Renison University College Affiliated with the University of Waterloo 240 Westmount Road N, Waterloo, ON Canada N2L 3G4 Phone: 519-884-4404 | Fax: 519-884-5135 | uwaterloo.ca/Renison Renison University College Land Acknowledgement With gratitude, we acknowledge that Renison University College is located on the traditional territory of the Attawandaron (also known as Neutral), Anishinaabe, and ​ Haudenosaunee peoples, which is situated on the Haldimand Tract, the land promised to the Six Nations that includes ten kilometres on each side of the Grand River. Winter 2020 Course Code: SDS 240R ​ Course Title: Art & Society ​ Class Times/Location: Tuesdays, 2:30pm-5:20pm, REN 1918 Instructors: Farrah Miranda & Ryan Hayes ​ Office: REN 1623 ​ Office Hours: Tuesdays before or after class, by appointment ​ Email: [email protected]; [email protected] (TBC) ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Course Description Our course examines pressing social issues in Canada through art. Drawing on work by socially-engaged artists, we explore a range of ways of seeing and being in the world. Topics include indigeneity, migration, racism, incarceration, austerity, gender identity, queerness, and disability justice. We review both performances of power and resistance, culminating in a hands-on creative project focused on building communities of care. Pedagogy We will host a generative learning space where we can collectively: ● Create an exciting and supportive class for reciprocal learning ● Explore current issues and developments in art and politics in Canada ● Embrace artworks as powerful learning tools ● Connect to real-world opportunities for applied learning As instructors, we value the kind of critical education that recognizes the relations of power that shape history and the political, economic and cultural environments in which we live. We select readings, artworks, music and conversations by artists and thinkers situated within and beyond the academy. Course Objectives and Learning Outcomes Upon completion of this course, students should be able to: ● Demonstrate critical thinking by applying social theory, including decolonization, ​ ​ anti-racism, disability justice, queer theory and feminism, to our current context ● Demonstrate creative inquiry by exploring the role of art in society and art as a force ​ ​ for social change ● Produce a socially-engaged art project through a collaborative process of research, ​ ​ development and critique Required Text ● Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha (2018). Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice. ​ ​ Arsenal Pulp Press. Readings Available on LEARN All other readings will be available via the course LEARN page. The collaborative spirit of this class depends upon a high level of participation from students, which includes keeping up with the readings and engaging in our weekly discussions. Course Outline WEEK DATE TOPIC READINGS ASSIGNMENTS INTRODUCTION: WAYS OF SEEING, WAYS OF BEING 1 January 7 Ways of Seeing: Indigenous Simpson, Dunkin, & Settler Aesthetics Lampert 2 January 14 Frameworks for Holmes, Helguerra Socially-Engaged Art 3 January 21 Print Culture: Publications Benjamin, Schultz, and Public Actions Dailey BURNING ISSUES: PERFORMANCES OF POWER AND RESISTANCE 4 January 28 Enacting Sovereignty: From Taylor SHOW Indigenous Recognition to & TELL Decolonization (15%) Presentations continue Week 4-9 5 February 4 Undoing Colonial Borders, Melo, Razack PROJECT Citizenships and Illegalities PROPOSAL (10%) 6 February 11 Are Prisons Obsolete? Hoszko, Chak, MIranda 7 February 18 Reading Week 8 February 25 Against Erasure: Walcott & Abdillahi, Confronting Anti-Black Maynard Racism in Canada 9 March 3 Resisting Cuts to Life: Klein, Moeller Fighting Neoliberal Austerity 10 March 10 Blessed are the Trans: Ramirez, Thom PROJECT Building Alternatives with DRAFT Trans Communities (15%) MAKING CHANGE: CREATING COMMUNITIES OF CARE AND HEALING 11 March 17 Dreaming Disability Justice Piepzna-Samarasinha 12 March 24 Making Magic from the Ware, PROJECT Madness Piepzna-Samarasinha PRESENTATION (15%) 13 March 31 Change the Culture, Change Ware, Rodriguez ARTIST’S the World STATEMENT (20%) Course Readings Schedule 1) INTRODUCTION: WAYS OF SEEING, WAYS OF BEING WEEK 1: Ways of Seeing: Indigenous & Settler Aesthetics ● Leanne Betasamosake Simpson (2017). “how to steal a canoe” in This Accident of ​ ​ ​ Being Lost. House of Anansi Press. P69-70 ​ ● Jessica Dunkin (2018). “Canoe” in Symbols of Canada. Between the Lines. P18-29 ​ ​ ​ ​ ● Nicolas Lampert (2013). “Parallel Paths on the Same River” in A People’s Art History ​ ​ ​ of the United States. The New Press. P1-10 ​ WEEK 2: Frameworks for Socially-Engaged Art ● Brian Holmes (2012). “Eventwork: The Fourfold Matrix of Social Movements” in ​ ​ Living as Form: Socially Engaged Art from 1991-2011. P72-85 ​ ● Pablo Helguera (2011). Education for Socially Engaged Art: A Materials and ​ Techniques Handbook. P1-25 ​ WEEK 3: Print Culture: Publications and Public Actions ● Walter Benjamin (1934: 1970). “The Author as Producer” in New Left Review 62. P3 ​ ​ ​ ​ ● Heath Schultz (2018). “On Pamphlets and Class Struggle: Notes on the Communist ​ Manifesto, Part 1” in Counter-Signals 3. P6-15 ​ ​ ​ ● Courtney Dailey, Onya Hogan-Finlay, and Leila Pourtavaf (2014). The Bookmobile ​ Book. Self-published by the BOOKMOBILE Collective. P7-9 & P21-37 ​ 2) BURNING ISSUES: PERFORMANCES OF POWER AND RESISTANCE WEEK 4: Enacting Sovereignty: From Indigenous Recognition to Decolonization ● Diana Taylor (2003). “Acts of Transfer” in The Archive and the Repertoire: ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Performing Cultural Memory in the Americas. Duke University Press. P1-51 ​ WEEK 5: Undoing Colonial Borders, Citizenships and Illegalities ● Carla Melo (2015). “Are We All In the Same Boat: Staging the “Invisible Majority” In ​ the Streets of Toronto” in Canadian Theatre Review, vol 161. University of Toronto ​ ​ ​ Press. P33-37 ● Sherene Razack (2002). “When Place Becomes Race” in Race, Space and the Law: ​ ​ ​ Unmapping a White Settler Society. P1-20 ​ WEEK 6: Are Prisons Obsolete? ● Sheena Hoszko (2016). “Of Birds, Ointments, and Care: How Peter Collins’ Artworks ​ Kept Him in Prison” in MICE Magazine 2 (Healing Justice). ​ ​ ​ ● Tings Chak (2017). Undocumented: The Architecture of Migrant Detention. Ad Astra ​ ​ Comix. P165-182 ● Farrah Miranda (2016). “Convergences in Art, Architecture and Migrant Justice ​ Activism: On Tings Chak’s Habitable Space” in VOZ-À-VOZ. E-fagia organization. ​ ​ ​ WEEK 7: Reading Week [No Class] WEEK 8: Against Erasure: Confronting Anti-Black Racism in Canada ● Rinaldo Walcott and Idil Abdillahi (2019). “After Black Lives Matter: Black Death, ​ Capitalism and Unfreedom” in BlackLife: Post-BLM and the Struggle for Freedom. ​ ​ ​ Arbeiter Ring. P71-86 ● Robyn Maynard (2017). “From ‘Woke’ to Free: Imagining Black Futures” in Policing ​ ​ ​ Black Lives: State Violence in Canada from Slavery to the Present. Fernwood ​ Publishing. P229-234 WEEK 9: Resisting Cuts to Life: Fighting Neoliberal Austerity ● Naomi Klein (2007). “Blank Is Beautiful: Three Decades of Erasing and Remaking the ​ World” in The shock doctrine: The rise of disaster capitalism. New York: Metropolitan ​ ​ ​ Books/Henry Holt. P3-21 ● Robert Moeller (2014). “Social Practice for Domestic Workers” in Hyperallergic. ​ ​ ​ ​ WEEK 10: Blessed are the Trans: Building Alternatives with Trans Communities ● Kai Cheng Tom (2017). “Your Grief is my Grave” in Rebellious Mourning. AK Press. ​ ​ ​ ​ P75-86 ● Aemilius Ramirez (2018). “Speaking Our Truths, Building Our Futures: Arts-Based ​ Organizing in 2SQTBIPOC Communities in Toronto” in Marvellous Grounds: Queer of ​ ​ Colour Histories of Toronto. Between the Lines. P71-82 ​ 3) MAKING CHANGE: CREATING COMMUNITIES OF CARE AND HEALING WEEK 11: Dreaming Disability Justice ● Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha (2018). “Writing (with) a Movement from Bed” in ​ ​ Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice. Arsenal Pulp Press. P15-29 ​ ● Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha (2018).“Toronto Crip City: A Not So Brief, ​ Incomplete Personal History of Some Moments in Time, 1997-2015” in Care Work: ​ ​ Dreaming Disability Justice. Arsenal Pulp Press. P79-96 ​ WEEK 12: Making Magic from the Madness ● Syrus Marcus Ware (2016). "Magic from the Madness: On Black Disabled Artists and ​ Activists Making Change" published online by CBC Arts. ​ ​ ​ ​ ● Syrus Marcus Ware (2019). “How to fight activist burnout” in NOW Magazine (August ​ ​ ​ ​ 7). ● Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha (2018).“Cripping the Apocalypse: Some of My ​ Wild Disability Justice Dreams” in Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice. Arsenal ​ ​ ​ Pulp Press. P122-135 WEEK 13: Change the Culture, Change the World ● Syrus Marcus Ware (2017). “On Writing: 2025: Light Black Years From Now” in C ​ ​ ​ ​ ​ Magazine 132. ​ ​ ● Favianna Rodriguez (2013). “Change the Culture, Change the World”. Creative Time ​ ​ ​ Reports. Course Requirements and Assessment ASSIGNMENTS DUE DATE VALUE 1) PARTICIPATION ALL 10% 2) STRUCTURED CRITICISMS ALL 15% - 5 Reflections (minimum), completed in-class 3) SHOW & TELL PRESENTATION - Brief Presentation WEEKS 4-9 15% 4) CREATIVE PRINT PROJECT Collaborative - Proposal (750 words) WEEK 5 10% - Draft (16-24 page zine) WEEK 10 15% - Final Presentation (10 minutes) WEEK 12-13 15% Individual - Artist Statement (750 words) WEEK 13 20% 1) PARTICIPATION – 10% We all live busy lives and have many competing demands on our time. However, in order to make the most of our time together we expect each student to make their best effort to show up to class and