Media Art
Students work with faculty advisors to devise self-designed majors. Coursework in the major builds upon students’ experiences in the general education curriculum while providing students with pathways to deepen their knowledge or further develop their passion in a particular area of study.
Media arts are inherently interdisciplinary, social pursuits.
At every level, media arts courses integrate history and theory, engage critically with existing artworks, and instill the range of technical skills necessary to make innovative, creative work. Though students incorporating media arts into their self-designed majors do not track into specialization, they can choose to emphasize any or all aspects of media arts taught at Antioch College: photography, video, sound, and new media. Most media arts courses welcome students from other disciplines who have taken the appropriate prerequisites. In this way, among others, media arts courses draw from the intellectual and cultural assets of the entire College community. Meanwhile, advanced courses provide focus amidst the rigorous, broad, and deep media arts curriculum.
When Designing Your Major
- Students with a self-design degree primarily focusing on media arts should plan to take about a 45 credits in MEDA and CAP prefix courses.
- Students with a self-design major that incorporates media arts and another area of study should take 12 credits of intro and intermediate MEDA courses and 12 credits of MEDA advanced courses.
- All students incorporating media arts into their major should take about eight MEDA credits in history and/or theory.
Intro and Intermediate
- MEDA 102 Basic Media Production
- MEDA 245 AudioVision: Video Production Intensive
- MEDA 290 History of Cinema
Advanced
- MEDA 390 Spec. Top. Film Hist.: Cross-cultural Encounters in Cinema
- MEDA 380 Advanced Projects in Media Arts
- MEDA 399 Advanced Independent Study in Media Arts
Capstone Sequence
- CAP 394 Capstone Preparation
- CAP 495 Capstone Project
Electives
- ARTS 111 Visual Language – 2D Design
- HIST 110 Ohio Stories
- HIST 210 African American History from the Colonial Period to the Present
- HIST 225 World History I
- MEDA 270 Special Topics in Media Arts: Choreographed Films & Experimental Musicals
- MEDA 265 Introduction to Animation
- MEDA 165 Community Voices
- PERF 103 Voice and Speech
- PHIL 115 Eastern Thought
- PERF 180 Approaches to Acting
- VISA 102 STUFF
- VISA 299 Independent Study
Cooperative Education Field Placements
Media Arts students have myriad opportunities for practical experience in the field in courses that engage local radio, television, and cinema, and through a variety of national and international cooperative work opportunities, including:
- Assistant Editor and Sound Technician, Sharp Productions, Los Angeles, CA
- Digital Archivist, Oral History in the Liberal Arts
- Videographer in Residence, Art Place, Portland, IN
- Betty’s Daughter’s Arts Collective, Harlem, New York
- Homer Art and Frame Co in Alaska
- Kitchen Contemporary Art Center, NY
Faculty in the arts
Catalina Jordan Alvarez grew up in rural Tennessee with a Colombian mother and an American father. Her narratives explore the cultural and composed movements of bodies across social and geographical boundaries. Her films have screened at festivals including New Orleans, Los Angeles, Slamdance, Fantastic Fest, Edinburgh Short, Oxford, and Palm Springs. She is a recipient of fellowships and residencies from the Flaherty Seminar, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Flux Factory and the Wexner Center for the Arts.
Alvarez approaches teaching as another facet of her art practice. In her intermediate video production intensive, students conduct documentary research in order to shoot their own fictional narrative. This approach connects the class with members of the community and grounds their fictions in historical specificity. Her fall 2018 class studied the Antioch Program for Interracial Education (1964-1969) and later produced a film about a group of female black students who created systemic change at Antioch by lobbying for the creation of the Afro-American Studies Institute. In her course, “Choreographed Films and Experimental Musicals,” students study the history of the musical alongside formal experimentation in contemporary art as inspiration for their weekly assignments. Her syllabus functions as a script with room for interpretation—she asks students to use techniques she is currently developing, and they adapt these to their own creative visions. Alvarez also teaches solid technical grounding: cinematography and composition, shutter speeds and apertures, as well as fundamentals of recording and mixing sound. Students review the rules of continuity editing and use Adobe Premiere Pro to edit, create titles, and color grade. In her senior projects course, students learn to operate specialized equipment and subsequently integrate these tools in their own projects.
