Hada De Basura: The work of the ‘garbage fairy' in an arts based community development research project

by Heather Goodwin

The thesis is focused on a the use of art and art making as a tool to address environmental awareness and social issues and community development in a small community on an island in Nicaragua, in which I lived for a period of time working along side pre-established local organizations and facilitating workshops. In presenting this thesis through an Indigenous narrative framework, I take on the role of a storyteller more than that of the researcher in recognition of my shared cross-cultural living experience. This thesis functions to demonstrate the benefits of social action and cross-cultural art therapy work in service of larger social struggles facing the world. These benefits are explored through my documented lived experience working alongside a rural community in Nicaragua tackling social issues and transforming garbage into art work. Woven into these pages that you hold in your hands are two stories; a narrative account of my shared lived experience, which largely serves as data of this paper, as well as a story that was distilled down to its essence, then embellished and transformed from this narrative account in to a children’s picture book to share back to the community that welcomed me.