Enacting Place: a Comparative Case Study

Abstract

As a community-based art educator, I advocate for an arts-based educational environment that embraces postmodern tenets and encourages individuals to reflect on self and society in relation to the places in which they dwell and learn. This thesis is a dialogue on emplaced community-based art education. Issues of urban education, social justice, and critical pedagogy are considered in relation to participants’ enactments of place within two distinct community-based educational settings. In order to investigate the connections between a culture of place, place-based education, and the community-based programs of each site, the role of art and artifacts was carefully considered in building a sense of place and placemaking within the comparison of each case study. Data was collected over the course of a year and later analyzed through the lens of narrative analysis-a focus on how people spoke to personal values and social beliefs associated with their enactment of place-based education.