Suggested Reading
This reading list gathers books, anthologies, and critical texts that inform my artistic practice, research, and teaching. Spanning art theory, social practice, pedagogy, environmental justice, archival studies, and abolitionist thought, these texts shape the perspective I bring to community-based projects and art. Together, they reflect an interdisciplinary approach to knowing, one that sees cultural work as a form of scholarship, cultural memory, and collective action.
Art Theory, Social Practice & Cultural Work
- Art as Experience — John Dewey
- Phenomenology of Perception — Maurice Merleau-Ponty
- Relational Aesthetics — Nicolas Bourriaud
- The Fluxus Reader — Edited by Ken Friedman
- Art as Social Action: An Introduction to the Principles and Practices of Teaching Social Practice Art — Gregory Sholette, Chloë Bass, and Social Practice Queens
- The Routledge Companion to Contemporary Art, Visual Culture, and Climate Change — Edited by T. J. Demos, Emily Eliza Scott, and Subhankar Banerjee
- Promoting Civic Engagement Through Art Education: A Call to Action for Creative Educators — Edited by Flávia Bastos and Doug Blandy
- Art and Social Justice Education: Culture as Commons — Edited by Therese Quinn, John Ploof, and Lisa Hochtritt
- Breath(e): Toward Climate and Social Justice — Glenn Kaino
- Worlding Ecologies: Art, Science and Activism Towards Climate Justice — Niekolaas Johannes Lekkerkerk
Pedagogy, Critical Education & Radical Learning
- Pedagogy of the Oppressed — Paulo Freire
- Education for Critical Consciousness — Paulo Freire
- Deschooling Society — Ivan Illich
- Tools for Conviviality — Ivan Illich
- Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom — bell hooks
- Teaching Community: A Pedagogy of Hope — bell hooks
- Mind in Society — Lev Vygotsky
- Arts-Based Research in Education: Foundations for Practice — Edited by Melisa Cahnmann-Taylor and Richard Siegesmund
Borderlands, Migration & Decolonial Thought
- Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza — Gloria Anzaldúa
- This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color — Edited by Cherríe Moraga & Gloria Anzaldúa
- Chicano and Chicana Art: A Critical Anthology — Edited by Jennifer A. González et al.
- Unity and Struggle: Speeches and Writings — Amílcar Cabral
- Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples — Linda Tuhiwai Smith
- The Idea of Latin America — Walter Mignolo
- Brown in the Windy City: Mexicans and Puerto Ricans in Postwar Chicago — Lilia Fernández
- Mexican Chicago — Rita Arias Jirasek
Environmental Justice, Commons & Climate
- Governing the Commons — Elinor Ostrom
- Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants — Robin Wall Kimmerer
- Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor — Rob Nixon
- Sustainability in an Imaginary World: Art and the Question of Agency — David Maggs and John Robinson
- Environmental Justice in the Anthropocene: From (Un)Just Presents to Just Futures — Edited by Stacia Ryder et al.
- Monsanto: A Photographic Investigation — Mathieu Asselin
Archival Theory, Critical Histories & Memory
- Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route — Saidiya Hartman
- The Archive and the Repertoire — Diana Taylor
- Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History — Michel-Rolph Trouillot
- Museum Frictions: Public Cultures/Global Transformations — Edited by Ivan Karp et al.
Abolition, Justice & Collective Liberation
- Art on My Mind: Visual Politics — bell hooks
- We Do This ’Til We Free Us: Abolitionist Organizing and Transforming Justice — Mariame Kaba
- Beyond Survival: Strategies and Stories from the Transformative Justice Movement — Edited by Ejeris Dixon and Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha
— Edited by Ejeris Dixon and Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha - Abolition. Feminism. Now. — Angela Y. Davis, Gina Dent, Erica R. Meiners, and Beth E. Richie