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TTIMonthly News
News Posted 4.28.10
News Posted 4.1.10
News Posted 3.1.10
News Posted 2.1.10
Contact Information
To feature your news about public scholarship in the arts, humanities, and design, e-mail Jamie Haft at jmhaft@syr.edu.
About this News Page
From January to May 2010, Imagining America will collaborate with the Community Arts Network (CAN) to create this News Page. CAN is the primary source for information, exchange, research and critical dialogue within the field of community-based arts. Visit CAN's Web site at www.communityarts.net.
News posted 3.1.10 in collaboration with 
Call: Broadening the Digital Humanities Fellowship
Fifteen fellowships are available for a National Endowment of the Humanities summer 2010 program designed to broaden the digital humanities. Offered in collaboration with University of California’s Humanities Research Institute, University of Southern California’s Institute for Multimedia Literacy and the electronic journal, “Vectors,” the fellowship includes a four-week California residency, beginning June 19, 2010. To explore “central issues in the digital humanities and in multimedia authorship,” fellowship recipients will engage in existing projects and create their own draft project. The application deadline is March 24, 2010. “While we are interested in innovative modes of multimedia scholarship,” the call for proposals says, “we are not necessarily looking for projects that are about new media. Rather, we are interested in a broad array of projects across the humanities and from a variety of disciplines, periods and methodologies.” [Link]
Structures for Inclusion Anniversary Conference
This March, Design Corps will convene its tenth Structures for Inclusion conference on design activism in Washington, D.C., hosted by Howard University. “Social Economic Environmental Design: SEED” is the theme of the conference, which will take place on March 27-28, 2010. Panels and discussions will focus on “how to build on the success of the green design movement in addressing critical social and economic issues through design.” The conference was established to bring together ideas and practices about serving underserved populations through innovative design, finding value in thoughtful design, redefining the role of architect (e.g., architect as community organizer) and involving community in the design process. The conferences are held in collaboration with architecture schools and community-based organizations, and funded by the National Endowment for the Arts. Design Corps was founded in 1991 by Bryan Bell. [Link]
Out Now: RIDE: Research in Drama Education, 2010
Vol. 15, Issue #1 of RIDE -- Research in Drama Education: The Journal of Applied Theatre and Performance is available now and readable online by subscription. The issue contains "'It could have been so much better': the aesthetic and social work of theatre" by three Toronto scholars; "The rough edges: community, art and history" by Alison Jeffers; "Marginal experiments: Peter Brook and Stepping Out Theatre Company," a Bristol-based collective of mental-health-service users, by Anna Harpin; "Theatre of rural empowerment: the example of Living Earth Nigeria Foundation's Community Theatre Initiative in Cross River State, Nigeria" by Liwhu Betiang; "Reflective praxis through narrative and poetry: performing Peace Mum" by Monica Prendergast; and more. RIDE was founded in 1995.; published by Routledge, edited in England. [Link]
10th Annual Dewey Lecture on Oral History
University of Michigan recently celebrated the 10th Annual John Dewey Lecture with a trans-local discussion on the importance of oral history. Anne Valk, associate director of the John Nichols Brown Center for Public Humanities and Cultural Heritage at Brown University, described a campus-community oral history project about Fox Point, R.I., which uses memory and history as the basis for building new and possibly positive connections. Michelle McClellan, assistant professor of history at University of Michigan, responded to Valk. “Maybe just as successive generations of students everywhere embrace the mascot and the traditions of their University,” McClellan said, “maybe they too could absorb local and regional history as part of the college experience.” Annual Dewey Lectures, hosted by University of Michigan’s Ginsberg Center, feature scholars who make activism and community engagement central to their work. [Link]
Call: Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Engagement
