Students
CUL 223 – Visual Countercultures: Graffiti, Kitsch and Conceptual Art
2015 – S2 Day
General Information
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| Unit convenor and teaching staff |
Unit convenor and teaching staff
Unit Convenor
Jillian Kramer
Tutor
Jillian Kramer
Tutor
David-Jack Fletcher
Jillian Kramer
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| Credit points |
Credit points
3
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| Prerequisites |
Prerequisites
15cp
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| Corequisites |
Corequisites
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| Co-badged status |
Co-badged status
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| Unit description |
Unit description
This unit introduces students to a range of theories that question traditional hierarchies of value and that enable a critical re-evaluation of the practices of everyday life. This unit theorises key topics such as: countercultures; oppositional cultures and post-subcultures; the politics of high versus popular and low culture; and counter-cultural practices in global and local contexts. The following practices, sites and objects are examined: graffiti, hip hop and crimes of style; graffiti and the cultural politics of public space; graffiti as a form of political activism and dissent; the relation between kitsch and high art; the politics of kitsch in the context of colonialism and Indigeneity; the cultural politics of tourist sites; gigantism and miniaturism; queer culture, camp and kitsch; and celebrity kitsch.
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Important Academic Dates
Information about important academic dates including deadlines for withdrawing from units are available at https://www.mq.edu.au/study/calendar-of-dates
Learning Outcomes
On successful completion of this unit, you will be able to:
- Demonstrate critical skills, informed by cultural theories, that will enable students to re-evaluate those practices of everyday life that are too often dismissed as worthless or ephemeral.
- Develop analytical skills that will enable students to examine and critique the presuppositions that constitute those hierarchies of value that classify, judge and position cultural objects and practices.
- Develop research skills that will enable students to present theorised, contextualised and informed accounts of key issues and problems in the context of subcultural and counter-visual practices.
- Demonstrate communication skills in order effectively and creatively to present research across different genres and cultural media.
- Employ cultural literacy skills that will educate students on the importance of issues of cultural difference and ethical relations across diverse social and political contexts.
General Assessment Information
There is no Turn-it-In for this unit.
Submit all Final Essays in the W6A assessment drop boxes. The Final Essay must be submitted before 5pm on Monday 9 November 2015.
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Bar-coded Arts Coversheet Written work must be submitted through the boxes in the foyer of W6A. Internal students must print and attach a completed coversheet to all submitted work. A personalised assignment coversheet is generated from the student section of the Faculty of Arts website at: http://www.arts.mq.edu.au/current_students/undergraduate/admin_central/coversheet. Please provide your student details and click the Get my assignment coversheet button to generate your personalised assignment cover sheet. No other coversheets will be provided by the Faculty. Return of marked work Marked work will be returned to students via tutorials or lectures. Residuals will be available for collection from the Arts Student Centre (W6A Foyer) after the exam period. |
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Extensions and Disruption to Studies |
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·Penalties for late submission of work: 10% a day will be deducted from the mark of a tutorial essay for everyday of lateness after the due date, unless the student supplies relevant documentation justifying late submission.
·NB: Final essays are in-lieu of examinations, therefore late essays will not be marked unless you have made a formal application for Disruption to Studies with supporting documentation.
·FINAL ESSAYS THAT ARE SUBMITTED AFTER THE DUE DATE WILL RECEIVE A MARK OF ZERO, AND THE STUDENT WILL FAIL THE UNIT UNLESS THEY APPLY FOR DISRUPTION TO STUDIES AND SUPPLY RELEVANT DOCUMENTATION JUSTIFYING THE LATE SUBMISSION.
Disruption to Studies Policy http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/disruption_studies/policy.html The
Disruption to Studies Policy is effective from March 3 2014 and replaces the Special Consideration Policy.
Extensions:
Penalties for late submission of work: 10% a day will be deducted from the mark of a tutorial essay for everyday of lateness after the due date, unless the student supplies relevant documentation justifying late submission.
