CENTER OF ARTS AND CULTURAL STUDIES

Ann Filemyr, IAIA Academic Dean

Biography:

Ann Filemyr, Ph.D. is the new Dean of the Center for Arts & Cultural Studies at IAIA. She brings fifteen years of experience in higher education and four years as a non-profit arts organization director to her new role. She served as Department Chair for Cultural & Interdisciplinary Studies, and as Associate Dean and Interim Dean of Faculty at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio. She is a leader in innovative curriculum design to reflect values-based educational initiatives. She believes the purpose of education is to provide a structure for the acquisition of skills, attitudes, and knowledge for personal and social transformation. She served as a Teaching and Research Assistant for Great Lakes Indian Ethnobotany and Philosophy in the Native American Studies Program at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and attended the first World Parliament of Indigenous Peoples during the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. In 1994 she spent the summer at Zuni working with the Zuni Conservation Project on documentation and outreach. She is a poet and writer and has been twice nominated for the Pushcart Prize in Literature for her poetry.

Poem:

Education:

B.Ph. Creative & Performing Arts
Thomas Jefferson College of Grand Valley State Colleges, Michingan
M.A. English: Creative Writing Emphasis on Contemporary Poetry.
University of Wisconsin; Milwaukee
Ph.D Environmental Communications
Union Institute & University, Ohio

Major Professional Activities:

Chair of Cultural & Interdisciplinary Studies Department, Full Professor, Antioch College, Ohio.(1990-2005)

Founder and Director,"The Yellow Springs Community Environmental Health          Project," (September 2003 - June 2005) Designed and directed a 2-year community-based action research project bringing together Antioch College students with residents of Yellow Springs, Ohio to complete an in-depth local survey on issues of health and the local environment. Included the newsletter, "Circle of Flourishing," workshops, presentations, and a final report. Results were compiled and used by the Village Council of Yellow Springs in a citizen visioning process to inform policy and development decisions facing the community. For more information see: http://fc.antioch.edu/~communityhealth_survey

Founder & Director, 2000-2004, "Antioch Summer Writing Intensive," month-long writing workshops in poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction.

"A Question of Survival: Environment and Development in the U.S. and Brazil." an independent media project (1991-1994) culminating in a one-hour video documentary including footage of the international Indigenous Peoples World Parliament in Rio de Janeiro; the Green Cities Urban Forum in Curitiba; the Imprensa Verde (Green Press) Global Forum in Belo Horizonte; and The Earth Summit U.N. Conference on Environment & Development.

Publications & Writers Residencies:

Mabel Dodge Luhan House Writers Residency, Taos, NM, May 2003
"The Healing Power of Being Here," in the on-line journal From the Field, eds. Michele Gibbs and George Colman, www.realoaxaca.com/from-the-field/winter2002.html
Skin on Skin, poetry chapbook, Star Fire Press, 2000.
Hedgebrook Women Writers Retreat Residency, Whidby Island, Washington, May 1999.
She Wears Many Masks, prose poems and collage, one-of-a-kind artist book in the exhibit, One Who Sees with a Wild Eye, Herndon Gallery, 1998.
My Home Planet, prose poems and photographs, one-of-a-kind artist book in the exhibit, Letters Home, Herndon Gallery 1996.
Making Theories; Building Alliances; Creating Change: A Multicultural Perspective on U.S. Women's Lives (Mayfield Pub. 1998) eds. Margo Okazawa Rey and Gwyn Kirk, essay, "Loving Across the Boundary."
Environmental Journalism Fellow, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI.May 1995
Greening the College Curriculum: A Guide to Environmental Teaching in the Liberal Arts (Island Press, NY 1995)
eds. Jonathan Collett and Steve Karaskashian; co-authored chapter on "Media & the Environment" with Karl Grossberg.
Thinking, one-poem artist book in a limited edition of 100 copies, Vestige Press, Michigan 1987

Teaching Statement:

"At IAIA I believe our work as educators involves empowering our students to become active and engaged participants in shaping the future of their personal lives, their tribal communities, and the world. Learning occurs when we apply exquisite attention, the deep desire to know and understand, and our unique capacity to be transformed by what we learn."