The Role of Art in the Pegagogy of Social and Racial Sympathy

By:
Dr. Rebecca Carr
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Both John Dewey and Alain Locke were American Pragmatists with a keen interest in education, especially the place of art in education.Although contemporaries sharing this common interest, there is little evidence of direct communication between the two. This paper first summarizes Dewey's well-known theory of art in education and second explores Locke's unique ( and to this day unheralded) insight that art is a crucial means of promoting sensibilities and feelings in peoples of diverse economic, racial and cultural backgrounds that tend to bring them together and identify one with another rather than to separate and segregate them.Locke's unique insight on the importance of art buttresses the general argument of John Dewey and lends it urgency in these days when the racial divide in America is increasing and the funding for arts in education is decreasing.


Keywords: John Dewey, Alain Locke, Art in Education, Pedagogy of Social and Racial Sympathy
Stream: Creative Arts and Learning
Presentation Type: 30 minute Paper Presentation in English
Paper: A paper has not yet been submitted.

Dr. Rebecca Carr

Lecturer, Department of Philosophy
George Washington University, George Washington University
Washington, DC, Washington, DC, USA

I consider myself first and foremost a teacher. To upper level students, I teach 19th C.philosophy and American Philosophy. For 20 years I have been studying the writings of Charles Peirce, with a special interest in his logic and the way in which logical discoveries force changes in his theory of reality. I have lectured on this subject and been an active member of Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy.
Of late, I have been interested in racial issues from a pragmatic standpoint and this interest has led me to the work of Alain Locke, an African -American who received his PhD from Harvard in 1918. A student of William James and Santayana, he considered himself a Pragmatist . He was the intellectual spokesman of the Harlem Renaissance. His academic work at Howard University is less well known, perhaps because he was interested in adult education, perhaps because his repeated call for social change through new pegadogy did not reach a white audience. Of particular interest is his interest in the arts, the fine arts and the literary arts. He lectured extensively on the use of art in an academic curriculum to foster feelings, sentiments, of respect, appreciation, and sympathy for people and cultures foreign and unfamiliar. So, I have been of late working through his papers at Howard University in order to bring to light forgotten thoughts that benefit the work today on multiculturalism that is not divisive.

Ref: L07P0229