Art Education in Crisis: A Critical Race Studies Response to Endemic Complacency

Abstract

This commentary advances thoughtful and imaginative alternatives to endemic complacency on matters of racial inequity in the field of art education. In a style that embraces cultural irony and a spirit of serious play, the Coalition for Racial Equity in the Arts and Education (crea+e) identifies three areas ripe for anti-racist intervention--discourses, embodiment, and form and proposes audacious new movements, like dropping beats, for racial justice in art education. The crea+e collective’s form of writing is intentionally polyvocal and aesthetically eclectic in a way that mirrors the very nature of collective work in intellectual and social movements. Collectives need not erase or smooth out the different modulations of expression, thought, and experience to speak as a collective voice. Thus, through its content and form, the commentary aims to propel critical race discourse within the arts and arts education.