Call for Papers: Thematic Issue on Challenging Conformity in Arts Education

Call for Papers: Thematic Issue on Challenging Conformity in Arts Education

Guest editors: Judit Onsès and Ebba Theorell

Despite reports and research about the potentialities and benefits of arts, it is well known it is a marginalized subject matter in most of the schools world-wide (Alter, Hays & O’Hara, 2009; Fraser, 2013). This is due, in part, to the fact that in many countries there is not a specialty in arts education in teacher training. This means that teachers may feel challenged to fully engage in teaching arts (Gibson & Anderson, 2008) or using arts in teaching other disciplines.

In our neoliberal and standardized societies, there is a fixation of simplifying pedagogical practices as well as measuring and producing quick results. In arts education this often means a pressure to create uncomplicated artworks or decorative objects linked to festivities such as Christmas trees, Easter chickens, carnival masks, and other local festivities... all done in the same way. While cultural decorations may connect us to local and global traditions, such product-oriented tasks rarely invite children to explorative processes that involve complexity, ambiguity, and loss of control of their outcomes.

How might arts education research invite teachers in schools to experiment in non-conforming ways with both traditional disciplines such as drawing, painting, and crafting, and with more contemporary approaches to art such as media, performance, installations, drama, and dance? How can educators encourage their students, themselves, and each other to dig into their creative and explorative capacities and discover who they can become and what their power to create can bring to the world?

Art education researchers have already suggested possible approaches to these questions. Eisner (2004) and Atkinson (2012) claim that to engage with arts education means being open to uncertainty; to what we do not know. Art education can be understood as an adventure (Atkinson, 2015) in which teachers and students are involved in creative encounters in which they never know the end (Bayles & Orland, 1993). Atkinson (2017) encourages researchers and teachers to explore the immanence of learning experience, helping both students and teachers to become-other.

These examples from art education research not only aim to foster creativity and self-expression in educational practice but also to empower students to develop and explore their own artistic voice and identity, making room for collective forms of expression and strengthening the sense of communitarian belonging. They show that artistic and educational growth may occur when individuals are encouraged to question, experiment, and explore new possibilities for art and education. Rather than imposing rigid standards of evaluation, art educators can foster a culture of open-ended inquiry where the process of artistic creation is valued as much as the end product.

Keeping these insights in mind, we invite researchers to share their art education experiences and research in relation to questions such as:

· How can art education welcome diversity of artistic and educational processes and challenge conformity?

· How can traditional arts education contribute to experimenting with stereotypes in arts practice and foster significant and insightful learning?

· What kind of approaches to art education may enhance learners’ subjectivity and expression?

· How can arts education challenge individualization and standardization, and foster collaborative creative learning?

 

Submission

Please submit a max. 150-word (excluding references) abstract by September 10, 2024, through Research in Arts and Education’s online platform: https://journal.fi/rae/about/submissions. Please note that you must register to the platform to submit your abstract.

Make sure you use the submission section “Abstracts” when submitting the file. In “Comments to the editor,” write “CFP Challenging Conformity” and the manuscript format listed below (Research article; Visual essay; Commentary; Media review).

The submitted manuscripts should not have been previously published nor should they be currently under consideration for publication elsewhere.

All authors must follow Research in Arts and Education Author Guidelines at every phase of the publication process.

The authors will be notified of the status of their abstract by September 25, 2024 and are expected to send their full manuscripts by January 13, 2025. The issue is scheduled to be published by December 2025.

There are four recommended manuscript formats for Research in Arts and Education:

· Research articles approach and study their topic mainly through academic means. Recommended length for this format is 6,000 words including references. All research articles go through a double-blinded peer-review process.

· Visual essays approach and study their topic mainly through artistic means. Artistic content must be accompanied by a written component in which the author describes, analyses, and/or reflects their artistic practice. Recommended length for this format is 3,000 words including references. All practice-based / visual essays go through a double-blinded peer-review process.

· Commentaries are short and concise texts aiming to stimulate academic discussion on topical issues, both among the journal authors and in the academic community in general. Recommended length for this format is 3,000 words including references. Commentaries are not peer-reviewed.

· Media reviews can include book reviews, exhibition reviews, or reviews of other publications. The recommended length for media reviews is 3,000 words including references. Media reviews are not peer-reviewed.

Each format can include visual material as well as multimedia content (e.g., performative content, video, internet, or sound work, etc.). Since Research in Arts and Education is published in PDF format, multimedia content must be included as external links. Authors are responsible for hosting all external content as well as ensuring its accessibility, as Research in Arts and Education does not currently provide online hosting services.

Research in Arts and Education grants open access to all publications and is ranked in the Publication Forum of The Federation of Finnish Learned Societies.

Please email Managing Editor Tina Mariane Krogh Madsen (tinamarianekrogh.madsen@aalto.fi) if you have any questions about submission procedures.

The thematic issue is guest edited by Judit Onsès (jonsesse@gmail.com) and Ebba Theorell (ebba.theorell@su.se)

 

Key dates for authors

Deadline for abstracts: September 10, 2024

Notification for abstract submissions: September 25, 2024

Deadline for first full manuscripts: January 13, 2025

Publishing date: December 2025

 

References

Alter, F., Hays, T., and O’Hara, R. (2009). The challenges of implementing primary arts education: What our teachers say. Australasian Journal of Early Childhood, 34(4), 22–30. https://doi.org/10.1177/183693910903400404 Atkinson, D. (2012). Contemporary art and art in Education: The new, emancipation and truth. The International Journal of Art & Design Education, 31(1), 5-18.

Atkinson, D. (2015). The adventure of pedagogy, learning and the not-known. Subjectivity, 8(1), 43–56.

Atkinson, D. (2017). Without criteria: Art and learning and the adventure of pedagogy. The International Journal of Art & Design Education, 36(2), 141-152.

Bayles, D., & Orland, T. (1993). Art and fear: Observations on the perils (and rewards) of artmaking. Image Continuum.

Eisner, E. (2004). What can education learn from the arts about the practice of education? International Journal of Education & the Arts, 5(4), 1–12.

Fraser, D. (2013). The challenge and value of learning and teaching in the arts. Set, 2, 20–28. Retrieved 7 May 2024 from: https://www.nzcer.org.nz/system/files/journals/set/downloads/set2013_2_001.pdf

Gibson, R., & Anderson, M. (2008). Touching the void: Arts education research in Australia. Asia Pacific Journal of Education, 28(1),103-112.