For Students: Current Courses

ANTHH261B01 — Memory, History, Anthropology

The social aspects of memory. Collective representations and memorial genres. Institutional memory and the effects of institutions on individual memory. Memory in oral and literate societies. Memory as a political act and a tool of political legitimacy. Mourning and trauma. Role of narrative in memory and the relationship between non-narrative forms and memory. How memory relates to the present and to the past. The course will examine a number of influential theoretical texts on memory and look at selected case studies.

Prerequisites: One 100-level course in Anth, Pols, Socl, or Hist.
Contact: zsaleh@haverford.edu.
Sponsored By: the Department of Anthropology and the John B. Hurford '60 Center for the Arts and Humanities

ARTSH253B01 — The Theory and Practice of Conceptual Art

In this course, the specific mid-20th C movement called Conceptual Art will be explored, as will its progenitors and its progeny. Students will study the founding manifestos, the canonical works and their critical appraisals, as well as develop tightly structured studio practica to embody the former research. The course invites artists, writers, activists, & cultural thinkers, those who want to know what it is to make things, spaces, situations, communities, allies, & trouble–without necessarily knowing how to draw, paint, sculpt, photograph, videotape, or film.

Contact: jmuse@haverford.edu
Sponsored By: the Department of Fine Arts, Independent College Programs and John B. Hurford '60 Center for the Arts and Humanities

RELGH325B01 — Religion, Emotion, and Global Cinema

Are emotions the raw materials of religion? Do our emotions & our modalities of being religious change across cultures or in history? How has globalization transformed the way religion feels to us, and can we see this transformation expressed in globalized images? This course examines theoretical work on religion and emotion to illuminate these questions, taking global cinema--films produced in the global age that image the interconnectivity of religious bodies--as a case study.

Prerequisites: Sophomore standing or permission of instructor.
Contact: dschaefe@haverford.edu
Sponsored By: the Department of Religion and the John B. Hurford '60 Center for the Arts and Humanities

ICPRH343B01 — Advanced Documentary Production

Explores the craft of documentary filmmaking beyond the basics. Students will produce fully-developed short digital video documentaries. They will hone their camera and editing skills and will learn basic producer's skills, including proposal writing, legal frameworks, fundraising, and distribution trends. Attendance at weekly Thursday evening documentary screenings is required.

Prerequisites: One introductory video production class or equivalent experience. (Students should enter the class having basic competency with video cameras and Final Cut Pro editing software.)
Contact: vfunari@haverford.edu
Sponsored By: Independent College Programs and the John B. Hurford '60 Center for the Arts and Humanities

ANTHH316A01 — Gender & Sexuality in the Middle East

The purpose of this course is to provide a critical and nuanced understanding of issues related to questions of gender and sexuality in the Muslim Middle East. The course approaches Islam historically and contextually by focusing on various issues, such as veiling, modernity, colonialism, feminism, Islamism, reform, sexuality, and nationalism. Some of the authors assigned are Leila Ahmed, Lara Deeb, Afsaneh Najmabadi, Beth Baron.

Prerequisites: ANTH 103, one course in Islam or the Middle East, any course in GSS, or consent of the instructor.
Contact: zsaleh@haverford.edu
Sponsored By: the Department of Anthropology, the Gender & Sexuality Studies Program, the Middle East and Islamic Studies Concentration, and the John B. Hurford '60 Center for the Arts and Humanities

ICPRH242A01 & COMLH242A01 — Introduction to Visual Studies

This course will introduce students to the trans-disciplinary field of Visual Studies. This field not only concerns itself with traditional visual media and artifacts such as those already taken seriously by art historians and film theorists, i.e., painting, sculpture, photography, film, video, etc.—Visual Studies also seeks to examine images of all kinds, their systems of transmission, their points of consumption, and the very limits of visuality itself. E.g., these limits require an investigation of "blindness" as both trope and physical disability, the presumptions that privilege some senses over others and bother counting them at all, and the ambivalent denigrations that relate showing to telling: looks can be deceiving, but even a thousand words don’t measure up to a single picture. The course will ask both "what is there to see?" and "what is it to see?" and will take these questions to the humanities, the social sciences, and the natural sciences.
Contact: jmuse@haverford.edu
Sponsored By: the John B. Hurford '60 Center for the Arts and Humanities

RELGH210A01 — Religion, Sex, and Power

NEW COURSE.
This class will examine the intersection of religion, sex, and power, with a focus on contemporary American culture and politics. How do theoretical approaches to power apply to religion and sex, gender and sexuality? Why are issues surrounding sex so fascinating to those in positions of religious authority and religious resistance? How do emotions mediate power relations at the crossing between religion and sex.

Prerequisites: Sophomore standing or permission of instructor.
Contact: dschaefe@haverford.edu
Sponsored By: the Department of Religion and the
John B. Hurford '60 Center for the Arts and Humanities