EDUCATION
- 2017 MFA, Film and Media Arts, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA
- 2011 Certificate, Directing, filmArche, e.V., Berlin, Germany
- 2005 BFA, Experimental Theatre & Spanish Literature, NYU Tisch School of the Arts, New York, NY
SCHOLARLY ACTIVITIES
Michael Casselli has been interested in the hybridization of forms and media since he received his undergraduate degree in visual arts/performance theory from Antioch College in 1987. While at the college, he staged large-scale outdoor mixed media performance installations, whose primary focus was an attempt to clarify issues of sense-based perception and the physicality inherent in performative work. After Antioch, he was accepted into the Masters Program in Sculpture at Rhode Island School of Design (RISD).
While at RISD his worked started to move away from the performative context, while maintaining a vested interest in sense of physicality, choosing to focus on the role that the spectator plays as a necessary figurative element of a completed work. It was at RISD that he started to define the contextual framework through which his work was to be experienced. By eliminating physical boundaries between the viewer and the work, he provided the spectator with a choice as to how they would interact with it.
While these concerns still remain active in the work he produces today, his vocabulary has expanded to include more subtle ways of asking the same questions, and has allowed him to consider a broader palate of contemporary media in the creation of his work, utilizing video, robotics, and home-grown technologies. Michael spent twenty years in New York City within the underground art and performance scene, fully integrating his early concerns with performance and the visual arts. While continuing to create large-scale installations, he found himself able to apply many of the same concerns within the performance arena, creating scenic and video design for dance and theater, earning him a Bessie Award for Scenic Design in 1987. Michael relocated to Yellow Springs in 2009 to establish the Manic Design Studio, a place for hybrid experimentation in all media.
EDUCATION
- MFA, Visual Arts, Rhode Island School of Design
- Concentration: Sculpture
- Thesis: Hybrid Form and the Question of Traditional Arts Practice
- BA, Self-Designed Major, Antioch College
- Concentration: Visual Arts/Performance Theory
COURSES
- MEDA 101: Media, Internet, and Society
- MEDA 130: Practical New Media
- MEDA 160: Sound Art
- MEDA 230: Reactive Systems
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Luisa joined Antioch’s Cooperative Education faculty in 2015, and has a background in performance, women’s and gender studies, international education, and community engagement through the arts. Luisa has designed new co-op coursework engaging art as social practice, community action research, and place-based learning. Her primary focus areas within co-op include the arts and therapeutic practices as well as opportunities in Latin America. In Argentina, Luisa has developed co-op partnerships with organizations engaged in community action and social change, including: Mujeres de Artes Tomar, a feminist performance activist troupe; Fundación Hampatu, engaged in arts, sustainability and skills-based classes; and Club de Reparadores, a "repair club" that recycles and repairs items for reuse.
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Luisa's work as a writer, director and performer explores intersections of human rights, feminist thought, counter-memory, migration, ritual, and place-making. As an Open Society Institute Baltimore Community Fellow with Creative Alliance, Luisa developed an award-winning community arts program in southeast Baltimore. A member of Sol Rising healing arts troupe, Luisa was a founding member of Baltimore’s Theater Action Group and trained at The Theater of the Oppressed Laboratory with Agosto and Julian Boal, among others. As a teaching artist, Luisa aspires towards embodied, experiential and liberatory pedagogies and practices.
EDUCATION
- M.A., Comparative Women’s Studies, Utrecht University, The Netherlands
- B.A., Latin American Literature, Theater, Smith College
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Louise Smith ’77 is an alumna of Antioch College. She is a writer, performer, educator and therapist. She worked for eleven years in Ping Chong and Company, touring nationally and internationally with collaborative productions that incorporated media and movement. She also appeared in works by artists Meredith Monk, Julie Taymor, and Ann Bogart. Her solo works have been seen at P.S. 122, Dixon Place, Dance Theater Workshop and La Mama in NYC, as well as the Illusion Theater in Minneapolis. Milwaukee’s Theater X, and Actor’s Theater Louisville. Since 1984, she’s written and performed sixteen solo pieces. She is the recipient of a Jerome Fellowship in Playwriting from the Playwright’s Center in Minneapolis, a Bessie Award for her work with Ping Chong and an Obie for Painted Snake in a Painted Chair by The Talking Band. Smith was also awarded an NEA Collaborative Fellowship for Interfacing Joan, her solo with Ping Chong. In 2016 she had a writing residency at the Vermont Studio Center and was granted an Ohio Arts Council Artist’s Excellence Awards in playwriting, her second from the OAC. She’s written five plays for Yellow Springs Kids Playhouse, and in 2017 created a new work with Talking Band/Ellen Maddow entitled Fat Skirt and Big Nozzle, based on the paintings of James Ensor. She holds an IMA from Antioch University in Playwriting and an M.S.Ed from University of Dayton in Community Counseling.
