Call for Book Chapters
The Art of Decolonizing: Methods and Strategies from Art, Craft, and Visual Culture
Education
Editors : Dr. Amanda Alexander, Associate Professor, University of Texas Arlington
Dr. Manisha Sharma, Associate Professor, University of Arizona
Chapter Proposals Due (Submission Deadline) : August 31, 2020
Full Chapters Due : February 15th, 2021
Review Policy : Double Blind Peer Reviewed
Introduction/Overview :
Artists and educators in the contemporary world are crossing disciplinary boundaries to
collaboratively address socio-political and socio-cultural shifts from global to nationalist and
race-biased policies regarding issues like immigration, health-care, policing etc. They are also addressing economic factors of neoliberalism affecting public education policy and funding; legal ramifications of undermined labor forces; ownership of artifacts and rituals in cultural industries in national and international contexts; identity politics of how bodies—of women, LGBTQ+, and persons of color—are controlled by institutional structures; and the urgency of challenging human exploitation of the natural environment for political and economic profit.
Our book will present such topics from the perspective of art, craft, and visual culture education to highlight the leadership of the arts in addressing these urgent issues. In short, this edited volume evokes discussion of what forms of decolonizing engagement can be recognized as art, craft, and visual culture education. Moreover, we’re seeking deeper examinations of:
● How decolonization has been and is still being defined and discussed in the contemporary
world in connection with the arts?
● What are the conversations happening in international, border-crossing spaces rather than
each specific region (US, Europe, South Asia, Australia & New Zealand, Africa, and
Latin America)?
● What are the conversations around conceptual frameworks and practical acts of
decolonization beyond the specificities of Indigeneity and postcolonial/decolonial
contexts to better understand their confluences and differences?
Included chapters will demonstrate how art, craft, and visual culture education activate social
imagination and action that is equity and justice driven. Specifically, this book will provide
arts-engaged, intersectional understandings of decolonization in the contemporary world. It will combine current scholarship with pragmatic strategies and insights grounded in the reality of socio-cultural, political, and economic communities across the globe. We seek chapter submissions from diverse geographies and demographics that speak to significant decolonizing discourses in contemporary art, craft, and visual culture education.
The book will have four sections that address the colonization of (1) histories, (2) space and land, (3) mind and body, and (4) digital and virtual realms. We seek submissions for each of these sections that will present conceptual and pragmatic frameworks of decolonization work being done through the arts in connection to various disciplines and sites. The themes of histories, space and land, mind and body, and the digital will highlight and illustrate how artists, educators, and researchers exemplify the use of decolonial methods, theories, and strategies—in research, artmaking, and pedagogical practice (rather than present work in disciplinary silos). This is reflective of decolonization ideals in contemporary contexts.
A key aspect of this book is that it will present to its readers practical, enactable strategies and actions that demonstrate what decolonization looks like in practice within art, craft, and visual culture education. Thus, we are looking for chapters from across several locations of practice such as K-16, museum education, community-based art education, and studio settings. This is to encourage collaboration on more equitable terms where people work with each other as opposed to one segment working for the other. We are seeking narratives of work being done in the broader arena of art, craft, and visual culture education, which intersects with other disciplines in Social, Behavioral, and Health Sciences.
The pre-pandemic world was already witnessing shifts from global thinking back to more
insular, nationalistic visions. The pandemic not only united the world in a shared concern, it also highlighted and underscored the exacerbation of existing socio-economic-political-cultural-technical inequalities of race, class, caste, gender, and the skewed economics of socio-political and cultural institutions that maintain them. It therefore becomes more important than ever to revisit what decolonization looks like in current and future
contexts, which is what this book examines. The book is under review for contract with
Routledge Press: Taylor and Francis.
Call for Chapters :
For this edited volume, please submit chapter proposals in APA format and with no more than 150 words (not including references). As you describe your proposed submission, please
3 indicate: 1) the proposed content, 2) who you consider to be your primary audience (artists,
teaching artists, teachers, students, researchers, general public, administrators, etc.), 3) which of the four themes you are addressing (histories, space and land, mind and body, or the digital), and 4) what format you choose (creative shorts, enacted encounters, or ruminative research). Ensure that your proposal clarifies how art, craft, and visual culture education is centrally engaged with decolonization work.
Thematic options to consider for your proposal are:
Section 1 : Decolonizing Histories : This section includes chapters that demonstrate how
artists, researchers, and teachers address various histories to shape their decolonizing
work. Histories might refer to personal, cultural, political, or disciplinary.
Section 2: Decolonizing Space and Land : This section includes chapters that
demonstrate how artists, researchers, and teachers activate space and land, physically and
conceptually, to shape their decolonizing work.
Section 3: Decolonizing Mind and Body : This section includes chapters that
demonstrate how artists, researchers, and teachers consider presence and/or absence of
mind, intellect, emotion, and body to shape their decolonizing work.
Section 4: Decolonizing the Digital : This section includes chapters that demonstrate
how artists, researchers, and teachers imagine digital and virtual spheres to shape and
disseminate their decolonizing work.
Choose from one of the three following formats:
1. Creative Shorts : Creative shorts are visual formats that may be illustrations, graphics,
diagrams, tables, poems, manifestos, etc. with a maximum limit of 1000 words and a
maximum of six separate TIFF images.
2. Enacted Encounters : Enacted encounters are short chapters describing process and
focus on the efficacy or failure of enacted curriculum and/or pedagogical strategies. This
type of chapter speaks to personal encounters in professional practice and the challenges
and triumphs of decolonizing work rooted in arts education. This type of submission has
a limit of 3,000 words including references.
3. Ruminative Research : Ruminative research consists of more traditional academic essays
that present research, studies, or theoretical stances in decolonizing work in art, craft, and
visual culture education. This format has a 5,000 word limit including references.
Submission Notes & Questions :
● We will review submissions and reply by November 1st, 2020.
● Please send submissions to artofdecolonizing@gmail.com
● Feel free to contact either editor to discuss possibilities:
Amanda Alexander, amandaa@uta.edu or
Manisha Sharma, msharma1@arizona.edu
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