Engaged Citizenship: media, performance and activism

Course goals

After completing this course students are able to:

1. Demonstrate broad knowledge on engaged citizenship, social movements, and activism.
2. Synthesize concepts from diverse disciplinary backgrounds (anthropology, decoloniality, citizenship studies, media and performance studies) and apply them in classroom discussions and in academic writing.
3. Apply theories on activism for the staging of three micro-actions which will be mediated, performative, or both.
4. Practice positionality and listening to other perspectives in classroom conversations and in writing.

 

Description of assignment	Weight	Assesses which learning goals
1) Attendance and in-class participation	10%	4
2) Homework and preparation for class	10%	1, 2, 3 & 4
2) Micro-action 1	25%	3 & 4
3) Micro-action 2	25%	3 & 4
5) Term paper	30%	1, 2, 3 & 4

 

Content

"The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any." — Alice Walker


Engaged citizenship requires active participation in shaping society. It suggests that being a responsible member of a community isn't just about enjoying rights but also about taking action to uphold justice, equality, and democracy. Activism is a fundamental aspect of democratic citizen participation. But what does it mean to be an activist? And how can individuals and communities drive meaningful social and political change? And how do media, visuality, art and performance shape and give meaning to social movements?

This course explores the intersections of engaged citizenship, activism, media, and performance.

First, we will discuss overlaps and differences between Western concepts of citizenship (based on the notion of the ‘nation-state’) and non-Western conceptions of citizenship (e.g. planetary citizenship, indigenous and decolonial conceptions). We will also discuss different forms, goals, strategies, and repertoires of activism (e.g. rallies, sit-ins, community activism) and learn about activist practices by discussing concrete examples. These case studies will be grounded in a theoretical framework that draws from anthropology, politics, citizenship, and decolonial studies.

In the second part we will analyze how visual and digital media (e.g. posters, stickers, zines, video projections, meme activism, citizen journalism) can be used to express political solidarity, raise awareness, or mobilize citizens into collective agency and thereby serve as powerful tools for political and social change. In this part, students will also start applying theories and probing relevant concepts through creative, experiential learning: we will produce our first micro-action – a small-scale form of creative activism –  using media tools.

In the third part we will study embodied forms of activism (e.g. protests, occupations, interventions, rallies) that use artistic means to make their point. We will focus on how basic performance practices (e.g. using costume, character, voice, gestures, sensory awareness, attention strategies) and the immediacy of lived bodily sensations, perceptions and behaviours can be employed for both organizing and enacting embodied activism in public space. In this part, students will continue to apply theories and to probe relevant concepts through creative and experiential learning: they will make their second micro-action using embodied performance practices.


This course may be of special interest to students pursuing Media Studies, Performance Studies, Anthropology, or Political Science.