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Common Course Outline

Course discipline/number/title HUM 1200: Artistic Responses to Social Issues

Catalog Description

Credits 3
Hours/Week 3
Prerequisites (Course discipline/number) None
Other requirements College level reading and writing is recommended
MnTC Goals (if any) Goal 6/The Humanities, the Arts, Goal 7a/Human Diversity, Goal 7b/Race

Course Description

This course is designed to help increase an understanding of how Fine Arts (which may include creative writing, and the performing and visual arts) reflect and can impact current events relating to human rights, diversity, anti-racism and intersectionality, and other social issues. Students will drive the focus of the course through their research and group collaboration. Students will research historical and contemporary issues as a foundation to working together to develop arts-based group and/or individual projects as statements to encourage societal awareness, impact, and reconciliation.

Date Last Revised (Month, year)

April, 2024

Outline of Major Content Areas

  1. Art works that address diversity, anti-racism, bigotry, and social issues
  2. Research and theories of Fine Arts
  3. Exploration of collaborative processes
  4. Production and project building

Learning Outcomes (General)

The student will be able to:

  1. Examine contributions to the arts by creators who have experienced racial oppression as it intersects with gender, class, sexuality, disability, and other social identities.
  2. Explore the diversity and impact of social issues on the arts in historical and contemporary society.
  3. Apply personal and group ethical and equity standards for how the arts are used to reflect human rights and responsibility, and social activism.
  4. Produce works that address contemporary issues (social activism, citizenship, anti-racism, human rights etc.) using collaborative arts-based techniques.
  5. Articulate an informed personal reaction to works of art through the lens of contemporary social activism, equity, anti-racism, and diversity.

Learning Outcomes (MnTC)

Goal 6/The Humanities, the Arts

The student will be able to:

  1. Demonstrate awareness of the scope and variety of works in the arts and humanities.
  2. Understand those works as expressions of individual and human values within a historical and social context.
  3. Articulate an informed personal reaction to works in the arts and humanities.
Goal 7b/Race

The student will be able to:

  1. Examine significant challenges of and contributions by people in the United States who have experienced racism and other forms of oppression such as sexism, classism, ableism, heterosexism, transphobia, antisemitism, and Islamophobia.
  2. Identify communication and relational skills necessary for living and working effectively in a racially, culturally, ethnically and linguistically stratified society with historic and ongoing practices and structures of exclusion.
  3. Identify socially just and anti-racist practices that increase equitable outcomes and inclusion in the United States.

Methods for Evaluation of Student Learning

Methods may include but are not limited to:

RCTC Core Outcome(s)

This course contributes to meeting the following RCTC Core Outcome(s):

Critical Thinking
Students will think systematically and explore information thoroughly before accepting or formulating a position or conclusion.

Special Information (if any)

None