Assessment Tasks
| Name | Weighting | Due |
|---|---|---|
| Class Test | 20% | Week 4 |
| Tutorial Presentation | 30% | On assigned tutorial week |
| Final Essay | 50% | Monday 9 November 2015 |
Class Test
Due: Week 4
Weighting: 20%
Students will be given an in class test that requires them to offer brief definitions of the key terms that organise the conceptual framework of the unit. The definitions of the key terms must be based on the readings and lectures of the opening weeks of the unit, specifically, the Michel de Certeau, Stuart Hall, Dick Hebdige, Jeff Ferrel, Greg Tate and bell hooks readings.
In their responses, students need to demonstrate a clear and effective grasp of such terms as 'tactics,' 'strategies,' 'crimes of style' and so on as discussed in the readings and lectures.
Marking Criteria:
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Clear grasp of key terms
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Lucid Expression
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Functional understanding of theoretical concepts
On successful completion you will be able to:
- Demonstrate critical skills, informed by cultural theories, that will enable students to re-evaluate those practices of everyday life that are too often dismissed as worthless or ephemeral.
- Develop analytical skills that will enable students to examine and critique the presuppositions that constitute those hierarchies of value that classify, judge and position cultural objects and practices.
- Employ cultural literacy skills that will educate students on the importance of issues of cultural difference and ethical relations across diverse social and political contexts.
Tutorial Presentation
Due: On assigned tutorial week
Weighting: 30%
Students are required to present an oral, multi-media tutorial paper based on a selected tutorial topic. Length: 20 minutes. Students will select a topic in the course of their first tutorial.
Please note that topics and time of presentation cannot be changed. A medical certificate will be required to reschedule the time of the presentation.
Base your tutorial presentation on the topic and readings of your selected week. Explain in your presentation the key concepts and issues outlined in the week's readings. Illustrate your presentation with examples (from media, films, videos, and so on). Pose questions to the class based on the issues and concepts you are addressing. Make sure you pose relevant questions to the class and that you generate discussion amongst the tutorial group. Generating class discussion related to the topic you present is a key aspect of your assessment for this task.
Your assessment will be based on the following criteria: clear and effective grasp of the key issues raised by the relevant readings; relevant evidence used to support and illustrate your arguments; posing of relevant questions to class; creative and innovative address of the topic; and effectively engaging the class in discussion of key issues.
Marking Criteria:
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Clear communication of issues and theoretical concepts
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Substantive evidencing and illustration of the topics discussed
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Engaged communication with the students in class via the posing of questions and generation of discussion on the topic in the course of the tutorial presentation
On successful completion you will be able to:
- Demonstrate critical skills, informed by cultural theories, that will enable students to re-evaluate those practices of everyday life that are too often dismissed as worthless or ephemeral.
- Develop analytical skills that will enable students to examine and critique the presuppositions that constitute those hierarchies of value that classify, judge and position cultural objects and practices.
- Develop research skills that will enable students to present theorised, contextualised and informed accounts of key issues and problems in the context of subcultural and counter-visual practices.
- Demonstrate communication skills in order effectively and creatively to present research across different genres and cultural media.
- Employ cultural literacy skills that will educate students on the importance of issues of cultural difference and ethical relations across diverse social and political contexts.
Final Essay
Due: Monday 9 November 2015
Weighting: 50%
Final Essay
Word Length: 3,000 words
Due Date: Monday 9 November by 5pm.
Essay Questions:
1. " 'Ways of operating' constitute the innumerable practices by means of which users reappropriate the space organised by techniques of social production.," Michel de Certeau. Discuss how particular subcultural practices, such as graffiti for example, illustrate de Certeau's thesis on "ways of operating," "arts of making" and "strategies" and "tactics."
2. Popular culture, Stuart Hall argues, is structured by the "double movement of containment and resistance." Discuss in relation to a particular cultural practice such as graffiti or the production/consumption of kitsch.
