats at my black neighbor during an argument.
How to best create public dialogue revealing the ugly underbellies of both the oppressed minority and privileged white experiences in an effort to reconcile them? Baltimore and Durban have begun to use community art as the catalyst for deep personal, social, and political change, and I am interested in furthering this effort during my studies.
2. Describe a significant intercultural experience, issue, or event and its impact on you.
My class met up with Donald and Kflu outside of an old Catholic school building in Middle East Baltimore. A room on the top floor acts as the headquarters of the Save Middle East Action Coalition (SMEAC). The coalition was created nine years ago by neighborhood residents who learned about the East Baltimore Development Initiative from the newspapers. EBDI is a fourteen year comprehensive plan to revitalize Baltimore's East side, turning it into an internationally prestigious biotech park and mixed income residential neighborhood. To do this they are evicting current residents, promising replacement housing, and bulldozing their homes. Donald is a displaced resident, and Kflu is SMEAC's community organizer, helping residents fight for fair housing rights.
Donald walked us through his neighborhood, and as I passed an old eviction notice stapled to a boarded up door, I remembered the early 1900's, when this city was the first to bring about legalized segregation and a sentiment of racialized urban reform. I thought of the promises of urban renewal and "serving the greater good" that surrounded slum clearance in 1911. Donald spoke of his love for his neighborhood, and the pain and anxieties of being displaced. Two black and white photos are stapled to the plywood of another abandoned building. One depicts a riot in the 1960's, when the Jim Crow laws were overturned. The other is of Martin Luther King Jr. speaking to a crowd. On a wall a few blocks away, a spray paint tag cries out "I wonder if heaven got a ghetto!"
Returning to the catholic school building, my class and I pass Sunday school signs saying "Love one another," and posters of a black Jesus and a black Last Supper. As everyone sits and talks, I ask Kflu what he did before he came to Baltimore. He told me he used to do similar community organizing work in the Bronx. I told him I was interested in getting more involved in SMEAC's efforts, and he called a few weeks later with a project. Remembering I was an art student, he asked if I could help him design a photo collage documenting SMEAC's history as a holiday gift to supporters. We spent all Monday going through hundreds of photos and arranging them in a final poster on a computer. Kflu told me about SMEAC's history and a little of his own. His family is from Eritrea and lives around D.C.'s large huge population of Eritrean refugees. Kflu and I are continuing to work together, now on a photography project documenting his community organizing experience here in the states. I'm learning about Eritrea, grassroots organizing and how the little guy stands up against big business and government. Most importantly, however, East Baltimore, Donald, and Kflu are teaching me how to step outside of myself and look at my world through the eyes of another.
3. Please write a friendly letter to your host family for your homestay
To those I love without knowing,
Thank you for graciously opening your home to me. I can not wait to meet you all! My name is Stephanie, and I'm a student at an amazing art school in Baltimore, Maryland. I am studying painting, but also enjoy writing, photography and book-making. My siblings are interested in the arts as well. My older sister, who is 22, is a theater student, and my younger sister, who is 19, is a dance student. My younger brother, 18 and still in high school, enjoys playing the guitar. My father teaches athletics at an elementary school and my mom is an administrator at a vocational school for refugees in Florida. My family is very close and treasures holidays and summers when we are all home in Florida. I grew up close to the beach and have a deep love for the ocean. I swim as often as possible, and have even been making paintings of water lately. I'm sure my stay with you will also inspire many future paintings and works of art!
Sincerely,
Stephanie McKee
4. Independent Study Project Proposal
The Independent Study Project (ISP) is a key component of SIT Study Abroad programs. Your ability to propose an appropriate project with a single focus is an important factor in admission. A successful ISP aims to increase knowledge in a field of study that contributes to the host culture. Once on-site, you may develop or change your proposal based on additional knowledge of local realities and resources. Your Academic Director will approve and supervise your final project proposal, and you will identify a local expert to act as your project advisor. The culmination of an ISP is typically a 20-40 page paper and an oral presentation. Your topic should be relevant to the theme of the program and host country.
Institutional Review Board
Human Subject Review Policy - In keeping with federal regulations, ethical guidelines for scholarly research, and the mission of SIT/World Learning, all SIT Study Abroad student ISP research involving human subjects must receive SIT's Institutional Review Board (IRB) approval and adhere to standards in SIT/World Learning's Human Subjects Review Policy available online.
