Sparks of Creative Agency in Arts Education: Flashpoints of Social Injustice to Imagine Otherwise

This paper examines how experiences of social injustice can become sparks of creative agency in arts education and thus can lead collective forces towards social justice. Drawing from critical social theoretical perspectives on arts equity, creative agency, and transformational resistance, the authors engage flashpoint methodology to highlight pivotal moments documenting experiences from their respective research studies of youth arts education programs. These pivotal experiential moments—flashpoints—reveal insights into how disruptive and disorienting experiences of social injustice can spark creative agency and facilitate collective movement toward social justice.