Spring 2026 Course Search

This is a course for composers who have taken composition courses previously and have good notation skills.  Enrollment is limited to 10 students. Each student will produce a sizable piece for String Quartet. The class time will be used for analysis and study of works composed for string quartet and for examination of the student’s works-in-progress.

In her essay, Violence, director Anne Bogart writes, "Richard Foreman, perhaps the most intellectual of American directors, said that, for him, creation is one hundred percent intuitive. I have learned that he is right. This is not to say that one must not think analytically, theoretically, practically and critically. There is a time and a place for this kind of left-brain activity, but not in the heat of discovery in rehearsal and not in front of an audience. As soon as the door closes in rehearsal or as soon as the curtain goes up in performance, there is no time to think or reflect.

This two-credit course involves working on the conceptualization and editing of the national print literary magazine Bennington Review. Students will serve as Editorial Assistants for the magazine. The course will also engage students in how to approach fiction as an editor: from the selection process, macro edits, and micro edits—to the conversation with the writer.

Born to a multilingual family and culture, with connections to both India and Pakistan, and educated at Cambridge in the UK, Rushdie was already a celebrated writer when an Iranian clerical fatwa against him in 1989 launched him to another level of fame (or infamy). Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini charged Rushdie with blasphemy in his novel, Satanic Verses, published the prior fall (1988), offering a bounty for his life. The fatwa was never repealed.

This course serves as an introduction to rhythms, songs, and musical practices from Africa and the African Diaspora, including Brazil, Cuba, Haiti, Puerto Rico, and the Dominican Republic. Students will learn these traditional folkloric rhythms using indigenous percussion instruments from these territories and provinces. Class discussions will convey history, culture, language, and dance from these regions. Students will also have opportunities to create rhythms and arrangements in collaboration in our “break-out” segments.

When you first learn how to paint, the focus is typically on gaining facility with the application and manipulation of paint to articulate the subject. In this intermediate course, we shift our attention to the often overlooked step that precedes painting: preparing the surface. 

Piano Lab I aims to introduce the piano to first-time musicians or first-time pianists. Over the course of the semester, basics in music theory, piano technique, and note reading will be taught, culminating in an end-of-term recital. Please note that this course is meant for beginners, not advanced pianists.

The captivity narrative is a uniquely American literary form, a distinct, adventure-driven offshoot of the Puritan spiritual autobiography--with affinities to the slave narrative--that has more in common with today's reality-based media programming that you might think. We'll spend the term looking closely at the captivity narratives that form the canon, beginning with the Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson (1682), and charting developments in the genre as it exploded with the so-called Indian wars between the U.S.

Actions In Process: Junior Choreography Workshop positions creative research as a multifaceted practice that includes dancing, reading, writing, drawing, sound-making and theatrical design. The course weaves choreographic practice and group study in a variety of collaborative, experimental and performative configurations. Time in class will be devoted to combinations of lectures, workshops, exercises, readings, discussions, viewings, listening sessions and individual/group choreographic experiments.

The U.N. estimates that there are 281 international migrants in the world, a number that has grown precipitously over the past half century and shows little sign of dissipating. Over the same time period, anti-immigrant parties and leaders have sprung up across much of the world, with visions of national revitalization contingent upon militarized borders and mass deportations. How might we understand the complex and contradictory forces that give rise to such a reality?

Digital Realities: Rhino 8 and the Art of Making is an introductory course in Digital Fabrication using Computer-Aided Design (CAD) and Computer Numerically Controlled (CNC) equipment. This course will explore the use of 3D Printers, CNC Laser Cutters, and CNC Routers to create custom objects modeled in Rhino 8. The course will cover the necessary workflows and parameters used for each machine, as well as general maintenance, material management, and best practices. This course aims to build technical skills and consider aesthetics, functionality, and design concepts.

What does intimacy reveal about our social worlds? This seminar explores a range of recent methods in the study of intimacy, as well as what it means to make intimate knowledge claims. Through neighboring concepts in Anthropology, such as kinship, friendship and relatedness, as well as through intimacy’s imbrication with economy, sexuality, violence, and more-than-human worlds, this course considers the varied shapes that intimacy takes across distinct social worlds.

This course examines the history of immigration to the United States. How did this country become a “nation of immigrants”? How did immigration become so central to American national identity? What are this country’s purported ideals on the subject and has it ever lived up to them?  

In this course we will be taking a hands on approach to understanding the lever harp both historically and compositionally. We will be building and stringing small 19 string harps which will be used as the basis for our compositional work where students will be creating new works of varying length for the lever harp to be presented at the end of the semester. We’ll look at what techniques are and are not achievable, what makes this instrument unique to other harps, and how to include it in larger compositional contexts.

In this course, students will document the lived experiences of individuals during this immensely challenging period in American history. Students will receive training in the methods of oral history, interviewing techniques, historical ethics, and archival work. They will conduct interviews of classmates and community members. These narratives will then be preserved in order to provide future generations with a firsthand account of the United States during this period of history. 

This course is an introduction to the magic of copper plate Intaglio. We will explore various techniques to prepare our plates including hand working and acid etching with materials such as rosin resists and sugar lifts. By the end of term, we will be printing in color. Ultimately, the overall goal of our endeavors will be to begin a dialog about artistic production in a contemporary context while also exploring the unique history of the intaglio process.