In this hands-on course, students are introduced to the processes of theatrical/performance production. We will examine and take part in the collaborative nature of performance arts by executing projects from the Fall semester's Division III Theatre Seminar under the real constraints of time, materials, budgets, and acquired skills. Working under the leadership of Division III students, the class will design and realize the visual, physical, spatial, and aural components of the productions.

There are processes designers in the theatre must undertake to realize the physical world of a play. Within the performing arts, no single aspect of design exists in isolation and no designer should fly solo. Moving through a series of individual and group exercises, students will begin to develop their own process toward expressing the passion of a theatre work through their designs. Throughout the semester, students will develop a design vocabulary that allows for collaboration and interplay, while producing unified and coherent design work.

This course is a hands-on writing laboratory in which you create original theatrical work. The form can vary widely. You might write: choreopoems, naturalistic plays, plays inspired by oral history, or plays in forms that you invent. The course will help you develop an ear for the voices within you, help you shape them into characters and theatrical worlds, and foster a community of writers defined by generous listening.

A cranky is a storytelling device consisting of a box with two spindles and a hand-cranked illustrated scroll and accompanied by instrumental music, song or spoken word. Crankies arrived in the southern Appalachians with British immigrants beginning in the 1800s and served as entertainment as well as a means to record local, historical events. In this course, we will build crankies and create stories from folk ballads, original music, and songs that deal with contemporary issues.

This class investigates the line drawn (or is it painted?) between two studio art processes: painting and drawing. Where does one stop and the other begin? What does it look like to draw like a painter? Working with and on a variety of media, students will be introduced to new materials and techniques while expanding ideas behind their own art practice. Alongside in-class studio work, research, critique, and community are highly valued in this course. Materials provided for in-class work are paid for by the lab fee.

This is an intermediate-advanced creative writing course ideal for Division II and Division III students, particularly those with a passion for exploring transitions, both chosen and unchosen, as an engine for beautiful expressions of art. It will also appeal to those wanting to explore how movement is controlled, and who controls it. We will look at writers who embrace these themes in different contexts. For instance, in the context of those profiled for their race, religion, or sexual orientation.

This studio course introduces intermediate-level sculpture and studio art concentrators to mold making and casting processes. Students will be exposed to a range of cast sculpture, both historic and contemporary via books and slide lectures. Through assignments and independent work, students will explore the process of mold making and casting through a range of different materials including plaster, concrete, silicone rubber, and thermoplastics. Students will research historical and contemporary artists who utilize casting and present relevant work for class discussion.

This course examines how scholars in feminist, queer, and transgender studies theorize the politics of race, racialization, and white supremacy. Focusing primarily on the racial state in the United States, we will examine the ways race, gender, and sexuality emerged out of colonization, enslavement, incarceration, immigration, science, and the law. Students are expected to have some familiarity with theories and histories of race, gender, and sexuality. Students should also be prepared to engage a variety of written texts ranging from poetry and memoir to dense, difficult theoretical essays.

This course examines the fraught intersection of politics and popular culture in the US. In this class, we ask: What is pop culture? How does it differ from other cultural expressions? How does pop culture both challenge and reify white supremacist capitalist patriarchy? What and who get to be political? How does pop culture act as a vehicle for the appropriation or exploitation of Other cultures? Is consuming pop culture a form of political action? How do explicit political themes both enrich and detract from consumption? What economic imperatives drive pop culture production?