Transformative Language Arts Concentration

Goddard Student The low residency MA in Individualized Studies Program offers a 48 credit concentration in Transformative Language Arts.

The Transformative Language Arts Concentration is for students interested in the intentional use of the written, spoken and sung word for individual and community growth, development, celebration, and transformation. Students choosing this concentration build upon and extend their previous experience with the spoken and/or written word to further develop a transformative practice for themselves and their communities.

Transformative Language Arts is a new and emerging academic field focused on social and personal transformation through the power of the written, spoken or sung word. Drawing on all of the language arts, Transformative Language artists bring the language arts to community-building, cultural and ecological restoration, personal development, and many other areas of individual and collective liberation. Transformative Language artists, scholars, facilitators, and consultants facilitated creativity and language arts in many venues, such as community centers, schools, prisons, health centers and hospitals, businesses, research facilities, retreat centers, and more, facilitating creativity and language arts.

Students choosing this low residency concentration learn how to develop and sustain meaningful community engagement and work through which they can cultivate making a living through Transformative Language Arts. At the same time, students deepen their own practice as transformative language artists in writing, storytelling, drama, multi-genre, and interdisciplinary arts involving the power of words.

"In the tradition of Tikkum Olam, the Hebrew phrase that means putting back together the broken world, Transformative Language Arts draws upon creative writing, storytelling, songwriting, drama, performance, and other forms of written, and oral communication that contribute to naming and honoring individual and community experience, perceptions, voice and vision."
--- Concentration Coordinator Caryn Mirriam-Goldberg

"My own life was transformed as a result of the work I accomplished in the Transformative Language Arts Program, in important and gorgeously difficult ways. I'm so grateful for the gentle and generous guidance of my peers and advisors - I bring them with me, in heart and spirit, as I move through the world continuing the work we began together in Vermont."
--- Jennifer Cross, Transformative Language Arts Graduate

Request more information about the low residency MA in Individualized Studies Program and the Transformative Language Arts Concentration

Core Values

Personal and Social Transformation

Students look inwardly and outwardly, reflecting upon what their individual artistic practice illuminates about community and culture, and how their study and community work teaches them about their place in the world.

Transformation as an Individual and Communal Process

We encourage students to envison transformation as a process through which individuals envision transformation as a process through which individuals and communities can find the means to celebrate their truths, make positive changes in their lives, and honor their history and traditions.

Defining All the Defining Terms

At the core of the low residency MA in Transformative Language Arts is the premise that individuals engaged in Transformative Language Arts, whether participants or facilitator, name for themselves what they discover and cultivate through the language arts.

Honoring the Spoken, Sung, and Written Word

By valuing the spoken and sung word as much as the written word, students explore various ways to use the language arts for a wide range of populations.

Interdisciplinary Theory and Practice

Transformative Language Arts is inherently interdisciplinary, drawing from many fields, often including education and pedagogy, creative writing and literature, communications, psychology, and social action.

Progressive Education in Theory and Practice

Transformative Language Arts is based on progressive educational principles that support cooperation, collaboration, and experimentation, as well as transformative non-authoritarian and other community-centered models of facilitation and leadership.

Greater Perspective on One’s Place in the World

In order to work effectively with others, especially in a transformative context, low residency MA in Transformative Language Arts students examine how they see themselves and are seen in relation to family, community, culture, and ecosystem.

MA in Individualized Studies

Transformative Language Arts Concentration

Core Values

Read More...