CULTURAL POLICY RESEARCH
Cultural policy is the government actions, laws and programs that regulate, protect, encourage and financially (or otherwise) support activities related to the arts and creative sectors, such as painting, sculpture, music, dance, literature, and filmmaking, among others and culture, which may involve activities related to language, heritage and diversity. In less-confusing terms, cultural policy refers to laws and actions by government related to arts and culture.
The creation of or change to cultural policies is what arts advocates work toward. This could mean an action by federal, state, or local government to provide funding to the arts. This could also mean a change in tax laws which would affect what individual artists can claim as work-related expenses on their taxes.
I have been interested in cultural policy since college, when I first became involved in arts advocacy. In order to advocate for change, we must understand what our current situation is, how we got here, and what factors caused these decisions to be made. This is why, during my time in higher education, I focused my studies on understanding different aspects of arts advocacy. Below, you can access two papers I've written on cultural policy.
U.S. Arts & Cultural Policy: Understanding & Implications for Arts Administrators
This was written in 2015 as the capstone paper for my bachelor's degree in music at Wartburg College in Waverly, Iowa. Though some references may be out of date, it serves as a starting place for arts administrators who want to know more about U.S. cultural policy.
Cultural Exceptions in Multinational Trade: Analysing NAFTA to Conceptualise TTIP
This 2016 paper is my dissertation for my masters degree in arts administration and cultural policy at Goldsmiths, University of London. As a graduate student, I became engaged in trade activism as part of the student-led organization Students Against TTIP. TTIP, an acronym for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, was a trade agreement being negotiated between the U.S. and the EU at the time of writing. Though many things have changed since the writing of this paper (including Brexit, the dissolution of TTIP, and the replacement of NAFTA), it provides an in-depth look at cultural policies included in two major trade agreements, as well as the values that countries place on culture and how they put policy in place to protect it.
Other Research
Compendium of Cultural Policies
In 2016, I assisted Rod Fisher with the United Kingdom's entry on the Compendium of Cultural Policies and Trends' website. Initiated in 1998, this online database provides in-depth information on cultural policies, statistics, and trends of European countries. You can learn more about Rod and my work with him on the Compendium of Cultural Policies and Trends website.
