course: community projects in the arts and humanities
rojects list


Community Projects In the Arts and Humanities was a university-wide course that I developed and taught at the University of Michigan in 2000-2005, at the time I directed the Arts of Citizenship Program. It was a two-legged class, combining a seminar on public culture with a practicum in which student teams worked on cultural projects with community partners. It was, in effect, the curricular platform for student participation in the work of Arts of Citizenship.

I have taught other community-based classes that focused on a single project or type of partnership.  By contrast, Community Projects In the Arts and Humanities was multidisciplinary, with projects that spanned a range of public culture-making.  I taught it recurrently, and students were allowed to take it repeatedly.  Sometimes student teams undertook stand-alone, semester-long projects; other teams advanced 'chapters' of ongoing, long-term partnerships.

The lists below give the projects on which student teams worked each semester.  Note that the names of community projects sometimes changed as the projects themselves evolved.  Here I use project titles as they appear in the Past Projects page, not necessarily the original names in the course syllabi.  I embed links where this website includes further materials on projects.

You can read syllabi for several semesters of Community Projects In the Arts and Humanities here: 2000, 2001, 2005.  Visit the Past Projects page for an overview of all the project partnerships in which I had a significant role.

 

Fall Term, 2000

Students On Site
Environmental Legacies
Poetry of Everyday Life
Underground Railroad in Michigan
Mosaic Youth Theatre Projects: "2001 Hastings Street"
Homelands
Michigan Radio Partnerships: "Coming of Age During the Riot Years"

Winter Term, 2002

Students On Site
Environmental Legacies
Homelands
"Hallelujah Project"