Story and the Arts

This subject is not offered in 2016.

170 hours

For the purposes of considering request for Reasonable Adjustments under the Disability Standards for Education (Cwth 2005), and Student Support and Engagement Policy, academic requirements for this subject are articulated in the Subject Overview, Learning Outcomes, Assessment and Generic Skills sections of this entry.

It is University policy to take all reasonable steps to minimise the impact of disability upon academic study, and reasonable adjustments will be made to enhance a student's participation in the University's programs. Students who feel their disability may impact on meeting the requirements of this subject are encouraged to discuss this matter with a Faculty Student Adviser and Student Equity and Disability Support: http://services.unimelb.edu.au/disability

This subject involves a practical and theoretical study of how humans construct and communicate meaning through the expressive symbol systems of the arts. Its focus will be on narrative in the traditional forms of drama, literature, visual arts, music, dance, and also contemporary hybrid forms. The practical content will be supported by a series of lecture/tutorials in which appropriate theoretical frameworks from a number of disciplines will be introduced. Focus texts include those produced for children and young adults.
In this subject students will be involved in making narrative and artistic texts across a range of genres and within a variety of contexts. Artistic texts will be taken to mean music, performance and visual texts in addition to the more traditional written and spoken forms. Students, individually and in groups, will also analyse the use of story and symbol in artmaking and the co-construction of meaning with an audience in a diverse range of settings.
This subject is suitable for students with little formal art or writing background.

Students will demonstrate:
• An enhanced understanding of visual and textual narrative and the relationships between them and with audiences;
• An understanding of construction and communication of multiple symbol systems;
• The capacity to understand and apply a range of symbolic and expressive systems;
• An enhanced capacity to critically analyse a range of visual and narrative texts in and across cultural contexts;
• The ability to make an original visual and/or textual narrative;
• An enhanced capacity to create, imagine and innovate, and to reflect on these processes.

There will be two items of assessment.

Item 1: A 15 minute class presentation, 1600 words equivalent, due mid semester, 40%
Item 2: Students may choose to complete one of two final assignments, due end of semester, 60%

• Assignment A: A 2400 word written analysis of a response to a narrative
• Assignment B: A 2400 word equivalent negotiated project

This subject has a minimum hurdle requirement of 80% attendance at all tutorials, seminars and workshops.

Readings will be given out in class.

This subject potentially can be taken as a breadth subject component for the following courses:

• Bachelor of Arts
• Bachelor of Biomedicine
• Bachelor of Commerce
• Bachelor of Environments
• Bachelor of Music
• Bachelor of Science
• Bachelor of Engineering

You should visit learn more about breadth subjects and read the breadth requirements for your degree, and should discuss your choice with your student adviser, before deciding on your subjects.