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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 4.1.10 in collaboration with 
Launch: New Platform for Digital Publishing
A new platform for online journals has been developed by the Society of Architectural Historians, and it could impact digital publishing in many disciplines, including the humanities, arts and design. The platform, developed by the Society of Architectural Historians (SAH) with the University of California Press and JSTOR, seeks to close the gap between reading about important architectural examples and experiencing them. Funded by grants from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the online journal will support video, virtual modeling and digital mapping. The journal “is intended to encourage scholars to explore the use of digital storytelling tools while nudging publishers to renovate their digital journals and e-textbooks to support those tools,” says Pauline Saliga, executive director of SAH. The journal is available to SAH members this year, and will sell independent subscriptions in 2011. [Link]
Center for Social Media’s May Conference, D.C.
On May 12, 2010, American University’s Center for Social Media will host Making Your Media Matter 2010, a conference themed “Real Stories, Real Impact.” Co-sponsored by Media that Matters, a project of Arts Engine Inc., the conference is for established and aspiring filmmakers, nonprofit communications leaders, funders and students looking to learn and share cutting-edge practices for creating media that matters. Topics include: Strategic from the Start - Developing Synergies to Build your Conversation; Honest Truths: Documentary Ethics In Practice; Spotlight Stand Up on New Tools and Research; and Fiction for Change: How are Narrative Films Making a Difference? Keynoters are Pamela Yates and Paco de Onis, filmmakers of "The Reckoning." The Center for Social Media, directed by Patricia Aufderheide, investigates, showcases and sets standards for socially engaged media-making. [Link]
“Going Public!” Spring Series at KSU, Ga.
“Going Public!” is a spring leadership development series for faculty and staff at Kennesaw State University designed to foster shared knowledge about public scholarship. The series of seven workshops includes presentations from exemplar projects around the country to demonstrate how public scholarship can contribute to public debates, explore local issues and foster a rich civic life. Participants will identify ways to link engagement initiatives across campus and develop short and long-term action plans to set a course for building the public scholarship movement at KSU. The series is organized by Associate Professor of History and American Studies LeeAnn Lands, and sponsored by KSU’s Center for Excellence in Teaching, Office of the Provost, Vice President for Research, Dean of the Graduate College, American Democracy Project, Imagining America@KSU, and American Studies program. For updates, visit the ImaginingAmerica@KSU page on Facebook. [Link]
CHCI's June Meeting on Global Humanities, R.I.
The 2010 Annual Meeting of the Consortium of Humanities Centers and Institutes (CHCI) will be held June 13-15, 2010, at Brown University’s Cogut Center for the Humanities. The title of the meeting, "Whose Global Humanities?," is intended to spur a collective interrogation of the idea of globalism in the context of academic research, publishing, programmatic activity, networking and organization-building. The meeting includes keynote speeches by James Leach, chair of the National Endowment for the Humanities, as well as by Rajendra K. Pachauri, economist and environmentalist, and Mieke Bal, filmmaker and cultural theorist. Three affinity groups -- Humanities for the Environment, Associate Directors and Administrators and Digital Humanities – will also meet. CHCI, established in 1988, is an arena for the discussion of issues germane to cross-disciplinary activity in the humanities. [Link]
Art in Agriculture at Auburn University, Ala.
This spring, Auburn University continues its annual interdisciplinary series, Art in Agriculture, which brings together artists, designers and scientists to examine a topic related to agriculture, food, the environment or natural resources. This semester’s series is titled “Reclaiming Ground” and includes two exhibitions, several workshops for kids and seven lectures. One exhibition combines agriculture and architecture, called “Agritecture,” and another features sustainable designs by students in the Landscape Architecture Program, Design Program and Art Department. The lectures investigate questions such as: What is the role of the artist and designer in society at large? Can ordinary citizens make a difference in their local ecologies? How can a university encourage its students to become involved in their community? Art in Agriculture is jointly hosted by AU’s College of Agriculture, College of Liberal Arts and Department of Art. [Link]
Columbia College Chicago’s International Symposium
This month, “Claiming Creativity: Art Education in Cultural Transition” will bring together artists, designers, architects, educators and leaders in business, science, commerce, industry, public policy and the environment. The international symposium will take place April 21-24, 2010, and will be presented by Columbia College Chicago in partnership with the European League of Institutes of the Arts. Through keynote speakers, workshops and an online forum for conference papers and discussion, a number of questions will be considered, such as: Does creativity solve problems? How creative is science? Is technology a medium? How creative should a researcher be? Is creativity political? Additionally, a symposium journal will be published through Columbia College Chicago’s academic press. [Link]
New in Places to Study: M.A. in Cultural Studies
Today CAN has added to its Places to Study database the Masters of Arts in Cultural Studies at the University of Washington, Bothell. Housed in UWB’s Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences program, this two-year, 60-credit degree builds the foundational knowledge of cultural studies inquiry, with a special emphasis on participatory action research strategies and diverse forms of community collaboration. Community-based research and learning are a hallmark of the program, which is grounded in the belief that students do their best work when integrating theory and practice. The program culminates in a Capstone Research Project where students use their abilities in ethnographic, textual and performance-based research methods to implement a project that engages various forms of cultural work, including arts policy, cultural activism and public history, among others. UWB’s Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences program is directed by Bruce Burgett. [Link]
New in Places to Study: Public Practice Degrees
CAN has added to its Places To Study database the M.A., M.F.A. & Ph.D. in Performance as Public Practice (PPP) from the University of Texas at Austin. The PPP program “explores the widest possible parameters of performance in its relationship to historical and contemporary global culture as well as to local communities.” The M.A., M.F.A. and Ph.D. degrees are 36, 60 and 72-credits, respectively. All three programs have flexible, individualized curricula, and share three required courses that introduce students to research methods, pedagogy and the field. Students design the majority of their coursework and practical experiences, which could include studying Augusto Boal or working with Theatre Action Project. The PPP’s Web site states, “Your interests in practice can be integrated into your coursework; we encourage you to keep practice a part of your life while you study.” [Link]
Grad Student Conference on Public Humanities, Wis.