EDUCATION
- M.S.Ed., Community Counseling (with Licensure), University of Dayton
- I.M.A., Playwriting, Antioch University
- B.A., Theater, Antioch College
COURSES
- PERF 103: Voice and Speech
- PERF 250: Rehearsal and Production
Additional faculty with whom you might work
Brooke Bryan is Chair of the Writing Program and Assistant Professor of Writing and Digital Literacy at Antioch College where she specializes in phenomenological oral history and undergraduate research frameworks.
Supported by the Great Lakes Colleges Association, Brooke directs Oral History in the Liberal Arts—a three-year initiative funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation that supports undergraduate oral history research by providing open source workflows and technology stacks for tools in the digital humanities, and articulating pedagogical strategies for ‘high stakes’ teaching and learning through faculty-mentored oral history projects across 13 institutions.
EDUCATION
- M.A., Oral History Methodology, Antioch University, 2013
- B.A., Classics, Antioch University, 2009
SCHOLARLY ACTIVITIES
- Supported by GLCA, led a team of scholars and librarians exploring undergraduate research paradigms at ILiADS at Hamilton College's Digital Humanities Initiative; included funding for one student who was able to present on a panel, becoming a founding member of the Undergraduate Research Network
- Instructor at Ohio Humanities' residential Oral History Institute at Kenyon College
- Supported by the Lloyd Family Fund at Antioch College, coached four students to present posters of their faculty-mentored research projects (conducted during WORK 425) exploring social justice themes at the 2015 Oral History Association meeting in Tampa Bay.
- Led a workshop on digital tools for research at Oral History Association annual meeting, "Digging into Digital Platforms: One Interview/Four Tools"
- Served on the Grant Review panel for the Ohio History Fund, awarding $100,000 to 14 projects across the state
- Commissioned as an interviewer for Ohio History's Ohio Veterans Oral History project with the support of Ohio Humanities
- Awarded $393,710 grant from the Great Lakes Colleges Association through the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The three-year project, Oral History in the Liberal Arts, connects oral history and digital storytelling methods with experiential learning and undergraduate research paradigms-- developing a consortial archive and providing pedagogical tutorials and open source technology stacks to faculty and librarians across all 13 GLCA schools. The project is designed to provide micro-grants to more than 50 faculty, instructional staff, and students across GLCA over three years.
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
- A Closer Look at Community Partnerships, Oral History Review (2013) 40(1): 75-82 doi:10.1093/ohr/oht023 (https://ohr.oxfordjournals.org/content/40/1/75.full)
- Bryan, B. (2012). Why here/why now: using websites to power community projects. In D. Boyd, S. Cohen, B. Rakerd, & D. Rehberger (Eds.), Oral history in the digital age. Institute of Library and Museum Services. (https://ohda.matrix.msu.edu/2012/06/why-here-why-now/)
- Interview Project. Oral History Review (2010) 37 (1):71-73.doi: 10.1093/ohr/ohq035 (https://ohr.oxfordjournals.org/content/37/1/71.full)
Mary Ann Davis (pronouns she/her) is a poet, lyrical theorist, and scholar with varied interests across the disciplines of literary, feminist, sexuality, and queer studies. She earned an M.F.A. in Poetry from the University of Michigan – where she was awarded a prestigious Hopwood Award – before completing a Ph.D. in Literature and Gender Studies at the University of Southern California.
