Meet Arts in Education–Culture and Teaching Ph.D. candidate, Đenise Hạnh Huỳnh

Current Arts in Education–Culture and Teaching Ph.D. candidate, Đenise Hạnh Huỳnh shares what drives her research and creative expression.

What is your Ph.D research focus?

Through the embodiment of critical arts based ethnography, my work investigates the creative efforts we make as we unlearn harmful teachings from our upbringings. In particular, I am interested in the experiences of Vietnamese American artists in Minnesota and the implications of our work as it relates to culturally and linguistically sustaining arts curriculum, policy, and pedagogy. I want to understand how our lived experiences contribute to diasporic growth and creative expression–how we engage with, against, and past the real world context of colonialism and imperialism.

What drove you to enroll in the program?

I never met someone who held a Ph.D. until I arrived at Macalester College as a first-generation college student. Previously, I had only seen professors played by actors on television. Growing up, many people also told me that the arts were not possible for people like me–a descendant of working-class refugees. Instead, people with my set of experiences and people “like me” were expected to choose more “practical” fields. I want to be a part of changing these narratives. 

What do you hope to get out of your educational experience?

I have been grateful for the space to teach, research, and make art. I plan to continue deepening my publication and performance record alongside meaningful engagement with the community as I continue my dissertation work. I hope the time I have taken to reinvest in my own education will meaningfully contribute back into my collaborations with communities.

What do you plan to do after graduation?

Throughout my career, I have sought to understand educational policies, systems, and theories that impacted the trajectory of my life and the lives of other human beings who are marginalized by these systems. In terms of tangibles, I want to publish my first debut collection of poems, a picture book series in the works, and continue collaborating with other Vietnamese American artists. As such, I want to continue making art, teaching students, doing research, and serving my community; to continue investigating the questions that have always mattered to me. 

Learn more about a PhD in Arts in Education in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction.