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Learning Abstract - A New Pedagogy for Learning Communities


Learning Abstract - A New Pedagogy for Learning Communities: Ritual Poetic Drama Within the African Continuum
by Tawnya Pettiford-Wates and Carl Waluconis

The spread of learning communities has generally proven to be beneficial for learning at colleges and universities. At the same time, their broad proliferation has occasionally meant dilution of some of their basic strengths. Moreover, once they arrive on a campus successfully, they tend to take hold and become unchangeable. This establishment of learning communities as an integral part of curriculum reform can be positive, but it can also leave those involved complacent about what they have created.

Just the same, even established learning communities can offer the opportunity for the introduction of greater alternative pedagogies when the program involves the arts. When the arts are central, they retain their special ability to influence feelings as well as knowledge. Each winter quarter at Seattle Central Community College (WA), students in The Use of Ritual Poetic Drama Within the African Continuum program research, write, produce, and act in a play. The theme for these plays is consistently Racism in America, and each new play focuses on a specific group confronted with America's legacy of systemic racism and institutional bias. Through this class, the college created an independent nonprofit company, The Conciliation Project, whose mission is to promote through active and challenging dramatic work open and honest dialogue about racism in America in order to repair its damaging legacy.

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Dr. Susan Salvador
Office for Student Services
11/04/2003