Intersecting Identities: A Trioethnographic Exploration of How Disability Studies Informs Our Work as Artists, Educators, and Researchers

Abstract

is a Postdoctoral Scholar of Art Education at the Pennsylvania State University. With a Ph.D. in Art Education from Florida State University, her research focuses primarily on individuals with invisible disabilities and how they develop and renegotiate their own disability identity. Using theories from critical disability studies, Alexandra continues to generate artwork that addresses issues of ableism in an effort to challenge the stigmatized notion of mental health disorders within a normative society. In her most recent work as a practicing artist, Alexandra's mixed-media sculptures combine wire, glass, fiber and ink to encapsulate her own disability experience as she explores the sociocultural factors that perpetuate performative ablebodiedness. With a background in teaching students with disabilities, she integrates disability awareness into her pedagogical practices, and aims to uncover the ways that arts-based research can support disability identity development within primary and secondary educational institutions.

The Impact of Arts Integration in Primary Education

“…Arts integration is about teaching art as a separate subject and using art as a tool for expression, reflection, and understanding of the socio-cultural world, thereby promoting creativity and interactivity in learning (Bushati, 2018;. It has been suggested that arts integration can promote child agency, support disability identity development, and serve as a vehicle for social change in K-12 education (Sams & Sams, 2017;Allen et al, 2020). Additionally, the feasibility of integrating visual arts education into the primary education curriculum has been demonstrated, highlighting the potential for successfully implementing arts integration in schools (Strohbehn et al, 2020).…”