College of Fine Arts
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Department of Art and Art History
Department of Fine Arts
ARH 341L Chicano Art Histories and Futures
Department of Art and Art History
Please describe how students will engage in independent investigation and presentation of their own work through the course. Please explain specifically how your course engages students in the process of inquiry in your discipline.
Chicano art, especially that produced in Texas, is still an emerging field of academic inquiry due to the historical marginalization of Mexican Americans in the mainstream art world. In this course undergraduates design and execute an original research project employing the norms of art history and the broader humanities to begin to historicize this art movement and its key actors drawing on the unique resources of UT (Benson Library, Blanton Museum) and Central Texas. The process is divided into several steps—including exploratory investigation, topic selection, method and thesis development, primary and secondary research, thesis refinement, and presentation—in order to emphasize independent inquiry (and critical thinking) as a process of exploration and improvement rather than a preconceived finished product.
What kinds of projects, artifacts, presentations, or performances do your students produce as a result of engaging in this process of inquiry?
As part of their independent research project, students produce the following documents, which are building blocks of humanistic inquiry: proposal with hypothesis, annotated bibliography, formal presentation of findings, and an academic paper.
Please explain what independent work students will do in this course. If students are engaged in collaborative or team-based projects, explain how every student will exercise responsibility for and independence with some portion of the project.
Students produce the product independently, albeit in consultation with the instructor. Other students are encouraged to comment on the student’s presentation of findings, and the presenter is encouraged to address these comments in their final paper.
What pedagogical strategies do you use to prepare students to undertake the inquiry process in your course? If applicable, how does the work that students produce in this course build upon skills or knowledge they have developed in previous coursework?
As noted, students design and execute their research project in defined steps. Students in this course will have already begun to master some of art history’s basic methods—including formal/stylistic/iconographic analysis, comparative analysis, and historical contextualization—in previous (lower division) coursework. In this course they will be asked to decide, based on research questions, to synthesize (or not) these methods. Throughout the process they will be expected to use their intellectual judgment to decide which sources and methods best answer their questions. They are also introduced to the research methods of cultural studies and ethnic studies in this course.
Please specify what percentage of the students’ grade is based on the process of inquiry described above. Note that for a 3-hour course, at least one-third of the course grade must be based on the students’ independent investigation and presentation of their own work. (Students’ independent work must constitute one-half of the grade for 2-hour courses and all of the grade for 1-hour courses.)
The research project constitutes 50% of the course grade, broken down into various parts of the research process: The research project constitutes 50% of the course grade, broken down into various parts of the research process:
10% Research Paper Proposal
10% Annotated Bibliography
10% Paper Draft
10% Paper Peer Review
10% Paper Presentation
F A 369 The Entrepreneurial Artist
Department of Fine Arts
Please describe how students will engage in independent investigation and presentation of their own work through the course. Please explain specifically how your course engages students in the process of inquiry in your discipline.
In FA369, The Entrepreneurial Artist students take an experiential approach to learning effectual artist entrepreneurship. Effectual entrepreneurship is a decision-making strategy that focuses on a team’s resources and environment in the launching of a venture. In this class, each student launches his/her/their own arts-based business venture. By doing such work bit by bit, each student learns about opportunity recognition, customer/audience development, business planning, entrepreneurial finance, and other topics relevant to sustainable and self-directed careers in the arts. While the whole class functions as a learning cohort; project learning is performed independently.
What kinds of projects, artifacts, presentations, or performances do your students produce as a result of engaging in this process of inquiry?
All students completing the course take a phased approach to building a business plan – proposing a venture, testing it, and launching it. Weekly blog entries document each student’s progress towards the development of a new venture and synthesize readings, class discussions and activities. Weekly fieldwork presentations allow for students to share their progress as they roll out and test their product (art) in communities (among their consumers). The final reflection paper follows from a final presentation and accounts for the experience of independently launching their ventures.
Please explain what independent work students will do in this course. If students are engaged in collaborative or team-based projects, explain how every student will exercise responsibility for and independence with some portion of the project.
All students must independently identify and develop a new venture. By the end of the semester, after testing its viability, each student launches that venture. Identifying their audience (aka, “consumers” early), they test their product, organize findings, and synthesize feedback in product development. Regularly documenting their process and sharing the stages of development with class on a blog and through weekly presentations, they draw on each other’s and my feedback and insights as well those of their consumers. The final paper represents a culmination of the semester’s learning.
What pedagogical strategies do you use to prepare students to undertake the inquiry process in your course? If applicable, how does the work that students produce in this course build upon skills or knowledge they have developed in previous coursework?
Students will draw on readings in artist entrepreneurship theory and practice; they will also work modules on UDACITY, an online curriculum devoted to business learning, which they will adapt to arts-based ventures. This course is part of the undergraduate minor in arts management and administration; it is also a professional development course that allow them to focus closely on the outcomes made possible when business learning is applied to arts-based training expertise. As such, this course builds on and expands creative knowledge and capacity.
Please specify what percentage of the students’ grade is based on the process of inquiry described above. Note that for a 3-hour course, at least one-third of the course grade must be based on the students’ independent investigation and presentation of their own work. (Students’ independent work must constitute one-half of the grade for 2-hour courses and all of the grade for 1-hour courses.)
80% of the final grade is focused in Independent Inquiry (see syllabus). The breakdown for that 80% as follows. Weekly blog entry – 42%; weekly fieldwork presentations – 28%; final reflection paper – 10%. Each of these assignments focuses on independent new venture creation. The final 20% is participation.