3. "Subcultures represent 'noise' (as opposed to sound): interference in the orderly sequence . . . a kind of temporary blockage in the system of representation," Dick Hebdige. Discuss in the context of a specific subcultural practice.
4. Dick Hebdige outlines two forms of incorporation of subcultures by a dominant culture: the commodity form and the ideological form. Discuss these two forms of incorporation in the context of an actual subcultural style, with reference to bell hooks' essay on "Eating the Other."
5. "Graffiti exists as a public art outside the control of public officials, an alternative style outside the circle of corporate style and consumption," Jeff Ferrell. Discuss.
6. Graffiti, as a subcultural practice, contests established legal notions of public space, private and corporate property and art practice. Discuss.
7. "Shouting on the wall' - animating the virtual self," Nancy Macdonald. How is graffiti about individual and/or group identity, about the construction of virtual selves in dialogue across urban spaces?
8. Gang graffiti is about regulation, respect, reputation and the signing of space into place in the face of systemic exclusion and disenfranchisement of particular racialised communities by the state. Discuss with reference to Susan Phillips' essay.
9. Discuss how graffiti is a “contentious form of political participation.” Evidence your arguments with relation to specific and culturally-situated examples of political graffiti.
10. Drawing on Pierre Bourdieu's work, discuss how both kitsch and art are in fact all about questions of taste and distinction and the consecration of the social order.
11. Discuss the importance of technologies of reproduction in relation to kitsch. In your answer, you need to discuss Benjamin's and Olalquiaga's work on the aura, the original and the reproduction, the tactility of kitsch, and the democratisation of the image.
12. The kitsch object/souvenir promises the consumer "pieces of the aura (mythic time)." Celeste Olalquiaga. Discuss Olalquiaga's concept of notalgic kitsch and melancholy kitsch.
13. Aboriginalist kitsch is enabled by white supremacism: it is an "assertion of rights of ownership in the intellectual and cultural sphere to match power in the political and economic sphere," B. Hodge and V. Mishra. Discuss.
14. "Indigenous tourist wares were threatening because they blurred the boundaries, they rendered the other unrecognisable," R. B. Phillips. Discuss in the context of indigenous tourist art.
15. "We are enveloped by the gigantic, surrounded by it, enclosed within its shadow. Whereas we know the miniature as a spatial whole or as temporal parts, we know the gigantic only partially. We move through the landscape; it does not move through us," Susan Stewart. Discuss gigantism and the miniature in the context of examples in the Australian landscape and kitsch culture.
16. Art cannot exist without kitsch. Discuss in the context of the work of Marcel Duchamp and Jeff Koons.
17. Kitsch and queer "are in a lascivious embrace. They constantly transmute," Craig Judd. Discuss.
18. Queer kitsch brings into focus a concept of the self as "performative, improvisational, discontinuous, and processually constituted by repetitive and stylised acts," Moe Myer. Discuss.
19. "Representational excess, heterogeneity, and gratuitousness of reference, in constituting a major raison d'etre of camp's fun and exclusiveness, both signal and contribute to an overall resistance to definition," Fabio Cleto. Discuss.
20. "The audience's connection with celebrities, celetoids and celeactors is dominated by imaginary relationships," Chris Rojek. Discuss how celebrity kitsch is one of the key products of this imaginary relationship.
21. Construct your own essay question, with reference to the topics and readings of the unit, in consultation with your tutor.
Marking Criteria:
*Articulation of clear and cogent arguments in relation to the essay topic
*Evidencing of arguments with relevant evidence
*Deployment of the critical and cultural theories in order to analyse the topic under discussion
*Evidence of critical and creative thinking in the analysis of the topic
FINAL ESSAYS THAT ARE SUBMITTED AFTER THE DUE DATE WILL RECEIVE A MARK OF ZERO, AND THE STUDENT WILL FAIL THE UNIT, UNLESS THEY SUPPLY RELEVANT DOCUMENTATION JUSTIFYING THE LATE SUBMISSION.
