Spring 2018

Continuing course in basic keyboard skills. Students already fluent with notation and with music in their plan are encouraged to take this level, or talk with the instructor.

Continuing course in basic keyboard skills. Students already fluent with notation and with music in their plan are encouraged to take this level, or talk with the instructor.

Plants define the biological environment. All other organisms depend on plantsʹ capacity for photosynthesis. Plant structure and chemistry have shaped animal (including human) evolution, and we directly depend on plant products for food, medicine, structural materials, and many other things. Yet few people can name even the dominant plants in their environment, explain what

This seven week intensive class will be focused on understanding some basic methods for working with plaster. We will take a look at variety of gypsum products to understand their similarities and differences. Plaster has an amazing way of mimicking life. In this class, we will learn the states at which plaster transforms and use our hands to open our minds to the endless ways

This seven week workshop will cover the basic concepts and techniques for producing lithographic prints using aluminum plates, photo-lithographic plates, and pronto plates. Additionally, students will have the opportunity to explore more experimental techniques like photocopy lithography and aluminum foil lithography. Lithography is a printmaking process that allows for the

This seminar will delve deeply into the life and work of D. W. Winnicott, the British psychoanalyst famous for his work on playing, internal creative life, and the interplay between creative and psychotic elements in fantasy. We will read about the British psychoanalytic world in which Winnicott developed; his biography; some of his popular work, including transcripts of his

We will begin our study of War Poetry not on the beach before Troy or in the trenches of the first World War, but in our present moment, when, as legal scholar Mary Dudziak argues, wartime is no longer “an exception to normal peacetime,” but “the only kind of time we have.” What are War Poems when war is everywhere and always? Who does and does not get to write them? What kind

This performance ensemble will study polyrhythmic theory practiced in the Sub-Sahara, Southeast Asia , Caribbean , and Western music cultures. The individuals and ensemble will learn to play music that incorporates playing two or more contradicting rhythms at once. Each student will compose a piece for the ensemble to perform that is influenced by one or more of the

Print Assemblage is a course that explores printmaking as a base medium/material for a variety of mixed media projects. Students will bring to class various levels of printmaking experience, and be challenged to look beyond a traditional approach to printmaking.Demonstrations will be given in intaglio, monotype, woodcut along with variety of bonding and coating methods that

Unlike the more stable democracies of Western Europe and North America, many countries of the developing world lack durable, legitimate and effective political institutions or governmental systems. These countries are in the throes of wrenching political transitions and crises that compound weak political institutions with economic malaise, social polarization and/or cultural

The process of making artwork will be the major focus of the class. This studio class is designed to support the development of the creative process in ceramics with an understanding lending itself to all forms of art making in ceramics. Projects will be conceptually based requiring investigation on an individual level. Issues to be raised in this class will include functional

The question is what do you want to say? As we develop our interests in sculpture it becomes more and more imperative to find our own voice. The role of the artist is to interpret personal conditions and experiences and find the most effective expression for them. This course provides the opportunity for a self directed study in sculpture. Students are expected to produce a

In this course, students will read Proust’s novel, focusing more closely on Swann’s way, The Captive and Time regained. An exploration of the historical, cultural and artistic context, as well as cinematic adaptations will support a close reading of the text. Written assignments and oral presentations will help students improve their reading, speaking and writing skills in

A developmental, periodizing, regionalist, and heteronormatively inflected approach to idiosyncratic male artist-geniuses such as Michelangelo, Leonardo, Raphael, and Titian has dominated Renaissance art history. Yet given its cross-cultural colonial origins and paradoxical investment in both 'pagan' antiquity and Christian humanism, ‘pre-modern’ Renaissance visuality is

"All novels are about certain minorities," Ralph Ellison insisted in a 1955 interview with The Paris Review. "The individual is a minority. The universal in the novel--and isn't that what we're all clamoring for these days?--is reached only through the depiction of the specific man in a specific circumstance." If this is true, then the enduring power of Ellison's Invisible Man

In his review of Amy Hempel's story collection The Dog of The Marriage, New York Times book critic D.T. Max aptly wrote, "It's said that the music you hear when you are first sexually active is the music you keep wanting to hear your whole life." Often nicknamed, the "dirty realists," writers such as Hempel, have long had to defend the inherent breadth of their "miniaturist"

In her poem “Questions of Travel,” Elizabeth Bishop writes, Should we have stayed at home and thought of here? / Where should we be today? / Is it right to be watching strangers at play / In this strangest of theaters? This is the lament of every traveler, and the restlessness of these lines speaks directly to the literary practice we call ‘travel writing.’ We will examine the

Poetic form is as diverse as the poets who use them. Stretching from forms as old as the sonnet to as contemporary as the Twitter poem, poets utilize prosody to express specific concerns in shocking and beautiful ways. Every decision counts, and we will learn what those decisions are and the weight they carry for different poets. We will read extensively poems and craft essays

Marx's ideas remain an important source of political and social science thought. This class requires students to engage in a close and critical reading of a number of Marx's essays and works. The aim of this short course is to acquire a firm understanding of Marx’s central concepts.

This course will take a critical look at how news is reported in the media with a particular focus on stories dealing with conflicts. We will read articles from the news with, if you will, conflict resolution glasses on as we analyze the dynamics of different conflicts. We will also examine what gets reported, what does not get reported, and how stories are reported.

In this course, when making and performing new movement material, we will be thoroughly investigating, modifying, rearranging, and reconsidering our understanding and use of time. By focusing on time, we will find more about its intricate relationship to space and motion. We will challenge personal timing habits and patterns, explore them more deeply to find a wealth of

In this Module, students will gain an understanding of the United Nations conventions pertaining to refugees, and the different forms of forced migration. Vahidin will then share his own direct experience of his time as a refugee, specifically how people live in refugee camps and how they are structured and managed. Students will be asked to examine their own responses to this

In this course, students will examine specific visual representations within the context of French culture. Through the reading of a wide variety of French images, including Chartres cathedral’s stained glasses, La Tour’s chiaroscuro paintings, cartoon hero Tintin, surrealist drawings and films, and contemporary installations, students will hone their linguistic skills and

With the development of the podcast and online radio, audio documentary has made a major resurgence in popular culture. This course will explore the basic skills and techniques required to tell stories through sound. Along with the technical tools required, the focus will be on learning how audio production can enhance communication with an audience and inform their local

This introductory course explores the architecture of the Islamic world from the beginning of Islam to the present, extending from Spain to India. By examining architectural monuments from different periods and locales, the course demonstrates how architectural production was not only informed by religious ritual, but also shaped by cultural encounters with a diversity of