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by the authors into being. And it is here, argues Greene, that we will find the impetus to change direction and start anew. It is within fiction, through an imagining of what is possible, that underrepresented communities can find the possibility of voice and privilege not necessarily accorded by our current social structures. It is here that the possibility exists for perspective, understanding and compassion.

Perhaps most compelling is Greene's constant summoning of Wallace Stevens' poem "Man with the Blue Guitar." She urges us to heed the poem's protagonist, who refuses to "play things as they are" and insists instead that we must "throw away the lights, the definitions,/ And say of what you see in the dark..." By throwing out old definitions and starting anew, by saying what we see in the dark, by releasing our imaginations and those of our students thus.. .we open roads to new dialogue, new perspective and new possibility.

Reading Greene's essays, I found myself constantly arguing back: There's nothing about imagination that can be measured objectively! What's the practical application? How would we make it work? I have the sneaking suspicion Greene would say that the very act of asking those questions is proof positive I've lived far too long in an objective reality that leaves no room for imagined possibility or a better world.

Krista Apple is a freelance actor, writer and Teaching Artist in New York City. She is a graduate of Kenyon College (BA, 1999) and the British-American Drama Academy. kristaapple@yahoo. com

Pedagogy of the Oppressed Pablo Friere NIACE 1970, revised 1996 (3rd printing) ISBN 0 14 025403 X LB 6.95. To order contact [email protected]

Reviewed by Brian Joyce

It is not our role to speak to the people about our own views of the world, nor to attempt to impose that view on them, but rather to dialogue with people about their view and ours. —Pablo Friere

The best intentions of the designers and ongoing practitioners of arts in education and the placement of Teaching Artists into school and social service situations can surely be summed up by this from Friere. Yet a casual examination of the state of praxis within arts in education shows a difFerent reality. Simultaneous to its emergence in the 8O's and 9O's on multiple fronts, the field capitulated to the dominant culture's insistence that its practitioners assume the role of administrators of the status quo. From that time, and continuing to the present, the field repeatedly collapsed in upon itself in what can best be visualized as a kind of lava-lamp of mediocrity and oppression.

Too often the leadership of the arts in education movement identifies educators, administrators, politicians and funders as its "partners" when in truth they should join hands with America's children to explore the power of art to liberate us all:

For the role of students among students would be to undermine the power of the oppression and serve the cause of liberation.

Yet many still identify with the power brokers out of a misplaced allegiance

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to these oppressors, an identification that Friete predicts and dissects in the first section oi Pedagogy. There is a palpable sense of impotence among many Teaching Artists and even among administrators and education directors; many feel locked out of the decision-making process that defines their work with children. Too often the best intentions of Teaching Artists are defeated by prejudices and preconceptions that are ingrained within the cultures of the schools, social service organizations and artistic organizations that define the programs that serve our youth. Lost is the moment of real revolutionary creation along with a piece of our souls.

Friere argues throughout this powerful book that true liberation can only occur once all parties have been liberated, and here one gets the clear impression that those who will not be liberated by participating in a new and revolutionary way must be removed from the equation (for he that is hurt will be he who has stalled). It will not be sufficient for the Teaching Artist to read Friere's book and apply his theories only to her work. Participation in this true liberation must be thoroughly vertical, or it cannot succeed. The Teaching Artist must enact revolutionary change and liberation in the directions traditionally described as upwards, to the power brokers, and downwards, to the students, until these topographies are rendered meaningless and a new praxis emerges unilaterally between the newly-liberated equal partners.

Friere himself freely admits that only a handful of persons will finish reading his book; I can only imagine that few or none of those who complete it will implement it to any real degree. Then why read it at all? My answer is twofold; first, the book has the potential to bring into focus a great deal of background anxiety; to

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clarify the root of the malaise and ennui that permeates much of the work done by the front line Teaching Artists and which all too often leads to burnout within the profession. The second reason is that the book may just offer a framework upon which to finally define and professionalize the field beyond its current state as the bastard child of education and its mistress, the arts.

Many will balk at the above characterizations convinced that the system is the best one possible, choosing to ignore all evidence to the contrary. Friere is prepared for this reaction; it is, in fact, somewhat at the core of his thesis. The system is designed to defeat any attempt by its participants to break out of the cyclical routines that define it. Here one encounters Friere as a sort of prophet railing at us to follow him into the desert and certain doom; the uncompromising language that he employs underscores this role of zealot and fringe idealist. But he is not this image if the reader persists in both progressing through the text and allowing Friere's argument to reside next to her own ideas about education, the result can be life altering. The mad prophet dissolves to be replaced by the reader's own voice softly whispering these words of liberation into her ear. The Teaching Artist will begin to hear his own frustration enunciated and deconstructed. Before his eyes he will see uncovered a new possibility, a revolutionary pedagogy suited to the artworks that first drew the Teaching Artist to the profession.

