Misunderstood: Between Civic Practice and Community Engagement

With the increasing emergence of roles such as “Community Engagement Liaison” and institutional departments in “Civic Practice,” this panel seeks to explore and highlight the potential fractures between definitions in this increasingly popular practice. What are the critical ligatures between these practices, and also, how have they been usurped by institutions as development and philanthropic streams shift interest? Are new foci and terms such as “radical care,” “emergent strategies,” and “community outreach” mistranslated terms between the institution and the practice? Or the practice and the practitioners?

This conversation between practitioners in the field takes on three areas of focus, first, tracing the history of socially engaged art practice into the moment that this enters the institution. The rise of the "civic engagement/community engagement liaison" as an institutionalized role, and their alignment with missing driven values versus the care of a community. And lastly, how the ethics of these projects are developed through communal care versus the preservation of an institution. As institutions and philanthropic organizations shift towards racial equity in the field, the work produced by the participants in this panel may serve as an entry point into the work that currently in development.