Her scholarship explores literary, cultural, and theoretical engagements with erotic power in Great Britain and the United States from the mid-nineteenth century through the present, especially in the forms of sadomasochism, kink, and BDSM. Her monograph in-progress, Between the Monstrous and the Mundane, is a hybrid work of lyric theory. Offering a genealogy of sadomasochism that moves beyond stereotypes of extremity, focusing rather on the banal and the everyday, this project engages a range of texts: literature and art (Charlotte Brontë, Swinburne, Sacher-Masoch, Rice, Flanagan and Rose); culture and subculture (50 Shades, Samois, Society of Janus, BDSM handbooks); and theorists and practitioners (Deleuze, Foucault, MacKendrick, Rubin, Barthes, contemporary BDSM players), alongside the author’s reflections on her experiences in queer BDSM and leather subcultures.
Mary Ann’s poems have appeared in In Posse Review and Crab Orchard Review, and won the 2011 Prism Review Poetry Prize and the 2016 Robin Becker Chapbook competition for Portrait of a Voice. An essay published in OCHO: A Journal of Queer Arts explores her interest in bridging the divide between critical and lyrical thinking, especially as a process of healing. A poetry manuscript in-progress, Sublunary, returns to metaphysical questions and forms to sing through queer erotic intimacy and growing up queer.
Born and raised in Louisville, Kentucky, she also considers herself to be a Californian at heart. When not teaching or writing, she is reading long fantasy novels, practicing kundalini yoga, traveling in search of sublime crema (espresso), building queer and kink community, and ruminating on erotic ethics.
EDUCATION
- Ph.D. in English Literature and Gender Studies, University of Southern California, 2012
- M.F.A. in Poetry Writing, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, 2003
- B.A. in English and Creative Writing, Denison University, 2000
COURSES
- Literature 130, Literature and Social Justice: LGBTQ Lives
- Literature 246, The Harlem Renaissance
- Literature 250, Intermediate Creative Writing: Lyric Poetry and Lyric Essays
- Literature 331, Literary Moments and Movements after 1850: Literature Under Totalitarianism
- Literature 325, Literature and Power: Women Write the Erotic
- Literature 350, Advanced Creative Writing: Serial Poems and Story Cycles
- Literature 370, Special Topics: Queer Reading
- Humanities 494, Senior Seminar in the Humanities
- Humanities 495, Senior Project in the Humanities
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
In-Process
- Between the Monstrous and the Mundane. Hybrid work of lyric theory.
- Sublunary: Poems. Full-length poetry manuscript.
Articles/Essays
- “Oatmeal and Shit: Some Notes on Mundanity” Rated RX: Sheree Rose with and after Bob Flanagan. Ed. Yetta Howard. Under contract with Ohio State University Press. Forthcoming in 2020
- “‘On the Extreme Brink’ with Charlotte Brontë: Revisiting Jane Eyre’s Erotics of Power.” Papers on Language and Literature 52.2 (Spring 2016): 115-148. Print.
- “A Certain Simultaneity: On Lyricism, Criticism, and Healing Divides Between and Within.” OCHO: A Journal of Queer Arts. Issue 33 (Sept. 2014): 78-82. Print.
- “‘New Elemental Force’: The Necessity of an Engaged Poetry.” Denison Journal of Religion. Volume I (2001). Print.
Poems
- Portrait of a Voice: Poems. Winner of Robin Becker Poetry Series (chapbook). Seven Kitchens Press. October 2017. https://sevenkitchenspress.
com/robin-becker-chapbook- series/mary-ann-davis- portrait-of-a-voice/ - “City of Ends.” Crab Orchard Review, 20.1 (May 2015): 62-3. Print.
- “First Place in Poetry: ‘From the Sublunary Year.’” Prism Review 13 (May 2011): 131-7. Print. Judge’s comments: https://craigsantosperez.wordpress.com/2011/05/31/on-judging-my-first-poetry-contest-for-the-prism-review/
- “Phantasia.” In Posse Review 13 (2002): n. pag. Web. https://webdelsol.com/InPosse/davis13.htm
AWARDS
- 2018 : Southwestern Ohio Council for Higher Ed., Faculty Excellence Award for Service
- 2018: Martin Luther King, Jr. Drum Major Award for Faculty, Coretta Scott King Center, Antioch College
- 2017: Research Award, Antioch College Faculty Fund, Antioch College
- 2016: Winner of Robin Becker Poetry series, Seven Kitchens Press
- 2015: LGBTQ Faculty Award for Leadership and Mentoring, The Claremont Colleges
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Kevin McGruder’s interest in community formation led to a career in community development, and now as an academic, to research interests that include African American institutions, urban history, and gay and lesbian history. He has a B.A. in Economics from Harvard University and an M.B.A. in Real Estate Finance from Columbia University. Before pursuing doctoral studies at City University of New York, McGruder worked for many years in the field of nonprofit community development. Positions included Program Director at Local Initiatives Support Corporation, Director of Real Estate Development with the Abyssinian Development Corporation, and Executive Director of Gay Men of African Descent (in New York City).
