Art as a Tool for Empowerment

Posted by Pulitzer Center on February 4, 2025

How can students use their voices creatively to inspire change?

We are exploring how art can not only help to tell stories of empowerment and resistance, but inspire them. These resources created by our educator partners invite students to take a closer look at the role of art in addressing global issues and seeking justice.

In a unit, Green Justice: Exploring how rhetoric and art are used to inform and empower communities, created by Teacher Fellow and high school English Language Arts educator Deidra Wright, students explore Pulitzer Center-supported reporting and other resources related to environmental justice. Students will research local environmental activism and then choose a medium (social media campaign, podcast, graphic novel, etc.) to create a final project highlighting an environmental issue they are passionate about.

Created by the Joy Village team from The 1619 Project Education Network, this unit, The Art of the Disenfranchised: Harriet Powers’ Quilt Stories, also explores how creative mediums can tell important stories. Utilizing resources from The 1619 Project, students examine themes of disenfranchisement and resistance in the life of renowned African American quilter Harriet Powers. For their final project, students will create an art piece that tells a story about a contemporary issue of disenfranchisement.