Finally someone understands the problem, the frustration faced when a Teaching Artist enters the alien landscape of a school. Friere explains in detail why the new community created through the engagement of the Teaching Artist and the students never produces the massive

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new reality that seemed inevitable as the project was being designed. Friere offers a consistent and executable pedagogy that stands in stark contrast to many of the methodologies currently being employed nationwide. Friere puts words to the feeling that the Teaching Artist often has that he is operating, not as liberator, but as oppressor despite his best intentions and deepest desires. As Friere puts it "no one can be authentically human while he prevents others from being so." The Teaching Artist must become a participant in coliberation with her students by rejecting the oppressive methodologies currently operational within arts in education.

It is as much the entirety of the enterprise that must be examined as it is the minutia of individual execution. No truthful person should argue that arts in education was designed; it is more the truth that the field occurred. There are many reasons that arts in America created the Teaching Artist quite nearly out of whole cloth. The movement was as much spurred on by anxieties within the funding community as it was by any real ideals within the arts or education. As public money dwindled and funders increasingly came to demand proof that their dollars were making a difference, arts in education happened. It was a haphazard genesis with programs designed around hundreds of models and little actual scholarship penetrating into the daily practice. What little scholarship there was tended to focus in on the agility of the arts to respond to problems and short-falls within an increasingly faltering education system (or more to the point, systems linked haphazardly by funding initiatives and Federal restrictions).

Sterling examples of successful programs abound, but these are often

marred by the noise that emanates from programs that exist solely to enable jaded administrators to mine their funding for dollars that have disappeared from mainstream programs. There were, and continue to be, prophets toiling to create networks and to normalize praxis within the field. Yet the fact that these endeavors exist ad hoc within the prevalent chaos and epidemic mediocrity within the field leaves little time or opportunity to consider the core issues that were bypassed in the rush towards creation that accompanied the influx of new monies. Arts in education is an unexamined juggernaut, which has succeeded in elevating a generation of leaders who were never forced to rationalize their existence beyond the appearance of a popular outcry. Why is it necessary or valid to employ Teaching Artists? What, if anything, are they to do? How do we know if the movement has made a difference? One needs only attend a single meeting of Teaching Artists or education directors to see that what is sorely lacking in all of the discussions is a mandate. Friere will challenge anyone who is involved in the field to reconsider, or consider for the first time, the direction and intent of the work that is being done.

Many political and educational plans have failed because their authors designed them according to their own personal views of reality; never once taking into account (except as mere objects of their actions) the men-in-a-situation to whom their program is ostensibly directed.

What is sorely lacking, I would dare say nonexistent in the field, is a true dialogue with its partners, the young people. It has been assumed from the start that they are to be acted upon rather than acted with. Fear drives a great deal of the interactions between Teaching Artists and children.

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This fear is rooted in the fact that children make up a unique culture within the American landscape. Advertisers have recognized this for decades, often to the detriment of our youth, yet arts in education continues to use borrowed methodologies that do not capitalize on the unique ability of Teaching Artists to work within this alien culture. We worry more about how our Teaching Artists will navigate the subculture of the school than we do about their ability to engage the unique culture of the students housed there.

One can not expect positive results from an educational or political action program which fails to respect the particular view of the world held by the people. Such a program constitutes cultural invasion, good intentions notwithstanding.

Pedagogy of the Oppressed is not light summer reading; if you are traveling to the beach, take a good mystery. This book however removes a great deal of the mystery that surrounds the vocation of Teaching Artists. For anyone who has ever wondered if their presence within the classroom was doing more damage than good but could not articulate why that feeling arose, this book is a must. It cannot be that we will entrust so much of the future of both our youth and the arts to this methodology without seeking out hard questions and even more challenging answers. Friere is not universally correct, but he must be engaged. If the field is to attain real and lasting validity it will be through thinkers like Friere, no matter the consequences. No part of the practice, including its very design, can remain unexamined. As Friere says so eloquently:

The oppressors are the ones who act upon the people to indoctrinate them and adjust them to a reality which must remain untouched.

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Brian Joyce was the Director of the Phila- delphia International Children's Festival for 15 years, through 2004. He is a frequent speaker on issues relating to international children's theater. Brian can be reached at bdjoyce@comcast. net

Critical Response Process: A method for getting useful feedback on anything you make, from dance to dessert Liz Lerman and John Borstel Illustrated by John Borstel Dance Exchange, 2003 Paperback $24.00 includes shipping and handling To order: Liz Lerman Dance Exchange, 7117 Maple Avenue, Takoma Park MD 20912; 301/270-6700 XI5; www.danceex- change.org

Reviewed by Pamela Toll DeVault

As a Teaching Artist, I am sharply aware of the importance of reflection for my students. I believe that providing guidance and tools with which to discern and express their response to art is possibly the most important aspect of the work we do. I love what comes out of reflection in the form of verbal response to classmates' work. I am always looking for the new and better ways to guide this potent portion of a lesson to higher ground. Teaching Artists will find value in Lerman's Critical Response Process because of the way it teases apart the different aspects of viewers' response to a work of art. Through very well defined directions to participants, it slows and controls the journey from observation to opinion, providing a much richer reflective dialogue.

Liz Lerman developed the Critical Response Process to harness values like those just described, by tapping into