McGruder’s interest in Harlem’s history led to two entrepreneurial ventures. From 1990 to 1991 he was owner/manager of Home to Harlem gift shop, and from 2000 to 2008 he was co-owner of Harlemade Style Shop, a store providing Harlem-themed tee shirts, books and other items celebrating Harlem.
During the 2011-2012 academic year McGruder was a Scholar in Residence at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, of the New York Public Library, where he conducted additional research and revised his doctoral dissertation for publication as a book. The result is Race and Real Estate: Conflict and Cooperation in Harlem, 1890-1920 (Columbia University Press, June 2015).
EDUCATION
- Ph.D., History, City University of New York, Graduate Center
- M.B.A., Real Estate Finance, Columbia University
- B.A., Economics, Harvard University
COURSES
- CLCN 210: Community Engagement
- HIST 210: African American History from the Colonial Period to the Present
- HIST 331: The History of the American City
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
- The Emancipation Proclamation: Forever Free (Urban Ministries, Inc., 2013).
- Witness: Two Hundred Years of African-American Faith and Practice in the Abyssinian Baptist Church of Harlem (W.B. Eerdmans, 2013)
- Race and Real Estate: Conflict and Cooperation in Harlem, 1890-1920 (Columbia University Press, 2015)
- “A Fair and Open Field: The Responses of Black New Yorkers to the New York City Draft Riots”, Afro-Americans in New York Life and History, July, 2013
- “Pathologizing Sexuality: The U.S. Experience,” in Black Sexualities: Powers, Passions, Practices, and Policies, edited by Sandra L. Barnes and Juan Battle, Rutgers University Press, 2010
- “Black Sexuality in the U.S.: Presentations as Non-normative,” Journal of African American Studies, Vol. 13, No. 3 (2009)
- “To Be Heard in Print: Black Gay Writers in 1980s New York,” Obsidian III: Literature in the African Diaspora, Spring/Summer 2005, Volume 6, Number 1 (North Carolina State University)
- “Jane Ryder Fisher” The Black Scholar, Spring/Summer 1993
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Lara Marie Mitias currently serves as an Associate Professor of Philosophy at Antioch College where she teaches Asian philosophies, along with various courses in Western Philosophy. She completed her doctorate at the University of Hawaii specializing in Asian and Comparative philosophy. She has taught over 35 different courses in Western and non-Western philosophy, including Logic, Metaphysics, Social and Political Philosophy, Philosophy for Children (P4C) and courses on Death, along with many independent study courses, including On Happiness, and Indian Philosophy of Language. She has two published articles, “Desiring the Past,” and “P4C: Process, Perspective, and Pluralism for Children.”
Education
Ph.D., Philosophy, University of Hawai’i
M.A., Philosophy, Ohio University
B.A., Philosophy, Ohio University
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Favorite Courses
Existentialism
In this class we will study the writings of the some of the most interesting and influential philosophers of the 19th and 20th century, including Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Sartre. These philosophers bring our attention back to fundamental aspects of our own existence and experience and so have been classified together as 'existentialist'. Existentialist philosophers don’t offer us a philosophical movement, or any set of philosophical claims, or even methods. These philosophers aimed to lead us to our own point of view by giving us access to their singular points of view. They bring our attention to essential aspects of being an existing individual, and as both subject and object. Turning our focus back to the experience of being 'the existing individual', and recognizing the reality or 'truth' of our own subjectivity, has been a significant movement in the history of philosophy. This revival of the real (experiencing) subject has been pivotal for philosophical and social and political developments in the 20-21st century.
Indian and Buddhist Philosophy
This course is an introduction to Indian philosophical traditions including Buddhism.
