Why the Arts Don't Do Anything: Toward a New Vision for Cultural Production in Education

Abstract

In this essay Rubén A. Gaztambide-Fernández uses a discursive approach to argue that mainstream arts in education scholarship and advocacy construes "the arts" as a definable naturalistic phenomenon that exists in the world and is available to be observed and measured. In the course of his analysis, he examines how this construction is employed through what he calls the rhetoric of effects as part of the mainstream discourses used in arts in education research today. He describes how this positivistic rhetoric masks the complexity of those practices and processes associated with the arts, limiting the possibilities for productively employing such practices in education. In addition, he explores how discourses of the arts both arise out of and continually reify hierarchical conceptions of artistic practices in education and broader society. He concludes by proposing an alternative rhetoric of cultural production, arguing that moving toward this new way of understanding practices and processes of symbolic creativity is critical for expanding our vision for the arts in education. And Mr. Karp turns to me and he says, "Okay, Morales. What did you feel?" And I said. .. "Nothing I'm feeling nothing." And he says, "Nothing Could get a girl transferred." They all felt something, but I felt nothing. Except the feeling that this bullshit was absurd!-Diana Morales, from A Chorus Line

Market “choices” or structured pathways? How specialized arts education contributes to the reproduction of inequality

“…Our analysis supports that rather than being a vehicle for addressing inequality and ensuring equal access to educational opportunities to all students, specialized arts programs produce the same patterns of inequality as academic streaming and are therefore implicated in the reproduction of structural inequality. Less clear, however, is the role that "the arts," understood as a particular set of discourses and ideas that reflect certain values about cultural products and practices (see Gaztambide-Fernández, 2013), play not just in the production but also in the justification of inequality. In order to do this, here we draw on our own previous analysis of qualitative data collected for the UAHS project.…”

Music education as the herald of a cosmopolitan collective imperative: On being human

“…It was, as I also have argued elsewhere (Niknafs, 2017a), broader than only having music as a subject matter. It was a necessary part of our cultural education (Gaztambide-Fernández, 2013). Nevertheless, according to Jorgensen (2018),Among the central problems in music education in our time are those arising out of the othering of difference in music education.…”

Drawing out the value of the visual: children and young people theorizing time through art and narrative

“…Despite the generally low standing of the arts in the curriculum (Blatt-Gross, 2013;Gaztambide-Fernández, 2013;Greene, 1995) a range of research has indicated the positive effects of artistic engagement in cognitive development and social and emotional well-being (Blatt-Gross, 2013;Caldwell & Vaughan, 2011). As Bucheli, Goldberg, and Phillips (1991) argue, the arts contribute to learning in a range of ways:…”

“…This is demonstrated in the capacities of the children whose works are featured below. Gaztambide-Fernández (2013) contends that most of the mainstream literature that focuses broadly on the arts addresses the positive effects of artistic engagement, emphasizing both instrumental and intrinsic benefits (p. 214). He calls instead for a more complex understanding of the value of arts in education and the idea of artistic engagement as being 'cultural production', which is offered as a possibility for honouring the layered and complex nature of artistic work (p. 227).…”