Humanities projects in settings from prisons to public schools to a community food pantry were discussed last month at the Humanities Exposed (HEX) program's 3rd Annual Conference on Public Humanities at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. HEX Program Coordinator Courtney Byelich reported, “The sessions focused on a range of topics, including assessment of project goals; benefits and challenges of negotiating spaces, places and people unfamiliar to a university setting; and the outright value of the humanities to inspire conversation, new perspectives and fervor for continued learning.” Additionally, keynotes were given by the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Emily Auerbach, who directs its Odyssey Project, and Harvard University’s Doris Sommer, who directs its Cultural Agents program. The HEX program, housed in the University’s Center for the Humanities, supports graduate students in the humanities to design and implement projects in collaboration with community partners. [Link]
Just Design and the Future of Main Street, N.Y.
Columbia University professor Mindy Fullilove, whose work includes studying 100 main streets in the United States, France and Japan, will present a talk titled “Just Design and the Future of Main Street” in Syracuse, N.Y. on April 15, 2010. Fullilove will elaborate on “the aesthetics of equity” -- the capacity of design to be not just beautiful but also to move us closer to an open and democratic society. “Mindy’s work reminds us that urban spaces are not just questions of geography or architecture,” says Kendall Phillips, dean and chair, Syracuse University, “but are also psychological places filled with memory and meaning.” Fullilove will also make appearances in collaboration with two projects at Syracuse University, La Casita Cultural Center Project and Democratizing Knowledge, respectively. Fullilove’s visit is the second conversation hosted by Art-in-Motion, a project of Imagining America, Open Hand Theater and Syracuse Stage, and sponsored by grants from the New York Council for the Humanities and Syracuse University Chancellor’s Leadership Project. [Link]
Seeking: Director, Institute for Women’s Leadership, Rutgers, N.J.
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, invites nominations and applications for the position of Director for its Institute for Women’s Leadership (IWL). This position, reporting to the Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs, offers an individual committed to advancing the status of women within and outside the University a highly visible platform from which to foster programs and initiatives that further scholarship, education, policy and practice with respect to diversity, feminism and women’s leadership. The Director will be a visionary leader who can build on IWL’s previous and current accomplishments to build an agenda for the next decade. The successful candidate will possess a Ph.D. or other terminal degree in an academic or professional field and will be a scholar of national reputation, or will have had equivalent professional leadership experience in areas related to issues of significance to women. Nominations and applications welcome. [Link]
Community Built Association Conference, NOLA, May
Architects, designers, community builders and others will flock to New Orleans' Ninth Ward for "Transforming Communities through Collective Action," the 20th Anniversary Conference of the Community Built Association, May 5-8, 2010. Community Built partners from New Orleans nonprofit organizations will provide lessons learned from rebuilding after Katrina, while other experts share their knowledge and experience of neighborhood-enhancing community projects built from coast to coast. Sessions will address community-built architecture, nature and play, green schoolyards and using the arts to build community. Hands-on workshops will be led by experts like Laurel True (True Mosaics), creating a community mosaic; David Lowenstein, leading a painted-mural workshop documenting the migration of neighborhood residents post-Katrina; and Bond Anderson (Sound Play Inc.), coordinating volunteers in the construction of outdoor musical instruments that will be installed in a local school yard. [Link]
NEA Reports on Informal Arts, Urban & Rural
"Come as You Are: Informal Arts Participation in Urban and Rural Communities," released 3/22/10, is the NEA's first research publication in several years to examine the "informal arts." The downloadable report analyzes data from the NEA's 2008 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts, and defines the "informal arts" as "a broad range of 'citizen' arts in the forms of folk arts, popular culture and casual or hobby arts." Research found that urban and rural populations visit historical parks and attend craft fairs and outdoor performing arts festivals at the same rate. They also play musical instruments and attend arts events at places of worship at the same rate. But rural residents are more likely to sing in choirs, sew, weave, crochet or quilt; urban dwellers are more likely to create photography, videos or films for artistic purposes. [Link]