We begin with the Vedas and Upanisads, at the beginning of written history and with some of the earliest writing we have. In these ancient Sanskrit texts we find the seeds of a complex and analytical philosophical tradition, giving rise to a detailed development through theoretical debate with opposing schools lasting over a millennia.
From these early profound expressions of Indian philosophy, we turn to the seminal text of Indian culture and thought, the Bhagavad Gita, or Song of God. We will explore the ethics of the Gita with the study of Yoga philosophy, including parts of the Yoga Sutras, and will discuss the pervasion of the philosophy of yoga in the Indian philosophical and religious traditions, as well as its appropriation of this tradition and these ideas in the West. This text has been said to give the distillation of Indian philosophy offering its essence. In this text we also find the presentation of the views of two central strains of Indian philosophical thought: Advaita-Vedanta and Samkhya-Yoga. We will read from these schools most significant and most expressive texts, as well as secondary sources clarifying these philosophies.
After establishing this background in Classical Indian philosophies we will turn to Buddhist Philosophical developments. The Buddha lived relatively early in the development of Indian philosophies and the schools developed in argument with one another. In this enduring conversation, Buddhism is often involved and its traditions often hold views antithetical to central views held in common by other schools, and we will explore these important differences. We will also look at what is shared in these Indian traditions and its significance and in relation to more familiar Western philosophical ideas. There are also many divergences among and between these traditions on many issues and ideas. We will read excerpts from the Theravada and Mahayana traditions, including the words of Buddha and important Buddhist texts. We will end with a short introduction to the development Chan Buddhism in China and then Zen in Japan.
Philosophy for Children (P4C)
P4C stands for ‘Philosophy for Children,’ and is an innovative international pedagogical movement meant to foster inquiry and critical thinking skills in a shared community.
When we do philosophy with children (P4C), we don’t teach philosophy. Instead, we facilitate group discussion among students. P4C is most often at the elementary level, but can be done with any grade or group and the methods of P4C and their practice are useful far beyond the classroom.
With the Philosophers Toolkit for understanding one another in hand, and the rules and practices of doing P4C in shared community, together we discuss issues concerning the students and explore ideas that they are interested in. Through the practices of inquiry and critical thinking skills, students consider their own thinking and that of others on interesting and important questions. These may be questions that we often don't take time to explore. “Why does someone become homeless and why do we treat them badly?” a fearless group of students in Hawaii asked after one of them had thrown stones at a man living on a beach the day before. Children have innumerable ideas and questions; things they think and wonder about and want to talk about, and practicing P4C in the classroom gives us the opportunity.
The idea of P4C, and the P4C program was created by Matthew Lipman at Montclair State University but the ideals of P4C, and the importance of developing the thinking skills and practice of community inquiry can be traced to John Dewey and the requirements for genuinely democratic societies. And P4C has been called ‘philosophy for everyone,’ and its use and benefits extend far beyond the classroom. The methods of P4C enable us to engage and discuss critical issues together in a critical and productive way without being critical of others or being criticized by others. These methods of engagement and inquiry and this model of pedagogy are essential to productive dialogue and understanding.
The experiences we have doing P4C in the classroom are exciting and unique. It is very fun, often enlightening, and always interesting!
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All Special Topics Courses in Philosophy
(These courses are student-interest driven)
Recent Special Topics:
- Philosophy of Time
- Phenomenology
- Yoga Philosophy: Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras
Recent Independent Studies:
- Metaphysics
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Recent Papers
“De and Yin: Can Daoist philosophy offer us a new feminism?” Society for Asian and Comparative Philosophy (SACP) Conference, Beijing China 6/2017
“Going without-going: Going without-going: Conclusions on present time from a Nyāya-Buddhist debate,” American Philosophical Association Pacific meeting, March 2017
“Phenomenologies of Place” Philosopher’s Roundtable, Antioch College, October 2016
“The Place of the Body in Nishida Kitaro’s Phenomenology of Place,” Philosopher’s Roundtable, Antioch College, January 2017
“Living Places,” 11th international Philosophers East-West Conference on ‘Place,’ East-West Center, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, May 23-June 12016
“The Conversion of Opposites: Speculative Metaphysis and the Appreciation of Beauty in Whitehead’s Philosophy and Daoist Thought,” Society for the Advancement of American Philosophy (SAAP) 43rd Annual Convention, University of Oregon and Oregon State University, March 3-6 2016
“The Transitivity of External Good-ness and It’s Significance,” response paper to M. Cashen “Aristotle on External Goods: Applying the Politics to the Nichomachean Ethics,” Indiana Philosophical Association (IPA) Conference Response Paper, November 12-14 2015
Selected Publications
“The Logic of Dao” submitted to Frontiers in Chinese Philosophy (FPC), Brill Publishing, Submitted 6/2016, in third and final review 3/2017.
