CREATIVE & PERFORMING ARTS

This course will focus on the structures of creative industries, and how arts administrators successfully share creativity with the public and leverage the commercial opportunities of creative production. Students will explore such topics as the arts as a business, managing financial imperatives and the artistic process, and promoting and presenting cultural products; examine case studies from a variety of fields such as film, digital media, gaming, theater, museums, and publishing; and engage directly with practitioners successfully working in fields of arts and culture, and those managing the interface between creativity and business in London.

This course will chart the development of British film from 1994-2012, a period of confidence and success mirrored by a major structural and financial reorganization in the industry. Students will critically analyze key films and how they both emerge from and transform earlier British cinema tradition; develop an understanding of important British genres and film-making tropes; explore the ways in which British films reflect and respond to contemporary social and political conditions and events; and develop an awareness of specific ways in which UK and US film differs.

This course will explore the topics of advertising and marketing in Britain. Students will develop an understanding of the ways in which advertising is effectively planned to achieve the objectives set in the overall marketing plan, with reference to London as a global center for creative and production excellence; and conduct a comparative analysis of British advertising methods and styles. A complete syllabus will be available soon.

This course will address the development of the modern detective novel—British and American—from the late 19th century into the 21st century. Students will focus on cities as sites of criminal imagination, and on detectives as explorers of the city’s hidden connections; develop an understanding of the concept of the detective story and why crime fiction is one of the most popular forms of narrative; and explore specific connections between detective fiction and the urban environment, social dynamics, and the writers’ attitudes to such topics as diversity and ethnicity.

The Global Internship Course is designed to be completed alongside an internship placement, allowing students to earn academic credit. Students will attend weekly, discussion-led sessions that include educational support and mentoring in a classroom environment; develop personal and professional skills, learn to contextualize their internship experience socially and culturally, and employ the use of Globally Networked Learning technology to conduct a comparative global analysis with other CAPA students. At times, this analysis will be facilitated through CAPA Masterclasses led by professionals in a diverse range of fields.

The Global Internship Course is designed to be completed alongside an internship placement, allowing students to earn academic credit. Students will attend weekly, discussion-led sessions that include educational support and mentoring in a classroom environment; develop personal and professional skills, learn to contextualize their internship experience socially and culturally, and employ the use of Globally Networked Learning technology to conduct a comparative global analysis with other CAPA students. At times, this analysis will be facilitated through CAPA Masterclasses led by professionals in a diverse range of fields.

This course will introduce British society, culture, and museology in an era when exhibition displays are often controversial and politically charged. Students will consider museums as reflections of the British psyche, as unique cultural constructs that help us understand ‘Britishness’, and as institutions of “global” heritage in the context of a global city with a British perspective; explore the development of the modern museum and its operation; analyze the impact British history, society, and politics have had on London museums, their creation, and their day-to-day operations and audiences; and conduct field work in eight different London museums.

This course will examine modern works of art from the late 19th century through to the present. Students will analyze the development of modern art, particularly in response to World Wars I and II, through to contemporary practice; experience a diverse range of works on display in London; investigate attitudes and ideas in modern art; explore the effect of historical events, sociological changes, and advances in technology on the art world; gain an appreciation of a variety of materials and techniques; and develop an understanding of the global art market.

This course will explore a selection of Shakespeare’s plays to uncover his style and craft within the genres of comedy, history, and tragedy. Students will engage in Shakespeare's timelessness and learn to appreciate how vitally his ideas, themes, and concepts move from the concerns of his day to our own; develop skills of paraphrasing and textual analysis; analyze the relationship between plays; and examine the structure of different dramatic genres. Students will pay $70 for this course upon arrival in London, which pays for theater tickets.

This course will place students at the heart of the experience of theater. Students will engage with the key ideas underpinning the creation of theatricality, and attend a range of different performances and tours of specific theater spaces. They will explore such topics as the qualities, conditions, and boundaries of drama, audience engagement, philosophical issues raised by the theatrical experience, the origins of theater, the changing roles of performers and spectators over time, and the theater's prospects in the 21st century. Students will pay $70 for this course upon arrival in London, which pays for theater tickets.

This course will chart the representation of the occult in the city from the Early Modern period to the present day. Students will focus particularly on the performance and presentation of the occult and magical phenomena and its reception by the general public and social elites during specific time periods; develop an understanding of why magic has long been a subject of fascination; visit sites such as the Society for Psychical Research or the British Magic Circle; and attend a live performance of the magical or ghostly in London. Students will pay $40 for this course upon arrival in London, which pays for theater tickets.

This course will introduce creative writing in relation to the city and the particular challenges of writing about place. Students will examine how various subjects such as the river, urban spaces, solitude, ethnicity, particular boroughs, and characters (both fictional and real) function in London narratives; develop an understanding of the role of memory and experience in literary psycho-geographical accounts of the metropolis; utilize their observations of London to practice creative writing; and investigate the potential of place within the narrative of various genres.