SON Website

I find the SON website particularly notable for its huge scope.  There is so much!  The richness of this resource changes the way that it might be used in my mind.  This is  a library, an alternative library,  with a specific progressive remit,  to present a range of new and less heard voices in a dynamic and provocative format.  Rather than presenting this to students as a particular narrow resource I would rather make this  a standard go-to resource for any inquiry. “I should see what’s on SON about ……..”.   

I am reminded of Yinka Shonibare’s work “the British Library”  installation which contains thousands of books featuring names and voices of immigrants to Britain who have shaped the cultural fabric.  Among other things, this work seems to remind us that there is a whole catalogue of cultural influences that needs to be a part of the establishment as they are crucially relevant to contemporary British life.  It seems that  SON is doing something similar

Reading into the website I dug into the photography section.  There is an interesting article entitled “the Shirley Card”  by Shannyce Adamson discussing the bias built into color photography processing of different skin tones.  The Shirley cards were reference photos used to achieve pleasing skin tones by adjusting equipment.  White faces were used for years until relatively recently and the result is a bias toward naturalistic white skin tones in photographic and video equipment.  More contemporary reference cards feature black, brown and white faces enabling and encouraging better callibration for all skin tones.  

I feel that the intellectual/creative resources that we access need to have a more balanced cultural reference like the modern “Shirley Cards”.  SON is playing a part in doing that.

A Pedagogy of Social Justice Education: Social Identity Theory, Intersectionality, and Empowerment 

Aaron J. Hahn Tapper 

This  portion of a chapter mentions some of the bedrock concepts of Social justice education. 

I was particularly interested in the “Contact Hypothesis” and “Social Identity Theory” as these seem to relate specifically to the development of inclusive learning environments. I thought particularly of the contact hypothesis regarding a student from this past term who seemed creatively inspired and energised but completely isolated from her peers.  I had the sense that she was from a very different socioeconomic and educational background.  Despite some effort on my part she seemed unwilling or uninterested in collaborating.  I feel that this isolation restricted the students educational benefit as she did not have the enrichment that comes from peer learning and had to rely only on herself. I wonder if I should have done more to encourage the student to connect with peers but I felt that I would have been overstepping in my role as a technician.  Also as an older white middle-class man perhaps I could not understand the stresses and anxieties that may have been keeping her working on her own.

Josephine Kwhali’s Witness Video  reinforces what we have learned about critical race theory.  Her evident frustration seems to be telling us that there is something more going on here than unconscious bias.  She implies that this really is about wilful ignorance rather than something beyond the conscious control of people like me who have the jobs, money, power, and education.

Retention and attainment in the disciplines :Art and Design

Terry Finnegan and Aisha Richards

A revealing presentation of  (somewhat dated) statistics related to retention and attainment particularly related to marginalized groups.  I would be curious to know more about the effect on attainment that poverty has. Although, there is a brief mention of the attainment differencial between first quintile socioeconomic group and others but it would be interesting to have a more detailed breakdown.  Also would be interesting to hear about intersectional effects of race and socioeconomic group.  I can’t help but feel that UAL has a bit of a blind spot when it comes to poverty.  It doesn’t seem to be very high  on the agenda  when speaking about inclusion.