新作坊 Humanity Innovation and Social Practice

STREET-LIFE'S CREATIVE TURN: AN EXPLORATION OF ARTS-BASED ADULT EDUCATION AND KNOWLEDGE MOBILIZATION WITH HOMELESS/STREET-INVOLVED WOMEN IN VICTORIA

摘要：

Within the past decade, the arts as tools of adult education and qualitative research have grown in popularity (Butterwick & Dawson, 2005; [Cahnmann-Taylor] & Siegesmund, 2008; Clover & Stalker, 2007; Knowles & Cole, 2008). Advocates for the arts as emancipatory and critical forces for learning and knowledge mobilization construct arguments from several standpoints. One is the need to move away from the passive reception of the arts toward more active creation and engagement in the arts. This direct experience provides an important means "to personal or social development" ([Thompson], 2002, p. 30). Another standpoint is that access to the arts is a fundamental human right and something needed in our lives. This is the "bread and roses" argument whereby people need both "to enhance the quality of their lives in ways that are relevant to their urgent problems and real concerns and which lift their spirits in difficult and troubled times" (Thompson, 2002, p. 26). A further standpoint is the value of the imagination and creativity. Thompson (2002) believes that to liberate the imagination is to create opportunities to "explore experiences other than our own, in ways that can expand our moral comprehension" (p. 31). Collins (2006) goes even further, arguing that it is extremely important "to keep in mind the significance of the aesthetic dimension within a politically oriented emancipatory pedagogy [as it can be] an [expression] of support for a more just society" (p. 125). There is indeed a limit to day-to-day reality and cognitive knowing, and incorporating "other ways of knowing . . . as expressed through metaphor, dance, poetry, visual arts or dramatic expressions draw on the affective, somatic, and spiritual domains" (Lawrence, 2005, p. 4), key aspects of more holistic, transformative learning. A final important standpoint vis-?-vis the arts is knowledge mobilization and dissemination. These terms are commonly understood as pulling together information and transferring it within and across settings with the expectation it will be used conceptually or instrumentally (Hutchinson & Huberman, 1994). The aim is to provide new perspectives on issues that can help people make better or more informed decisions. Cole and Mclntyre (2003) argue that our contemporary society requires more holistic, dynamic, and creative approaches to mobilizing and disseminating knowledge. The more stimulating or engaging this process the more likely it is to have a holistic and deeply felt personal or social impact (Chwe, 1998). For Cole and Mclntyre, the arts are powerful tools of knowledge mobilization because of their innate ability "to evoke relational, emotional, cultural, social and political complexities" (p. 18). This alternative form not only is "more accessible" but has a unique and creative way of engaging "the audience/reader in meaning making and knowledge construction" (pp. 60-61). This has strategic value because communications with the public around complex social issues "must involve more than just transferring information" (Chwe, p. 48). Feminist art researchers suggest we need experimental texts that go beyond traditional discursive practices and allow "us to hear silences and see absences and invisibilities" where we were unable to before (Ball, 2002, p. 2). Taken all together these epistemological standpoints provide a useful framework from which to consider the arts-based project and more fully appreciate both its impacts and challenges.