“The Place of the Body in the Phenomenology of Place: Edward Casey and Nishida Kitaro.” In Place. Edited by Peter D. Hershock and Roger T. Ames. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, forthcoming.
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Rahul Nair is an Assistant Professor of World History at Antioch College. Previously he has served as an Assistant Professor at Georgia Gwinnett College in Lawrenceville, Georgia (2012-13) and at the University of Denver in Denver, Colorado (2005-12). He received his doctoral degree in History with a specialization on South Asia, from the University of Pennsylvania in 2006, after graduating with an M.A. in Modern Indian History from Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, India. His areas of specialization include South Asia, imperialism, and world history. He is currently working on a book titled, The Rise and Decline of India’s Population Problem in the Twentieth Century. He is fluent in Malayalam, French, Bengali, and Hindi.
EDUCATION
- Ph.D., History, University of Pennsylvania, 2006
- M.A., History, Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, India, 1998
- M.A., Economics, University of Delhi in Delhi, India, 1996
- B.A., Economics, University of Kerala, 1993
COURSES
- HIST 105: The World Beyond: Cultural Imagination, Exchanges and History In this foundation-level course, students will study how people in various parts of the world imagined what was beyond their everyday experiences, particularly across the oceans, and how these imaginings often motivated them to venture out to make contact with these other worlds for purposes of trade, resettlement, and conquest. The course will use early texts of various cultures, travelogues, diaries, ship captains’ accounts, newspaper articles, and other sources to reveal the voices of the participants in historical events.
- HIST 226: World History II, from 1500 CE to present This course provides students with an understanding of the changes experienced by peoples in Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Americas as the interaction between these peoples increased as a result of exploration, trade, and conquest. Topics to be covered will include the global impact of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade, the establishment of colonies by European nations, the growth and expansion of militarism, the development of foreign policies to manage the interaction between nations, the decolonization movement, and the growth of the global economy.
- HIST 334: The History of a Person: Gandhi Gandhi’s iconic status both in India and abroad owes much to his leadership role in the struggle for Indian independence from British rule. His own life was roughly coterminus with the Indian national movement, which in 1947 resulted in the creation of two nations, India and Pakistan. Gandhi’s philosophy of non-violence, political morality, and critique of western modernity were developed in the context of and are inextricably linked to the history of the Indian nationalist movement. In the first part of this course we look at the origins and trace the development of an Indian national movement that was already half a century old when Gandhi came onto the scene. We then examine how under Gandhi’s leadership the nationalist movement becomes a mass movement that culminated in both the tragedy of partition and the triumph of independence.
SCHOLARLY ACTIVITIES
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
- Book Manuscript: The Rise and Decline of India’s Population Problem in the Twentieth Century (under contract with Routledge)
- “The Planning of Birth in the Birth of Planning: Medicalized Birth Control as Population Control in India, 1919-1952,” under review in South Asian History and Culture.
- The Population Problem in Inter-war India and China, Panel Organizer, 2017 American Historical Association Conference, Denver, 5-8 January 2017.
- The Planning of Birth and the Birth of Planning: Medicalized Birth Control as Population Control in India, 1919-1952, 2017 American Historical Association Conference, Denver, 6 January 2017.
- The Pitfalls and Potential of Teaching Gandhi to American Undergraduates, Presenter, Roundtable on Teaching South Asia in the U.S. and the Midwest: Strategies, Challenges Possibilities. 2016,Ohio Academy of History Annual Meeting and Conference, 1-2 April 2016.
- Sex and the Nation: A Tale of Two American Visitors to India, 2013, International Conference on South Asian Studies, Leiden, 6-7 December 2013.
- “The Construction of a ‘Population Problem’ in Colonial India 1919-1947,” in Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History (2011), 39:2, 227-47.
