Arts Education

Arts education explores the relationship between arts theory, inquiry, and practice in a variety of social and educational settings. Recognizing the arts as expressions of diverse worldviews and spiritual, ecological  and cultural understandings, we acknowledge our relational responsibilities to the human and more-than-human worlds. In their many forms, the arts and research-creation are at the interstices of life, theory, imagination, activism and action.

Research within arts education engages the theoretical, historical and philosophical foundations of arts in society and community. Faculty members welcome diverse perspectives and ways of being in the world, including arts for social change, as well as Indigenous, ecological and phenomenological approaches. Community arises through shared creative experiences, conceptual explorations, collective action and diffractive reflections. Here, the art of scholarship attends to curiosities and to learning realized through embodied exploration, while arts as inquiry animate longing and belonging amid the tensions and possibilities of daily life.

Doctoral students come from a variety of artistic backgrounds, including dance, media arts, music, theatre, writing, curatorial practice and other creative fields, and work in contexts such as post-secondary, K–12 education, cultural and arts institutions, consulting and diverse arts communities. 

As a doctoral student focused on arts education, you will explore interdisciplinary knowledge grounded in the intersections of scholarship, artistic practice and pedagogy. Your doctoral studies will create opportunities to connect research, creative work and educational practice, while celebrating individual artistic journeys and arts practices. As scholars, educators, artists and leaders, we invite you to seek the living pulse of your scholarship. 

Research topics and course themes include:

• Arts-based educational research and methodologies
• Art education theory and philosophy
• Art and social change
• Arts, wellbeing and health
• Art as knowledge practice, including Indigenous and cultural perspectives
• Arts in human development and learning
• Art teacher education
• Community and public arts education
• Technology and emerging media in arts education
• Embodiment and arts practice
• Curriculum theory and pedagogy in arts education
• Interdisciplinary and creative inquiry practices
• Performance and arts-based inquiry
• Intercultural and global perspectives in arts education