March 22, 2010, is the proposal submissions deadline for the 10th International Research Conference on Service-Learning and Community Engagement. The conference will be hosted by Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis on October 28-31, 2010. The theme is “International Perspectives: Crossing Boundaries through Research.” Proposals that present research findings are invited to address a number of questions, such as: “How does research assist in crossing boundaries between campus and community partners, between faculty and students, between disciplines or between and across cultural contexts? Is the American, westernized concept of service-learning transferable to other contexts?” Additionally, proposals are invited according to "new and continuing tracks," including assessment, technology, faculty roles and rewards and more. Conference organizers anticipate, "Understanding service-learning and community engagement from diverse cultural perspectives will add insight necessary for comparative research and to improve practice." [Link]
Dialogue about Water's Implications for Design
Washington University in St. Louis, Mo., will host, "NL - StL - NO: A Dialogue about Water's Implications for Design and Infrastructure," on design projects in the Netherlands (NL), St. Louis (StL) and New Orleans (NO). Organized by Derek Hoeferlin, senior lecturer in architecture at Washington University, the discussion will focus on different, yet related, initiatives and projects that emphasize the significant implications water holds in design and infrastructure. The event features Ambassador of the Netherlands to the United States Renée Jones-Bos, with presentations by Hoeferlin and David Waggonner, principal, Waggonner & Ball Architects. Respondents include Dorothée Imbert, chair, Master of Landscape Architecture, and Buzz Spector, dean, College & Graduate School of Art. The event will take place on Tuesday, March 2, 2010, at the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts. [Link]
Launch: Art-in-Motion in Syracuse, N.Y.
Art-in-Motion, a project of Imagining America, Open Hand Theater and Syracuse Stage, will feature conversations and performances centered on activating the arts and stimulating urban redevelopment in Syracuse, N.Y. Beginning next month, four public conversations will bring visiting scholars and artists together with Syracuse residents to discuss the impact of art connecting and strengthening communities. “The visiting scholars and artists will extend our understanding of cultural participation in development as relevant to both local and national initiatives across the United States,” says Imagining America Director Jan Cohen-Cruz. The centerpiece of Art-in-Motion is a community arts project whereby residents will create giant puppets and theatrical scenes reflecting their neighborhood identities, culminating in a citywide street performance with the finished puppets in mid-September. Art-in-Motion is funded by grants from Syracuse University and New York Council for the Humanities. [Link]
New Urban Revitalization Program at NEA?
Rocco Landesman, chair of the National Endowment for the Arts, has proposed an "Our Town" program that will use small, targeted grants to help arts organizations revitalize their communities. According to Jeremy McCarter in NEWSWEEK (issue dated Feb 22, 2010), the program is part of the NEA's 2011 budget request. "It draws on research showing that investments focused narrowly at the neighborhood level can produce social ties and a healthier local economy. In next year's budget request, the agency asks for $5 million to start work in 35 or so locations around the country: developing arts districts, sponsoring festivals and commissioning murals and sculptures. This ground-up, community-building approach seems like an arts-world translation of some distinctly Obama-ish values." Landesman has also outlined ways for towns to build arts-related infrastructure, writes McCarter with "artist housing, say, or a redeveloped park." [Link]NHA Annual Meeting & Humanities Advocacy Day
The National Humanities Alliance will hold its 2010 Annual Meeting and Humanities Advocacy Day March 8-9, 2010, in Washington, D.C. The event will feature: panel discussions on the state of the humanities and the role of the humanities in shaping and contributing to public policy; luncheon and keynote address with NEH Chairman Jim Leach; briefings on federal funding and legislative priorities; and more. Featured speakers include: David Marshall, dean, University of California, Santa Barbara; Kathleen Woodward, director, Walter Chapin Simpson Center for the Humanities, University of Washington; and more. The goal of the annual event is to strengthen public support for humanities research and education and build an infrastructure for advocacy for the long-term. Online registration closed on February 19, 2010; if you have not yet registered, contact Erin Mosley at 202-296-4994 x150. [Link]
New in Places to Study: DukeEngage, Durham