On successful completion you will be able to:
- Demonstrate critical skills, informed by cultural theories, that will enable students to re-evaluate those practices of everyday life that are too often dismissed as worthless or ephemeral.
- Develop analytical skills that will enable students to examine and critique the presuppositions that constitute those hierarchies of value that classify, judge and position cultural objects and practices.
- Develop research skills that will enable students to present theorised, contextualised and informed accounts of key issues and problems in the context of subcultural and counter-visual practices.
- Demonstrate communication skills in order effectively and creatively to present research across different genres and cultural media.
- Employ cultural literacy skills that will educate students on the importance of issues of cultural difference and ethical relations across diverse social and political contexts.
Delivery and Resources
Required Text: The CUL223 Reader is the required text for this unit. It has all the readings for the relevant tutorial topics
The Macquarie University printery will set up a unit link for students in this unit to order and pay for their required reader. This link will be posted on iLearn by the unit convenor as soon as it is available.
Unit Schedule
CUL223 COUNTERVISUAL CULTURES: GRAFFITI, KITSCH AND CONCEPTUAL ART 2015
LECTURE SCHEDULE
Week One: Introduction
Week Two: Graffiti: Crimes of Style
Week Three: The Cultural Politics of Graffiti and Public Space
Week Four: Graffiti as Contentious Form of Political Participation
Week Five: Kitsch, Bad Taste and Distinction
Week Six: Kitsch, Mechanical Reproduction and Modernity
Week Seven: The Politics of Kitsch: The House of Aboriginality and Indigenous Tourist Art
RECESS: 14 SEPTEMBER to 25 SEPTEMBER
Week 8: READING WEEK: 28 September to 2 October: There are NO CLASSES during Reading Week
Week Nine: Kitsch, Gigantism and Miniaturism
Week Ten: Kitsch/Art
Week Eleven: Queer as Kitsch
Week Twelve: Celebrity Trash
TURTORIAL and READING SCHEDULE
Week One: 31 July: Introduction
Michel de Certeau, “Introduction,” The Practice of Everyday Life. Trans. Steven Rendall. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1988.
Stuart Hall, “Notes on Deconstructing ‘the Popular’,” in John Storey (ed.), Cultural Theory and Popular Culture. Hempel Hemstead, UK: Harverster Wheatsheaf, 1994.
Dick Hebdige, “Subculture: The Unnatural Break,” Subculture: The Meaning of Style. New York: Routledge, 1987.
Week Two: 7 August: Graffiti: Crimes of Style
Jeff Ferrell, “Crimes of Style,” Crimes of Style. Boston: Northwestern University Press, 1996.
Greg Tate, “Nigs R Us, or How Blackfolk Became Fetish Objects,” in Greg Tate (ed.), Everything But the Burden. New York: Harlem Moon Broadway Books, 2003.
bell hooks, “Eating the Other: Desire and Resistance,” Black Looks. Boston: South End Press, 1992.
Remi Calzadaa and Henke Pijenburg, “The Hip-Hop Movement”and “An Interview of Bernard Stiegler by Elizabeth Caillet,” Graffiti Art. Paris: Musee National des Monument Fracais, 1991.
Week Three: 14 August: The Cultural Politics of Graffiti and Public Space
Nancy Macdonald, “Making a Difference,” The Graffiti Subculture. Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave, 2001.
Frances Butler, “Youth Art and Mobile Galleries,” Artlink 14.3 (Spring 1994).
Susan A. Phillips, “Bloods and Crips in the City of Angels” and “The Gang Manifesto,” Wallbangin’: Graffiti and Gangs in L.A. Chicago: Chicago University Press.
Week Four: 21 August: Graffiti as Contentious Form of Political Participation
Lisa K. Waldner and Betty A. Dobratz, “Graffiti as a Contentious Form of Political Participation,” Sociology Compass, 7.5 (2013): 377-389.
