Karintha Lowe

This small seminar will provide students with the opportunity to engage in community-based work at the Hudson River Museum. Much of our course work will be held on-site at the Hudson River Museum, where we’ll work together on a series of curatorial and public programming projects related to the Community and Partnerships Gallery. Students should have previous experience working in an arts or nonprofit setting, as much of our course work will be directly aimed at engaging the local community with the Hudson River Museum’s exhibitions, collections, and events. Ultimately, students will gain firsthand experience working in the fields of curation and community engagement, as well as in events planning.

This course will introduce students to the major themes and methods of Asian American cultural studies. Each week, we will revisit a key “site” of Asian American history—the sugarcane plantation, the shoreline, the railroad, the internment camp, and the protest—and explore how Asians in America have differently documented themselves in relation to those spaces through art and literature. We will ask questions, including: How might a poem, photograph, or film differently represent the experience of migration? What common images emerge in the literature and art surrounding a particular historical event? What power or authority does the “documentary” hold in relaying the lived experiences of Asians in America? In answering these questions, course discussions will center on themes of memory, testimony, identity, and the power of representation. The course will also include field trips to area collections in documentary photography and filmmaking. Other assignments will include visual and literary analysis essays and creative-writing responses, as well as a curatorial project where students will have the opportunity to research Asian American documentarians and pitch artworks for exhibition at the Hudson River Museum.

This course will introduce students to the major themes and methods of Asian American cultural studies. Each week, we will revisit a key “site” of Asian American history—the sugarcane plantation, the shoreline, the railroad, the internment camp, and the protest—and explore how Asians in America have differently documented themselves in relation to these spaces through art and literature. We will ask questions, including: How might a poem, photograph, or film differently represent the experience of migration? What common images emerge in the literature and art surrounding a particular historical event? What power or authority does the “documentary” hold in relaying the lived experiences of Asians in America? In answering these questions, course discussions will center on themes of memory, testimony, identity, and the power of representation. The course will also include field trips to area collections in documentary photography and filmmaking. Other assignments will include visual and literary analysis essays and creative-writing responses, as well as a curatorial project where students will have the opportunity to research Asian American documentarians and pitch artworks for exhibition at the Hudson River Museum.