Undergraduate Courses

This course examines the current developments in contemporary art over the past decade – the art of ‘now’ – from the viewpoint of an artist’s practice & working ideas, looking at current global art production in aesthetic, economic, & social contexts. The major movements in painting, photography, sculpture, installation & performance are examined. Readings will be drawn from first hand interviews & point-of-view accounts, reviews, & critique; a major emphasis on interviews & online studio visits will accompany the texts. Guest artist lectures & off-site museum & gallery viewings will complement the weekly visual presentations & theory conversations.
Liberal Arts Core/CORE Equivalent - satisfies the requirement for Expressive Cultures

Art: Practice and Ideas' examines key developments in the visual arts from modernity to the present. Focusing on the ways in which representations both create and reflect the values of a society, the course introduces students to the full range of expressive possibilities within the visual arts, covering painting and sculpture, as well as photography, film, video, conceptual art, and computer media. Topics to be covered include classical, modern, and postmodern relationships to politics, vision, the mind, the body, psychology, gender, difference, and technological innovation. Students will see and understand how artists have integrated perceptions of their historical moment, as well as physical and social space, into creative practices that have, in turn, had a significant impact on the culture of the time.
Liberal Arts Core/MAP Equivalent - satisfies the requirement for Expressive Cultures

Dance is an integral & defining component of cultures throughout the world & throughout history. This course introduces students to dance as a live & performing art through a variety of experiences including attendance at live performances, examination of videos & theoretical texts, & physical participation in the practice & performance of dance. Through discussions, written assignments, & the creation of original dance compositions, students will explore the history & cultural relevance of a variety of forms of dance within their own lives, larger society, & the global community beyond.
Liberal Arts Core/CORE-MAP Equivalent - satisfies the requirement for Expressive Cultures

Why do fashion designers and brands exert such influence in contemporary society? What explains the trajectory from The House of Worth to Chanel to this season’s hottest label? This course investigates the interlocking forces shaping fashion: the designer system, celebrities, technology, politics, the arts and media. Through lectures and film viewings, readings, discussions, and individual research, students explore fashion as a crucial aspect of culture and how the fashion system evolved from roots in Parisian couture to become a global phenomenon.
Liberal Arts Core/MAP Equivalent - satisfies the requirement for Expressive Cultures

This course studies an experience that is at the heart of the original idea of education: the experience of living a life as if one were journeying along a path. With the aid of works of literature and the arts. we will examine various feature of this experience and their philosophical implications. Liberal Arts Core/CORE-MAP Equivalent - satisfies the requirement for Expressive Cultures.

Designed to develop an understanding of the literary experiences as an encounter between reader and text, and of interpretative problems related to each of the major literary genres.

Music is universal to all human cultures. This course will explore fundamental concepts of the psychological, emotional, and cognitive effects of music and what factors in the human body and brain are involved in producing them, with particular emphasis on cross-cultural study. Students will learn beginning methods of computational feature extraction and machine learning to explore simple artificial intelligence models that build on and articulate the conceptual frameworks of music and cognition introduced in the initial phase of the class.

An introductory course in the reading of poetry, designed to help students improve their abilities to understand , analyze, enjoy, and exercise critical judgment.

This course introduces non-majors to theatre as a live and performing art through a variety of experiences including attendance at live performances, readings of play scripts, and theoretical texts, and the creation of original plays. Through lectures, discussions, and written assignments, students will explore the roles of the playwright, actor, director, and designer in the production process, as well as examines the role of the audience in the live performance.
Liberal Arts Core/CORE Equivalent - satisfies the requirement for Expressive Cultures