Julie Peteet, “The Writing on the Wall: The Graffiti of the Intafada,” Cultural Anthropology, 11.2 (1996) 139-159.
“Muslim Women and Graffiti: Taking Art, Politics and Gender to the Streets,” 30 May 2013,
Fair Soliman and Angie Balata, “Egyptian Women Fight for Equality with Graffiti,” 29 April 2013, http://observers.france24.com.
Nicholas Casey, “Graffiti is Redefining Public Spaces in Post-Revolutionary Cairo,” The Wall Street Journal, 26 May 2013, http://blog.wsj.com/middleeast/2013/05/26/graffiti-is-redefining-public-spaces-in-post-revolutionary-cairo.
“She’s Making Graffiti at the Most Dangerous Place on Earth,” Green Prophet, 19 February 2013, http://www.greenprophet.com/2013/02/fighting-the-taliban-with-paind-draft/.
Week Five: 28 August: Kitsch, Bad Taste and Distinction
Gillo Dorfles, “Kitsch” and “Conclusion” in Gillo Dorfles (ed.), Kitsch: The World of Bad Taste. New York: Universal Books, 1969
John Codd, “Making Distinctions,” in R. Harker, C. Mahar and C. Wilkes (eds.), An Introduction to the Work of Bourdieu. Basingstoke, UK: Macmillan, 1990.
Week Six: 4 September: Kitsch, Mechanical Reproduction and Modernity
Walter Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” Illuminations. Ed. Hannah Arendt. New York: Schoken Books, 1985.
Celeste Olalquiaga, “The Souvenir “ and “The Debris of the Aura,” The Artificial Kingdom. London: Bloomsbury, 1999.
Week Seven: 11 September: The Politics of Kitsch: The House of Aboriginality and Indigenous Tourist Art
Glenn R. Cooke, “Kitsch or Kind: Representations of Aborigines in Popular Art,” Artlink 15.4 (Summer 1995).
Vivien Johnson, “Introduction: Aboriginal Art in the Age of Reproductive Technologies,” Copyrites. Sydney: National Indigenous Arts Advocacy Association and Macquarie University, 1996.
Ruth B. Phillips, “Why Not Tourist Art? Significant Silences in Native American Museum Representations,” Gyan Prakash (ed.), After Colonialism. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995.
RECESS: 14 SEPTEMBER to 25 SEPTEMBER
Week 8: READING WEEK: 28 September to 2 October: There are
NO CLASSES during Reading Week
Week Nine: 9 October: Kitsch, Gigantism and Miniaturism
John Cross, “Kings of Kitsch: Big Things” and Paul Ryan, “Bigs R Us,” Artlink 15.4 (Summer 1995).
Susan Stewart, “The Gigantic,” On Longing. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 1999.
Stephanie Stockwell and Bethany Carlisle, “Big Things: Larrikinism, Low Art and the Land,” Journal of Media-Culture, 6.5.
Week Ten: 16 October: Kitsch/Art
John Caldwell, “Live Now,” and Brian Wallis, “We Don’t Need Another Hero: A Critical Reception of the Work of Jeff Koons,” in F. W. Simpson (ed.), Jeff Koons. San Francisco: San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, 1992.
David Joselit, “Investigating the Ordinary,” and Roberta Smith, “Rituals of Consumption,” Art in America (May 1988).
Week Eleven: 23 October: Queer as Kitsch
Fabio Cleto, “Introduction: Queering the Camp,” in F. Cleto (ed.), Camp: Queer Aesthetics and the Performing Subject. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1999.
Craig Judd, “Kitschville: The Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras,” Artlink 15.4 (Summer 1995).
Richard Dyer, “It’s Being so Camp as Keeps Us Going,” The Culture of Queers. London and New York: Routledge, 2002.Moe Myer, “Introduction,” The Politics and Poetics of Camp. New York: Routledge, 1994.
