Curriculum

The MA in Human Rights & the Arts program is a dynamic full-time curriculum comprised of 42 credit hours (11 three-credit courses & a two-semester thesis project sequence).

The program is designed for full time students to complete the degree in two years.

Students have considerable flexibility in designing their program in order to meet their academic and professional goals and interests. To complete the program, students must meet the following requirements:

  1. Completion of five core courses (15 credits)
    • HRA 501 – The Politics of Interactive Art
    • HRA 502 – Oral History, Archives, and Ethnography: Methods of Inquiry
    • HRA 503 – Critical Perspectives on Human Rights
    • HRA 504 – Who Is the Audience? Collaborations and Community-based Art
    • HRA 601 – Human Rights and the Arts Survey
  2. Completion of six elective courses (18 credits)
    • At least two electives should be offered through the Center for Human Rights and the Arts.
    • At least one elective should be a practice-based or studio art course.
    • No more than one elective course requirement may be satisfied by means of an independent directed study with a core or affiliated faculty member of the Center for Human Rights and the Arts.
  3. Completion of two-semester thesis sequence courses (9 credits)
    • Students must enroll in and pass both HRA 698 – Thesis 1 and HRA 699 — Thesis 2 during the third and fourth semesters, respectively.
    • These two courses provide the general framework for progress toward the required thesis project (see below), each with their own specific components to ensure steady progress toward thesis project completion.
  4. Submission of Thesis Project
    • Students have the choice between writing a research-based academic MA thesis or creating a research-based artistic installation/performance/film.
    • Both options will be supervised by a thesis advisor and evaluated by a faculty committee in conformity with Bard College guidelines for graduate degrees.

Sample of Recent Elective Courses:

  • HRA 521: Evidence in Human Rights
  • HRA 522: Food, Labor and Human Rights
  • HRA 523: History of Human Rights
  • HRA 524: The Crisis of Global Order
  • HRA 531: Structuralism/Poststructuralism
  • HRA 532: Transnational Feminism
  • HRA 533: Queer of Color Theory
  • HRA 534: Indigenous Methodologies for Arts Research
  • HRA 535: Race and Real Estate
  • HRA 537: Global Indigenism
  • HRA 541: Filmmaking — Chronicle of a Season
  • HRA 542: Photography & Human Rights
  • HRA 543: Decentering Photography: Human Rights Strategies for Unsettling
  • HRA 544: Documenting Voter Suppression and Exclusion
  • HRA 545: Observation and Description
  • HRA 546: Photography for Non-Majors
  • HRA 547: Writing About Images
  • HRA 562: Latin America: Race, Religion, and Revolution
  • HRA 571: Contagiousness, Vulnerable Environments: Architecture as Research
  • HRA 572: Modernism and Fascism: Cultural Heritage and Memory
  • HRA 573: Exhibiting (Im)mobility: Art, Museums, Migration
  • HRA 574: Solidarity As Worldmaking
  • HRA 575: The Middle Sea: Mediterranean Encounters in Italy
  • HRA 576: Global Artists’ Networks and Associations
  • HRA 582: Environmental Justice: Art, Science, and Radical Cartography
  • HRA 583: Reproductive Health and Human Rights
  • HRA 592: Music and Rights
  • HRA 593: Digital Theaters
  • HRA 594: Illness and Performance
  • HRA 595: Great Political Essays
  • HRA 596: Writing and Resistance
  • HRA 597: Topics in Sound Art
  • HRA 599: Theater & Democracy
  • HRA 602: Mapping Global Foodscapes
  • HRA 603: Below the Threshold of Detectability: Aesthetic & Methodological Alternatives to Lacking Information
  • HRA 604: The Great Divide: Human vs. Nature in the Question for Human Rights
  • HRA 605: The Clash of Images and Human Rights Advocacy
  • HRA 606: Arts of Violent Pasts and Presents
  • HRA 607: Subjectivity, Experimentation, and Rebellion through Film
  • HRA 608: Scales of Time in Contemporary Art and Visual Culture
  • HRA 609: Global Cinemas of Migration
  • HRA 610: Ecotone: How to Curate A Landscape?
  • HRA 611: Documentary Arts: Practices of Fact and Fiction, History and Politics
  • HRA 612: Water-Bodies: Confluences, Deltas, Gulfs

 

The director of the MA program will serve as the general academic advisor for all enrolled students. Each student will formally identify their intended thesis project supervisor by no later than April 1 of their first year, and their thesis committee by no later than December 1 of their second year.

For additional information about program requirements, please contact the MA in Human Rights & the Arts program at [email protected].