Critical Approaches to Arts Administration in the New Millennium
Working Title:
Critical Approaches to Arts Administration in the New Millennium
Edited by Winter Phong, Ph.D. and Alicia Jay, Ph.D.
Beginning with the Great Recession, a series of economic, natural, and social catastrophes continue to affect the United States. During the past fifteen years, events and movements such as Occupy Wall Street, LGBTQIA+ rights, #MeToo, mass shootings, Black Lives Matter, and the COVID-19 pandemic, among others, have caused the arts industry to question, examine, and respond to these happenings. Specifically, the arts administration and management field is at a critical juncture. With a national push for social justice and reform, a global pandemic, and economic recession, and universal challenge to access, the arts administration and management field has the potential to change its trajectory or maintain the status quo. At a time where social life has been altered, industry and academic practitioners have had time to question existing practices as well as the opportunity to adapt to new challenges. A narrative centered on the fallacy of ‘before’ clouds critical assessment of current and ongoing practices within arts administration. The regular panic set off by events of the past decade and a half has created a need for the field to consider the now and next and how to make the arts industry betterfinancially and socially–for all.
The editors of this volume seek original essays about the status and practices in the arts administration and management field as they pertain to industry challenges and changes pertinent to 2020 and beyond. We seek essays of around 6,000-9,000 words that explore various aspects of current theory and practice.
Possible topics include, but are not limited to:
• Case studies about divergent arts management/leadership practices
• Recent challenges to the status quo of arts administration
• Decolonizing practices within arts administration
• Internal/external drivers for change in arts administration
• Acknowledging and responding to privilege, white and/or otherwise, within arts administration
• Addressing equity, diversity, inclusion, and social justice initiatives in arts administration
• Reflections of past arts administration theories/practices for the purposes of shaping the future of the field
• Response to and speculative recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic crisis
• Online/virtual theatre challenges from the administrative point of view
• Perspectives from the field: topics that bridge industry experience with academic theory/examination
These are only a few possible topics; the editors welcome other ideas. Please send a 200-300 word abstract to alicia.jay@indstate.edu by November 15, 2020.
Please note: We plan to submit this volume for peer review after it is completed.