The policy is designed to help students develop and implement ISPs that are ethically grounded, culturally sensitive, and respectful of research participants. This process includes local review boards at program sites, with an additional IRB at SIT's Vermont campus. Both will be available to act on any student ISP proposals that raise concerns or questions that cannot be resolved by the academic director and student together.
The SIT IRB has been registered with the Office of Human Research Protections of the US Department of Health and Human Services.
Students should be sure to understand the parameters of their home school's transfer requirements early in the ISP planning stages. We strongly encourage students to also discuss any IRB/Human Subjects Review requirements that the home school may implement for credit transfer, especially if they hope to use their ISP research for future projects.
As you develop your Independent Study Project Proposal, please take into consideration the following:
a one-month time frame
the theme and location of your selected program
the field-based nature of the project
the potential of the project to expand the knowledge base of a particular field of study
What focused question would you like to explore? (Your scope should be narrow so as to allow in-depth study.
I would like to explore how community arts is used as a tool of social reconciliation in Durban. Durban has had an active community arts scene since the 1970’s, and is now home to organizations like “Art for Humanity” and “Create Africa South,” whose missions are to use art to “promote human rights awareness regionally and globally” and to “develop, preserve and publish, exhibit or market South African creativity, both in the visual and literary arts." I have contacted Jan Jordaan, the founder of "Art for Humanity," asking if he needs an intern or assistance with any projects. He responded saying he could use help developing a school program that works with students and teachers to make banners featuring artwork and poems about human rights. The banners are hung around schools in Durban. Mr. Jordaan could also use help managing/promoting their exhibitions. Either of these options could become a practicum based ISP. Another option is working with Zulu women who make art in Durban. The organization "Create Africa South" began a project called "Amazwi Abesifazane, Voices of Women" in 2004. Women share intimate memories expressed in embroidered, appliquéd and beaded cultural documents. I have contacted the organization's founder and chairman, Andries Botha, about working with Create Africa South, and am waiting to hear back from him. In addition to strengthening culture, I'm interested in how the arts can provide minorities and the urban lower class with access to creative industries and new jobs. The 2007 Research Consortium on the Creative Industries of South Africa stated that "the Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative of South Africa (ASGISA) has now identified the creative industries, and particularly the craft and film sectors, as one of the identified drivers of sustainable economic opportunities and livelihoods for local communities whilst expanding business opportunities for small, medium and micro enterprise (SMMEs)." What other doors might community arts open for Durban's urban lower class?
What methods would you use to gather information from local sources?
If working with a community arts organization, I would attend their workshops and events. As locals work on collaborative art projects, I would participate, help where needed, observe, and interview. I might ask willing locals if they would at another time share their oral histories, which could be used in collaborative artwork and a final practicum-based ISP paper as primary source information.
What previous coursework on experience has prepared you for this project? Please include previous research experience.
Previous related coursework includes a class I took in Fall 2009 at Johns Hopkins University, titled "Race and Community in East Baltimore." Sponsored by the Center for Africana Studies, the class was part of a five year oral-history research project attempting to preserve East Baltimore’s ill-archived history before it was erased by gentrification. In addition to learning about middle-east Baltimore's racialized development, I found a resident who shared her oral history and allowed it to be posted online as a public document. As a final project, I worked on a mural for the new East Baltimore Community School. I researched the school, interviewed the principle and teachers, and helped teach four after school art classes in which the students worked on the mural. In Spring 2009 I took a "community based murals" class that required collaborating with the residents of a senior citizen's apartment building in west Baltimore. After connecting and talking with residents, I painted a mural for them on the walls of their lobby. In Spring 2009 I took a class at Johns Hopkins called "The African City: Art and the Politics of Place," where I learned the unique cultural make up of countries and cities across the continent. In my final research paper (titled "Ndebele Wall Paintings and Community Murals in South Africa: Affirming Identity Through Process") I argued that it is not imagery, but the process of making community murals in South Africa that links this genre to traditional Ndebele wall painting. Other related coursework includes the community arts internship I've held in Baltimore for three years now. The first year was spent teaching an art class at an art center in east Baltimore, and for the past two years I've been teaching students ages 6-13 at a Recreation center in west Baltimore.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)