Week Twelve: 30 October: Celebrity Trash
Chris Rojek, “Celebrity and Celetoids,” Celebrity. London: Reaktion Books, 2001.
Policies and Procedures
Macquarie University policies and procedures are accessible from Policy Central. Students should be aware of the following policies in particular with regard to Learning and Teaching:
Academic Honesty Policy http://mq.edu.au/policy/docs/academic_honesty/policy.html
Assessment Policy http://mq.edu.au/policy/docs/assessment/policy.html
Grading Policy http://mq.edu.au/policy/docs/grading/policy.html
Grade Appeal Policy http://mq.edu.au/policy/docs/gradeappeal/policy.html
Grievance Management Policy http://mq.edu.au/policy/docs/grievance_management/policy.html
Disruption to Studies Policy http://www.mq.edu.au/policy/docs/disruption_studies/policy.html The Disruption to Studies Policy is effective from March 3 2014 and replaces the Special Consideration Policy.
In addition, a number of other policies can be found in the Learning and Teaching Category of Policy Central.
Student Code of Conduct
Macquarie University students have a responsibility to be familiar with the Student Code of Conduct: https://students.mq.edu.au/support/student_conduct/
Results
Results shown in iLearn, or released directly by your Unit Convenor, are not confirmed as they are subject to final approval by the University. Once approved, final results will be sent to your student email address and will be made available in eStudent. For more information visit ask.mq.edu.au.
Additional information
MMCCS Session Re-mark Application http://www.mq.edu.au/pubstatic/public/download/?id=167914
Information is correct at the time of publication
Student Support
Macquarie University provides a range of support services for students. For details, visit http://students.mq.edu.au/support/
Learning Skills
Learning Skills (mq.edu.au/learningskills) provides academic writing resources and study strategies to improve your marks and take control of your study.
Student Services and Support
Students with a disability are encouraged to contact the Disability Service who can provide appropriate help with any issues that arise during their studies.
Student Enquiries
For all student enquiries, visit Student Connect at ask.mq.edu.au
IT Help
For help with University computer systems and technology, visit http://informatics.mq.edu.au/help/.
When using the University's IT, you must adhere to the Acceptable Use Policy. The policy applies to all who connect to the MQ network including students.
Graduate Capabilities
Creative and Innovative
Our graduates will also be capable of creative thinking and of creating knowledge. They will be imaginative and open to experience and capable of innovation at work and in the community. We want them to be engaged in applying their critical, creative thinking.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Develop research skills that will enable students to present theorised, contextualised and informed accounts of key issues and problems in the context of subcultural and counter-visual practices.
- Demonstrate communication skills in order effectively and creatively to present research across different genres and cultural media.
Assessment tasks
- Tutorial Presentation
- Final Essay
Capable of Professional and Personal Judgement and Initiative
We want our graduates to have emotional intelligence and sound interpersonal skills and to demonstrate discernment and common sense in their professional and personal judgement. They will exercise initiative as needed. They will be capable of risk assessment, and be able to handle ambiguity and complexity, enabling them to be adaptable in diverse and changing environments.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Develop research skills that will enable students to present theorised, contextualised and informed accounts of key issues and problems in the context of subcultural and counter-visual practices.
- Employ cultural literacy skills that will educate students on the importance of issues of cultural difference and ethical relations across diverse social and political contexts.
Assessment tasks
- Tutorial Presentation
- Final Essay
Commitment to Continuous Learning
Our graduates will have enquiring minds and a literate curiosity which will lead them to pursue knowledge for its own sake. They will continue to pursue learning in their careers and as they participate in the world. They will be capable of reflecting on their experiences and relationships with others and the environment, learning from them, and growing - personally, professionally and socially.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcome
- Employ cultural literacy skills that will educate students on the importance of issues of cultural difference and ethical relations across diverse social and political contexts.
