Simon Fraser University
Engaging the World

Course Outlines

Fall 2025 - CA 110 D100

Art, Performance and Cinema Studies: Introductory Seminar (3)

Class Number: 7427

Delivery Method: In Person

Overview

  • Course Times + Location:

    Sep 3 – Dec 2, 2025: Thu, 9:30 a.m.–12:20 p.m.
    GOLDCORP

  • Prerequisites:

    Open to art, performance and cinema studies majors.

Description

CALENDAR DESCRIPTION:

An introduction to the experience and analysis of contemporary arts. A combination of seminar discussions, combined with field trips to galleries, cinemas, performance venues, and public art sites, will introduce APCS majors to the disciplinary resources, methods and skills that they will continue to develop over the course of their degree.

COURSE DETAILS:

CA110 is the inaugural offering of a collaboratively designed, cohort-based seminar that serves as an entry point into the Art, Performance, and Cinema Studies (APCS) major. Through open group discussions of key readings and field trips that offer direct engagement with works of art and performance, students will have the space and time to discover what interests them in the arts while developing critical and analytical thinking skills.

The introductory seminar explores current issues in contemporary art within the broader context of the School for the Contemporary Art’s course offerings, exhibitions, public lectures, and performances. The APCS major offers training in the historical interpretation and critical analysis of the visual and performing arts from the 19th century to the present, with a focus on contemporary practices. In the seminar, students will be introduced to the conceptual and practical skills necessary to engage deeply with the historical and cultural issues addressed in the art objects and performances studied.

Guest speakers throughout the term will include SCA faculty members and SFU Shadbolt Fellow Dr. T’uy’t’tanat Cease Wyss, an Indigenous artist and ethnobotanist.

 

COURSE-LEVEL EDUCATIONAL GOALS:

  • To understand the ways that the arts examined in APCS are constitutive of culture.
  • To read and write about core concepts, methods, and theories from the disciplines of art history, visual culture and performance studies.
  • To observe, analyze, and interpret a range of works of contemporary art.
  • To evaluate arguments made in or about texts or works of the visual, performing or cinematic arts.
  • To develop a focused topic of research that combines written scholarship and possibly creative elements.

 

Grading

  • Weekly Journal 30%
  • Participation 30%
  • Presentation 10%
  • Written Assignment 30%

Materials

REQUIRED READING NOTES:

Your personalized Course Material list, including digital and physical textbooks, are available through the SFU Bookstore website by simply entering your Computing ID at: shop.sfu.ca/course-materials/my-personalized-course-materials.

Registrar Notes:

ACADEMIC INTEGRITY: YOUR WORK, YOUR SUCCESS

At SFU, you are expected to act honestly and responsibly in all your academic work. Cheating, plagiarism, or any other form of academic dishonesty harms your own learning, undermines the efforts of your classmates who pursue their studies honestly, and goes against the core values of the university.

To learn more about the academic disciplinary process and relevant academic supports, visit: 


RELIGIOUS ACCOMMODATION

Students with a faith background who may need accommodations during the term are encouraged to assess their needs as soon as possible and review the Multifaith religious accommodations website. The page outlines ways they begin working toward an accommodation and ensure solutions can be reached in a timely fashion.