More Than Craft and Criteria: The Necessity of Ars Spirituality in (Black Women’s) Poetic Inquiry and Research Poetry

Abstract

The author introduces ars spirituality as a reflexive practice in poetic inquiry. She examines Faulkner’s ars poetica and ars criteria and contends their focus on the craft, aesthetics, and evaluation of research poetry do not account for the ways in which spirituality influences Black women’s research poetry and poetic inquiry. The author argues Black women’s poetry—whether crafted from/for personal experiences, historical research, or transcripts—is born of the spirit and conceptualizes ars spirituality using the works of Audre Lorde and Cynthia Dillard. Three guiding principles of ars spirituality are discussed and an ars spirituality example is provided.

Reflecting on Violent Ruptures and Loss in Qualitative Research: A Poetic Inquiry

“…For us, building intimacy meant challenging our own and each other’s assumptions at times and affirming each other’s ideas, ways of knowing, and (re)membering at other times. As Cutts (2020) noted, “(re)membering is the infusion of body and consciousness—spirituality. It is an act of resistance that challenges dominant ideologies and the seduction to forget” (p. 913).…”

“…In our collaborative effort, we engaged in these processes of revision and critique both with respect to our academic writing as well as the poems. While we follow Faulkner, (2007), who considers the concepts of ars poetica (the art of poetry) and ars criteria (the art of criteria) as guiding principles for evaluating our poetry, we particularly considered Cutts’ (2020) notion of ars spirituality in our joint efforts. Drawing on Dillard, (2006) concept of “spiritual imagination” (p. 9), she notes that researcher-poets should access their “spiritual imagination and (re)member all we learned to forget as we engage in teaching, research and cultural work” (Cutts, 2020, p. 910).…”

“…While we follow Faulkner, (2007), who considers the concepts of ars poetica (the art of poetry) and ars criteria (the art of criteria) as guiding principles for evaluating our poetry, we particularly considered Cutts’ (2020) notion of ars spirituality in our joint efforts. Drawing on Dillard, (2006) concept of “spiritual imagination” (p. 9), she notes that researcher-poets should access their “spiritual imagination and (re)member all we learned to forget as we engage in teaching, research and cultural work” (Cutts, 2020, p. 910). This idea is particularly important to us, as we engaged in poetic inquiry as a project of (re)membering and memory work (Leonardo, 2020).…”

“My representation is performative”: Black Women's Reflection of Academia Through Collaborative Autoethnographic Poetic Inquiry

“…Howard et al (2023) note that this "methodological frame is paramount because poetry, as both product and process, has often served as the only bridge between our scholarship and the lives we live" (p. 601). Black women scholars, both historically and contemporarily, have used poetry as a mode of inquiry that protects their spirits from academia's intentional fragmentation of self (Cutts, 2019;Howard et al, 2023). For example, McAllister and Brown (2023) utilized collaborative autoethnographic poetic inquiry "as an act of resistance" (p. 5) to reflect on the tensions between collaboration and competition in academia.…”

“…McAllister and Brown (2023) contend that collaborative autoethnographic poetic inquiry can be "an effective vehicle for creativity which uncovers and conveys emotional knowing, which in turn informs a model for collaboration that enables and facilitates the critical and creative contributions of marginalized individuals within academia and therefore their career development" (p. 6). As qualitative researchers, this methodology grants us the opportunity to honor the complexity of our memories, re-story the descriptive details of everyday life, and craft pieces that hold deeper meaning (Cutts, 2019;Davis, 2021;Dillard, 2012;Faulkner, 2018).…”