I spent some time this morning thinking about how my area of interest has evolved. My goal now is to understand studio culture, which I’m loosely thinking of as the place of studio art and design education—the physical space, the relationships and interactions between students, faculty behavior, the idea of a creative atmosphere, and the big ball of emotions that go into learning in such a culture.
Some thoughts, as I start to look at my first independent study, which will start in a few weeks:
- My side-trip into critique was useful, in that it was a preview for how literature in design education is being framed and considered. So much of it focuses on architecture, and I’m not interested in that as a discipline for all sorts of reasons. I’ll start with a focus on design, and I’m also curious about how design studio culture and art studio culture are the same or different.
- I suspect that, at some point, this is going to get into “how is this supposed to happen online?” and something about that really feels wrong, perhaps because I want to stay as far away from conversations of ed-tech as possible. Maybe I should give it some space, as it’s the reality that a lot of educators face in teaching what was traditionally studio-based work. I’ll continue to think about this.
- Habitus emerges over and over in the literature I’ve been reading as one way of thinking about at least some of the qualities of studio culture. I’m also interested in the real-time (and long-term) construction, change, and destruction of the culture, and how all of “place” impacts how a student learns the magic of making things.
- Power dynamic continues to be an underlying theme in much of the literature, too. I need to think more about how much I want to dive into this head-on. There’s been so much thoughtful work already done in this area that I don’t think I will be qualified to add much to it. Maybe it will be enough for me to know about it.
- I am surprised by how little I’m finding about students themselves. There has been some work on self-reported sentiment, but there’s a wide-open canvas for seeing studio culture through the lens of a student.
- I’m aware that I am picking up academic jargon and structures in my way of thinking and in my writing, and I’m not thrilled about that. I realize that there is a language that helps other researchers understand what I’m talking about, and that gives some credibility to the ideas I’m kicking around, but if my work is ever going to have a real impact on educators, my words need to remain clear and direct.
I am anticipating my morning writing will slow down now as we head out to California. It really was a great mini-ritual for getting started with my return to academia. I will focus, for the time being, on getting organized around scholarly material I want to explore in the upcoming quarter.