CAN has added to its Places To Study database DukeEngage, the local, national and international civic engagement program for undergraduate students at Duke University. Supported by the Duke Endowment and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, DukeEngage provides funding for Duke undergraduate students to pursue immersive civic engagement experiences for a minimum of eight weeks in Durham, N.C., as well as in cities across the U.S. and abroad. Several programs this summer will be tailored to arts and culture: in Durham, N.C., Brazil, China, Colombia and Tanzania. For example, the program in Colombia, “Unveiling Stories of Peace,” will place students in Medellín to collaborate with community members through art, documentary video and historical memory projects. DukeEngage, a program of the Duke Center for Civic Engagement, was founded in 2008. Last summer, 350 students participated. [Link]
New in Places to Study: Art and Health, UCLA
CAN has added to its Places to Study database Arts Activism and AIDS Awareness courses and programs at University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Undergraduate and graduate students at UCLA can participate in several courses and programs offered through the Department of World Arts and Cultures and its Art | Global Health Center. Professor David Gere, arts critic and AIDS activist, directs the Center and teaches many of its courses. Gere’s latest course, “Make Art/ Stop AIDS,” teaches students about how art, in connection with public health and epidemiology, can be an effective tool in AIDS prevention and treatment efforts. Additionally, Gere's students put theory to practice through collaborative arts projects in Los Angeles communities. Other UCLA courses and programs teach students techniques to devise educational theater and create visual arts exhibits for AIDS activism and awareness. [Link]
Call: Chapters for Civic Education Textbook
The editor of a new textbook on the university and democratic societies is looking for chapter proposals on how the arts and arts communities work with colleges and universities to pursue citizenship education. “Citizenship, Democracy and the University: Theory and Practice in Europe and North America” will examine the role and methods of higher education in preparing citizens for meaningful participation in democracies. This interdisciplinary English-language text is being developed for use within graduate and professional degree programs whose graduates will be tasked with building, strengthening and maintaining the institutions and ideals underpinning democratic societies. Additionally, text editors hope it will be a useful reference for leaders and policy makers. The deadline for authors to submit chapter proposals is March 1, 2010. Contact Jason Laker, Queen's University, Canada, at jason.laker@queensu.ca. [Link]
Call: Sustaining Authentic Engagement, N.C.
February 15, 2010, is the proposal submissions deadline for the 2010 National Outreach Scholarship Conference in Raleigh, N.C., hosted by North Carolina State University. The conference will explore authenticity and sustainability as critical components of engaged scholarship, and will take place October 4-6, 2010, at the Greater Raleigh Convention Center. Proposals are invited for presentations that “communicate innovative research, program designs and impacts, lessons learned and curricular and policy development reflective of diverse environments and populations,” including topics such as urban and rural interactions, international contexts, distance-based learning, underserved populations, university-wide engagement programs and more. Proposals for panels, workshops and poster presentations must be submitted online. This is the 11th national conference sponsored by the National Outreach Scholarship Partnership Institutions, and attendance of more than 400 faculty, students, administrators and community partners is expected. [Link]
Brown University's Arts in the One World Conference
"Home: Composing the Rooted Local in the Rapid Global Environment" is the title of the fifth annual Arts in the One World Conference at Brown University, March 17-21, 2010. Sponsored by Brown's Theatre Arts and Performance Studies Department and the Interdisciplinary Genocide Study Center, the conference will explore "how the arts and social services compose, consider and translate community." Say the organizers (including artist Erik Ehn): "We are looking at how the sense of home, the ways it is defined and enacted, is useful as a political and esthetic argument for fidelity, trust, immanence, the safe store of memory and the reconstitution of identity. (As against? in dialogue with? industry and the nation-state.)" The agenda focuses one day each on Rwanda/Uganda and The Mid-East. The final day opens out to panels and roundtables on cultural diplomacy, student activism, peacebuilding and more. [Link]