Chapter 8: Intersectional Imagination: Arts-Based Strategies for Teaching Critical Sociocultural Knowledge

The scholarly literature on diversity studies in teaching and teacher education supports the argument that, in addition to knowledge of subject matter content and content-specific pedagogies (Shulman, 1986, 1987), teachers need to acquire knowledge of the history of social and educational inequality, sociocultural differences, and the various processes by which inequities are maintained in schooling (Sleeter & Grant, 2006). Research suggests that teachers who understand and care about students’ cultural assets and the sociopolitical context of students’ lives often mobilize this knowledge as a part of their pedagogy, particularly when teaching students from historically marginalized communities (Beauboeuf-Lafontant, 2005; Dilworth & Brown, 2008; Hollins, King & Hayman, 1994; Irvine, 2002; Ladson-Billings, 1994; Valenzuela, 1999; Villegas & Davis, 2008). Since critical perspectives are often omitted from the K–12 curriculum, teacher education courses become the places where many teachers are first introduced to this sociocultural knowledge (Brown, 2011; Milner, 2006, 2010).