Chun-Shan (Sandie) Yi

This course will explore madness and its construction as a site of pathology and deviance in our current society as well as important challenges to this construction. Utilizing an intersectional and interdisciplinary disability studies and mad studies critical lens this course will address how madness is constructed in relation to colonialist, white supremacist, capitalist, and patriarchal notions of rationality, linearity, and unity.

Readings will cover foundational texts in the anti-psychiatry movement as well as crucial texts to the development of mad studies. Many texts specifically address the relationship between race and madness. Artistic representations, as well as film and television representations will be utilized regularly.

Course work will consist of weekly reading responses, short presentations, one 2-3 page analysis paper, and a final creative project that includes a 5 page analysis paper

What is disability? How do we see, read, hear, smell and feel about disability? How does society represent disability and illness? How do artists theoretically and conceptually engage disability in their own practices? This course offers students critical thinking tools to examine the meanings of disability created by current social, cultural, economic and political systems. Over the course of the semester, students develop artistic vocabulary in relation to visual and cultural representations of disability found in mainstream society and in Disability Culture/Disability Art contexts.

Readings include the following topics: disability frameworks, disability as intersectional identity, and representations in art, media, fashion, and design . Students learn about the range and complexity of disability representations through the works of contemporary artists such as Riva Lehrer, Laura Swanson, and Christine Sun Kim, and through the work of dance and performance art groups. Students also read the work of disability scholars including Carrie Sandahl, Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, Eli Clare, Alison Kafer, and Petra Kuppers.

Coursework includes bi-weekly writing responses, a disability culture event paper, a media report, and a final art and writing project.

What is disability? How do we see, read, hear, smell and feel about disability? How does society represent disability and illness? How do artists theoretically and conceptually engage disability in their own practices? This course offers students critical thinking tools to examine the meanings of disability created by current social, cultural, economic and political systems. Over the course of the semester, students develop artistic vocabulary in relation to visual and cultural representations of disability found in mainstream society and in Disability Culture/Disability Art contexts.

Readings include the following topics: disability frameworks, disability as intersectional identity, and representations in art, media, fashion, and design . Students learn about the range and complexity of disability representations through the works of contemporary artists such as Riva Lehrer, Laura Swanson, and Christine Sun Kim, and through the work of dance and performance art groups. Students also read the work of disability scholars including Carrie Sandahl, Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, Eli Clare, Alison Kafer, and Petra Kuppers.

Coursework includes bi-weekly writing responses, a disability culture event paper, a media report, and a final art and writing project.

This course focuses on the intersecting ways artists engage people individually and collectively through the arts, including activism, education, therapy and social practice. Students will partner with galleries and organizations to realize a collectively developed project. Throughout the course close attention will be given to critical practices and methods, the ethics or working with community participants, self-reflexivity, the nature of professionalism within arts contexts, and the goals and impacts of art made with a participating public.

This experiential class is designed for artists who wish to develop a studio practice with a focus on the deviant bodymind histories and the representation of disability/illness narratives. Including perspectives both inside and outside of an artistic, therapeutic, and/or medical context. Students will learn to integrate disability aesthetics (Sieber, 2010), critical 'knowing-making' (Hamraie, 2017), crip technoscience (Hammraie and Fritsch, 2019), Crip Couture (Yi, 2020) and other disability art and design concepts and practices in their work. Students who are interested in the following area of practice/discipline might benefit from taking this course: art therapy and counseling, design object, fashion design, visual critical studies and fiber and materials studies.
Artists/designers/theorists that may be referenced in the course include Panteha Abareshi, Kristina Veasey, Laura Splan, Rebecca Horn, Harriet Sanderson, Sins Invalid, Daniel Moraes, Lisa Bufano, Aimi Hamraie, Kelly Fritsch, Tobin Siebers.
Students will create artworks that serve as an 'extension' of their bodymind state. 'Extensions' can include but are not limited to body adornments; wearable designs; physical, emotional or psychological aids; relational/interactive performances. Students will explore and choose media that reflect the wearer's (and or participant's) haptic memories and experiences of deviancy. Light reading, lectures, class discussions, gallery visits and visiting artist's talk will provide inspiration for students to develop their project.