ERIC Number: EJ1238212
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2019-Nov
Pages: 7
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: EISSN-1925-993X
EISSN: N/A
Exploring "Soul of a Nation": Disorienting Dilemmas of "Good White Women"
Voelkel, Micki; Henehan, Shelli
Canadian Journal for the Study of Adult Education, v31 n2 p123-128 Nov 2019
"Soul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power" is an exhibition of American Black artists from the 1960s through 1980s. Originally developed by the Tate Modern in London, the exhibition travelled to Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas, in early 2018. When we visited the exhibition, we intended to study how women were represented. Instead, we found the experience disturbing and disorienting. We were taken aback by the way the artists incorporated and owned images that we associated with racism, slavery, and segregation. As White, middle-class women from the American South, we felt ill-equipped to formulate an opinion or even to identify the emotions we experienced. The mutual cognitive dissonance we experienced caused us to re-evaluate our ideas and biases related to race. This essay describes our transformative learning in facing and confronting our White privilege and rethinking our attitudes and perceptions of race.
Descriptors: African Americans, Artists, United States History, Museums, Exhibits, Females, Racial Bias, Slavery, Racial Segregation, Whites, Emotional Response, Transformative Learning, Social Bias, Social Attitudes, Art Products
Mount Saint Vincent University. e-mail: cjsaerceea@gmail.com; Web site: https://cjsae.library.dal.ca/index.php/cjsae
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Identifiers - Location: Arkansas
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A