ABSTRACT
Two art education researchers, one identifying as Mexican-American and one as white, raised working class, formally educated and openly queer, document divergent and yet similar journeys describing the socially constructed and constricted borders/boundaries of class, race, and sexualities, alongside the tensions and roadblocks they face as openly queer academics. Researchers/authors such as Anzuldúa (1990), Ellis (2009), and Hughes & Román (1998) utilize autoethnographic methodologies, while Yoshino (2007) situates autoethnographic research within intersections of LGBTQ and racial identities. Kadi (1999), Lorde (1984), Zandy (2004), and Zweig (2000) include working-class issues in their autoethnographic methodologies to explore limits placed upon them in their research and teaching. One result is the emergence/development of a resistance/futility model of being/sustaining/resisting as artist teacher researcher as observed/documented through memoir and journaling. Through the study, the researchers examine how they are limited in imagining themselves as whole and relevant individuals in academe. The researchers question what methodologies might be developed to strengthen bridges between LGBTQ and art education communities. Researchers observe that contemporary LGBTQ climates/peers in art education mirror the horrifically homophobic and self-hating personal/professional lives/climates described/documented by researchers McNaron (1997), Jackson (2007), Stockdill (2014) as well as Chaich & Oldham (2017). These researchers contest/claim that current existing models are ill-suited and unacceptable for them. They document the futility of art educators existing under sexual radars where intersectionalities of identity, violence, fear, self-doubt, and self-confidence work against professional and personal safety and creativity. These two case studies indicate that current socially and lived realities/limits pose unreal and unlivable expectations/realities not only for the researchers themselves but also for other academics and practicing classroom teachers. Future case-study research utilizing the stories of practicing K-12 art educators is introduced and previewed and indicated as worthy and necessary.
