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Orientalism, Impressionism, Cubism, Expressionism. “Modern” was the buzzword in Europe in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

This course explores the idea of “modern” in European visual culture – art, film, theatre, dance – in this first truly global era, a time of incredible industrial and economic expansion and when European nations were extending their imperial reach throughout the world. Why are Impressionist or Van Gogh's paintings so compelling? What inspired Picasso to portray people the way he did? What do Mondrian’s grids of colour mean? Some themes we will track include European perceptions of unfamiliar lands and cultures, gender, racism, the beginnings of psychoanalysis, and the idea of the “artist-genius.” These we all shaped by global ambitions and hubris, devastating war, psychological angst, and political and economic booms and busts. 

The course is designed for students with no prior knowledge of visual culture or art history.

For more information, please contact Brett Roberts, brett.roberts@uwaterloo.ca

Increasingly, scholars and activists describe care as a radical or revolutionary response to social injustices and forces of power, such as neoliberal capitalism, mass incarceration, settler colonialism, or White supremacy. Drawing from the feminist care theorists and from community organizers, we will explore care as a community practice, one which sustains the well-being of individuals and communities, and which can be practiced as a form of solidarity within and between social justice movements. Not only will you gain a foundation in care theory, but we will apply our learning by practicing care and extending solidarity through a collaborative, community-informed project.

���dzٱ��:��department consent required to enroll. Please email philug@uwaterloo.ca to obtain permission. Permission is granted to anyone who has not taken the following courses.

• Fall 2024: PHIL 402 (8309) /GSJ 402 (8317)
• Winter 2023: PHIL 402-001 (8137) / GSJ 402-001 (8761)
• Winter 2021: PHIL 420-041 (4185) / GSJ 472-043 (8490)

This course examines how attention to trauma and healing can inform processes to transform conflict, violence, and injustice. With case examples from domestic abuse to colonialism and police violence, students explore theories and approaches to trauma and healing to better understand pathways to personal and social transformation and how they can be applied in various contexts. Topics include causes, types, and impacts of trauma; the role of trauma in cycles of violence; and frameworks for healing informed by contemporary social justice movements.

Trauma, Healing and Social Transformation explores a variety of approaches and frameworks for understanding trauma and supporting healing in the context of social transformation. The first part of the course explores core components of the Breaking Cycles of Violence, Building Resilience framework, which was created for an intensive educational program called Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience (STAR). In the second part of the course, you will study additional models and frameworks for trauma awareness and healing, with an emphasis on healing from historical and structural forms of trauma caused by colonial and racial violence. You will also examine narrative, arts-based, and intersectional theories and approaches for personal and social healing employed by Indigenous nations, social movements, and activist artists and writers, among others.

This course addresses issues that are often challenging to consider, read about, and discuss. For example, we consider sources of physical, emotional, and social wounding, including war, childhood sexual abuse, rape, systemic oppression, and forced migration. There will not only be differences in perspective among course participants, but also significant differences in proximity to these issues. Given the content, diverse lived experiences of course participants, and our broader social contexts, we will practice various grounding and centering practices in class.

While it is possible to experience therapeutic, or healing, benefits as you engage in the learning process, this course is an educational not a therapeutic space. Participants should regularly access strategies for care and support outside of class, which may include professional counselling, spiritual care, support groups, etc.

This course introduces students from a variety of backgrounds to the study of conflict, violence, and peace. It is the first of three preliminary core courses in the Peace and Conflict Studies Program at the University of ��ݮ��Ƶ. 1 Like peace and conflict studies, this course draws on works that synthesize insights from various academic fields in the humanities and social sciences, as well as those produced outside of the university. As such, it engages with works that offer not only different ways of understanding and dealing with conflict and violence but also differing methodologies and styles.  

Among the questions we will explore in this course are: 

1. What role does conflict play in human relations? Why is it so difficult to deal with?  
2. Is war inevitable? What does war involve and what are its consequences?  
3. How are mass killings in war made acceptable? Can law restrain war?  
4. How are warmaking, racism, and colonialism related?  
5. Is peace the absence of conflict or violence? What is the relationship between peace and justice? 

This course explores how and why the "camp" emerged as a major site of confinement and punishment, focusing in particular on the 20th century.

Students will consider a range of spaces that fall within the category of the camp, including detention camps, concentration camps, and forced labour camps. Case studies will be drawn from around the world, including Nazi camps in Europe, the Gulag in the Soviet Union, and camps in Canada, South Africa, Namibia, China, Cuba, the Philippines, Kenya, and the United States.

For more info, email Dr. Katherine Bruce-Lockhart (kbrucelo@uwaterloo.ca).

This course moves through the vital moments in feminist thought and practice throughout the 20th century (and before), focusing on the experience of BIPOC folks and the most marginalized within feminist communities. We will weave a complex intersectional narrative that helps us to understand and approach the complexity of current feminist struggles. At times, the material we cover will be both familiar and confronting, uncomfortable and critical. Finally, we will critically investigate the metaphor of the ‘wave’ itself and analyze and critique its relevance for our lives and world.