Assessment task
- Final Essay
Discipline Specific Knowledge and Skills
Our graduates will take with them the intellectual development, depth and breadth of knowledge, scholarly understanding, and specific subject content in their chosen fields to make them competent and confident in their subject or profession. They will be able to demonstrate, where relevant, professional technical competence and meet professional standards. They will be able to articulate the structure of knowledge of their discipline, be able to adapt discipline-specific knowledge to novel situations, and be able to contribute from their discipline to inter-disciplinary solutions to problems.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Demonstrate critical skills, informed by cultural theories, that will enable students to re-evaluate those practices of everyday life that are too often dismissed as worthless or ephemeral.
- Develop analytical skills that will enable students to examine and critique the presuppositions that constitute those hierarchies of value that classify, judge and position cultural objects and practices.
Assessment tasks
- Class Test
- Tutorial Presentation
- Final Essay
Critical, Analytical and Integrative Thinking
We want our graduates to be capable of reasoning, questioning and analysing, and to integrate and synthesise learning and knowledge from a range of sources and environments; to be able to critique constraints, assumptions and limitations; to be able to think independently and systemically in relation to scholarly activity, in the workplace, and in the world. We want them to have a level of scientific and information technology literacy.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Demonstrate critical skills, informed by cultural theories, that will enable students to re-evaluate those practices of everyday life that are too often dismissed as worthless or ephemeral.
- Develop analytical skills that will enable students to examine and critique the presuppositions that constitute those hierarchies of value that classify, judge and position cultural objects and practices.
Assessment tasks
- Class Test
- Tutorial Presentation
- Final Essay
Problem Solving and Research Capability
Our graduates should be capable of researching; of analysing, and interpreting and assessing data and information in various forms; of drawing connections across fields of knowledge; and they should be able to relate their knowledge to complex situations at work or in the world, in order to diagnose and solve problems. We want them to have the confidence to take the initiative in doing so, within an awareness of their own limitations.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Demonstrate critical skills, informed by cultural theories, that will enable students to re-evaluate those practices of everyday life that are too often dismissed as worthless or ephemeral.
- Develop analytical skills that will enable students to examine and critique the presuppositions that constitute those hierarchies of value that classify, judge and position cultural objects and practices.
- Develop research skills that will enable students to present theorised, contextualised and informed accounts of key issues and problems in the context of subcultural and counter-visual practices.
Assessment tasks
- Tutorial Presentation
- Final Essay
Effective Communication
We want to develop in our students the ability to communicate and convey their views in forms effective with different audiences. We want our graduates to take with them the capability to read, listen, question, gather and evaluate information resources in a variety of formats, assess, write clearly, speak effectively, and to use visual communication and communication technologies as appropriate.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcomes
- Develop research skills that will enable students to present theorised, contextualised and informed accounts of key issues and problems in the context of subcultural and counter-visual practices.
- Demonstrate communication skills in order effectively and creatively to present research across different genres and cultural media.
Assessment tasks
- Tutorial Presentation
- Final Essay
Engaged and Ethical Local and Global citizens
As local citizens our graduates will be aware of indigenous perspectives and of the nation's historical context. They will be engaged with the challenges of contemporary society and with knowledge and ideas. We want our graduates to have respect for diversity, to be open-minded, sensitive to others and inclusive, and to be open to other cultures and perspectives: they should have a level of cultural literacy. Our graduates should be aware of disadvantage and social justice, and be willing to participate to help create a wiser and better society.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcome
- Employ cultural literacy skills that will educate students on the importance of issues of cultural difference and ethical relations across diverse social and political contexts.
Assessment task
- Final Essay
Socially and Environmentally Active and Responsible
We want our graduates to be aware of and have respect for self and others; to be able to work with others as a leader and a team player; to have a sense of connectedness with others and country; and to have a sense of mutual obligation. Our graduates should be informed and active participants in moving society towards sustainability.
This graduate capability is supported by:
Learning outcome
- Employ cultural literacy skills that will educate students on the importance of issues of cultural difference and ethical relations across diverse social and political contexts.