Democracy Matters

Plan, Do, Check and Prove: Educating for Democracy on Campuses and Beyond

In this episode, we talk with Ian Simmons, the Founder and President of the Foundation for Civic Leadership and a member of the Madison Center's advisory board, about best practices and promising projects for enhancing democracy.

Beyond the Lens: Justice Through Photography

From Richmond to the West Bank, from Kentucky to Tanzania, photography has the potential to communicate lived experiences and complex social issues to those in power. In this episode, we talk with internationally acclaimed photographer Wendy Ewald about her work in Virginia and beyond using photography as a collaborative process to strengthen democracy. Ewald has spent more than 40 years collaborating with children, families, and teachers all over the world. In her work, she encourages her collaborators to use cameras (as well as using the camera herself) to record themselves, their families and their communities, and to articulate their fantasies and dreams. Ewald often has them mark or write on her own negatives, thereby challenging the concept of who actually makes an image. Wendy's website Literacy and Justice through Photography JMU's Center for Creative Inquiry (formerly known as Institute for Visual Studies)

Beware the Shrinking Imagination!

Two questions animate our work: What if? How so? The work of imagining is something we should take very seriously in civic engagement. It's difficult to engage our senses in this difficult and academic work and the shrinking imagination stifles our work. Professor Tim Eatman, Dean of the Honors Living-Learning Community and Associate Professor of Urban Education in the College of Arts and Sciences at Rutgers University, discusses the five senses to engage in the work of imagining: hope, history, passion empathy, planning.