Associate Professor of Philosophy Lewis Trelawny-Cassity’s areas of teaching interest are the history of philosophy, political philosophy, and environmental ethics. As an undergraduate, Lew majored in English Literature and Environmental Policy at Warren Wilson College. After a few years of working in a plumbing warehouse in Kendall Square, Massachusetts and volunteering at Gould Farm, a community for adults with mental illness in Monterey, Massachusetts, Lew completed a Master’s Degree in Political Science at Boston College, where he was awarded a Bradley Fellowship. After Boston College, Lew went on to get his PhD at Binghamton University’s philosophy department, where he wrote his dissertation on Plato’s Laws.
At Antioch, Lew enjoys teaching classes, playing basketball and ping pong with community members, and serving on the Farm Committee and the Community Council. Currently, Lew is part of a three-year grant from the Great Lakes Colleges Association that seeks to develop undergraduate research in ancient philosophy through multi-campus student-faculty collaboration and yearly student conferences. Lew also teaches classes that combine philosophy with cooking and farming.
EDUCATION
- M.A., Ph.D., Philosophy, Binghamton University
- M.A., Political Science, Boston College
- B.A., English Literature, Environmental Policy, Warren Wilson College
COURSES
- GSC 210: Continued Studies in Global Seminar: On Eating, Cooking, and Thinking This course is intended to explore the nature of eating, cooking, and cuisine through a combination of experiential, practical, ethical, cultural, and philosophical approaches. Students in this course will: 1) develop their cooking skills to prepare them for co-op and life after graduation; 2) investigate eating through the practice of mindfulness; 3) investigate the ontological and philosophical aspects of eating; 4) reflect critically on the concepts of diet and cuisine; 5) study the ethics of the eating of animals; 6) explore the connections between eating and ecology; and 7) explore the social, cultural, and religious dimensions of eating with others.
- PHIL 440: Selected Topics in Contemporary Philosophy: Heidegger’s Being and Time This iteration of PHIL 440 will be focused on a close reading of the Introduction and Division One of Heidegger’s Being and Time. Students are expected to read Being and Time carefully, with an aim to understanding the key terms, concepts, and overall structure of this challenging text.
- PHIL 299: Independent Study: Aristotle’s Politics This independent study will be a seminar focused on a close reading of Aristotle’s Politics. Students are expected to read all of the Politics, investigate secondary sources, and actively participate in class discussions. This course is part of a Great Lakes Colleges Association collaborative undergraduate teaching and research project. As part of this course, students are expected to present or comment on a paper at a conference held at Antioch College. This course will meet for approximately 22.5 hours during the quarter, not including the mandatory conference at Antioch or the optional conference at Earlham. In order to meet the credit requirement for this course and to fulfill its learning objectives, students are expected to spend at least 45 hours outside of class on the Politics.
SCHOLARLY ACTIVITIES
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
Selected Articles
- “On the Foundation of Theology in Plato’s Laws,” Epoché: A Journal for the History of Philosophy, Vol. 18, No. 2 (Spring 2014).
- “tēn tou aristou doxan On the Theory and Practice of Punishment in Plato's Laws,” Polis: The Journal of the Society for Greek Political Thought, Vol. 27, No. 2 (2010).
Selected Presentations
- “On Eating, Thinking, and Cooking,” with Isaac DeLamatre, 2016 Food Systems Workshop: Teaching About Food Systems: Creating a Community of Practice,” Columbia University, Institute of Human Nutrition, New York, 27 July 2016.
- “Remarks on Laws 623e3-4 and its Context,” Society for Ancient Greek Philosophy, New York, 24 October 2015.
- “Comments on Kevin Miles’ “Animal Allegory and the Politics of Zeus in Hesiod’s Theogony,” GLCA Ancient Philosophy Workshop, Wabash College, 24 September 2015.
- “Uncovering the Athenian Stranger’s Debts to Tyrtaeus and Theognis,” Society for Greek Political Thought Panel, American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, San Francisco, 9 September 2015.
Recent News
Works Biennial 2019 Opens With Party
The Herndon Gallery at Antioch College is pleased to welcome the public to the opening reception of the WORKS Biennial 2019, a group exhibition featuring the creative vocations and avocations of the staff and faculty of Antioch College. The...
