The CSHE and the BSIEL presents Black Research Approaches: Black Aesthetics in Educational Research, part of the 2023-2024 Black Study in Education Lab Webinar Series.
This webinar will focus on Black Aesthetics in research processes as the material, affective, and theoretical preoccupations that animate Black living.
Our featured speakers will be Dr. Gloria Wilson, Associate Professor of Arts Administration, Education and Policy, The Ohio State University, and Dr. Justin Coles, Associate Professor, Social Justice Education, University of Massachusetts. Dr. José Cossa, Associate Professor of Lifelong Learning and Adult Education, Comparative and International Education (CIE), & African Studies and CSHE Research Associate, The Pennsylvania State University, will be our discussant.
Recorded Webinar
Featured Speakers
Dr. Gloria J. Wilson
Dr. Gloria J. Wilson is Associate Professor of Arts Administration, Education, and Policy at The Ohio State University, co-editor of A Love Letter to This Bridge Called My Back and founder of Racial Justice Studio (University of Arizona). She is recognized for her work in Black Studies, cultural studies, hip hop and transnational feminisms, fugitive praxis, Afro-Asian solidarities, and as a facilitator for antiracism workshops in museums and community spaces utilizing arts-based pedagogies. Also a practicing artist, her multimedia work broadly examines notions of fugitivity, liberation, radical ancestry and specifically examines the intersections of racial identity and arts participation.
As an invited artist/speaker, she has presented for Spelman College’s Museum of Art BLACK BOX series and has been the recipient of a Fulbright award to study art, education and culture in Tokyo and Ogi Saga. Additionally, gloria has presented workshops exploring creative thinking dispositions for Harvard Graduate School of Education’s Project Zero. She is a steering committee member for crea+e, a collective advocating for racial equity in the arts and education and is current Associate Editor for the Journal of Cultural Research in Art Education. Her current art-making focuses on the intersections of freedom-dreaming, garment-making and print-making, particularly the Blackademic Project and forthcoming installation honoring the descendants of Clotilda survivors in Africatown, Mobile, Alabama. Her work has been exhibited in numerous museums and universities throughout the United States.
Dr. Justin A. Coles
Dr. Justin A. Coles is an Associate Professor of Social Justice Education in the department of Student Development at University of Massachusetts Amherst – College of Education. Within the college, Dr. Coles serves as the inaugural Director of Arts, Culture, and Political Engagement at the Center of Racial Justice and Youth Engaged Research (CRJ). At the CRJ, Dr. Coles directs the Black Healing Joy and Justice Collective. Dr. Coles’ socially and community engaged, arts-based research engages Black urban youth creativity and activism to inform counter structures to oppressive U.S. schooling policies, processes, and histories. Dr. Coles is a William T. Grant Theories of Blackness, lndigeneity, and Racialization in Research to Reduce Inequality in the Lives of Young People Writing Fellow. In 2023, Dr. Coles was inducted into the Martin Luther King Jr. Collegium of Scholars at Morehouse College. Formerly a Co-Editor-in-Chief for Equity & Excellence in Education, Dr. Coles currently serves on the International Editorial Board for Curriculum Inquiry. Additionally, Dr. Coles serves as Co-Chair for the American Educational Research Association (AERA) Special Interest Group (SIG), Hip Hop Theories, Praxis, & Pedagogies. Most recently, Dr. Coles was appointed to the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) Research Foundation Board of Trustees. Dr. Coles is published in a myriad of academic journals.
Discussant
Dr. José Cossa
José Cossa, Ph.D., is a Mozambican-American scholar, writer/author, researcher, poet, blogger, “twitterer,” podcaster, entrepreneur, and an Associate Professor in the College of Education at Penn State. Cossa holds a Ph.D. in Cultural and Educational Policy Studies with a depth area in Comparative and International Education from Loyola University Chicago.
He is the author of the book Power, Politics, and Higher Education: International Regimes, Local Governments, and Educational Autonomy, the recipient of the 2012 Joyce Cain Award for Distinguished Research on People of African Descent, a Co-Founder of AI4Afrika, and a member of the MacArthur Foundation 100&Change Panel of Judges for two consecutive years (2018 Inaugural Challenge and 2019).
