A Critical Exploration of The Boondocks For Art Education: A Philosophical Interpretation Of Black Visual Culture Through The Lens Of Double Consciousness
Open Access
- Author:
- Grant, Alphonso Walter
- Graduate Program:
- Art Education
- Degree:
- Master of Science
- Document Type:
- Master Thesis
- Date of Defense:
- June 20, 2013
- Committee Members:
- Booker Stephen Carpenter Ii, Thesis Advisor/Co-Advisor
Paul C Taylor, Thesis Advisor/Co-Advisor
Charles Richard Garoian, Thesis Advisor/Co-Advisor
Christine M Thompson, Thesis Advisor/Co-Advisor - Keywords:
- Black visual culture
curriculum theory
and double consciousness - Abstract:
- The intricacies and the complexities within Black visual culture in general and in the animated television series The Boondocks specifically have been disarticulated and not recognized sufficiently in relationship to curriculum theory in the field of art education. While some scholars have examined curriculum in art education, (Carpenter & Tavin 2010; Rolling 2010), or in curriculum studies (Pinar 2004), neither field has sufficiently applied non-dominant Eurocentric White American cultural ideologies to interpret or theorize Black visual culture. Furthermore, this thesis assumes art education as an academic discipline to advance the scholarship of W.E.B. Du Bois’s (1903) concept of double consciousness, a multi-dimensional incessant awareness of the lived experience of some Black people, as curriculum theory. With that said, authors have offered persuasive arguments about the salience of curriculum theory and the education system (Carpenter & Tavin 2010; Rolling 2010); however, Du Bois’s (1903) concept of double consciousness remains a relatively underexplored concept when it pertains to curriculum theory. This thesis augments considerations for exploring the complicated conversation (Pinar, 2004) of adapting double consciousness as curriculum theory in the field of Art Education. Drawing on sources from the academic disciples of Art Education, African American Studies, Visual Culture, and Curriculum Theory, this thesis builds a conversation about the interpretation of Black visual culture looking through the paired lenses of the three dimensions of double consciousness—sociological, phenomenological, and epistemological (Grant, 2013; Taylor, 2010)—and three threads of visual culture—substantial, phenomenological, and pedagogical (Tavin, 2003).