Course Schedule

Climates of Resistance will be examining the themes below. Click on the session titles to access each day’s Learning Log or Course Materials.

Each week’s asynchronous Learning Log should be completed by the end of the day on Monday.

The professor will provide informal feedback at the end of each unit. Students can make changes based on comments and class discussions anytime until Friday 17 December at 7:15pm Eastern, at which point the Learning Log will be graded using this rubric.

Week 1: Positioning Ourselves

Week 1 Checklist:

A photograph of Uman's piece titled "I'll Sit Here and Wait for You." The piece features a black chair with the titled words written in white placed in front of a black and yellow patterned wall.

Learning Log, Session 1 (due 30 August)

Gaining Familiarity

to introduce the class and prepare ourselves for a semester of shared learning through virtual platforms

artwork by Uman
Jessica Matier's painting titled "Give and Take." Water colors of reds, pinks, whites, yellows, and blacks splattered in the center of a neutral canvas. Black emerges from the left and right sides of the canvas.

Course Materials, Session 2 (1 September)

Creating Community

to recognise each other’s perspectives and agree upon shared principles for engagement with these issues

artwork by Jessica Matier

Week 2: Challenging Oppression

Week 2 Checklist:

Jeffrey Gibson's piece titled "American History." The piece, made of arranged yarn, wool, and beads, has the message "American History is Longer Larger More Beautiful and More Terrible than Anything Anyone Has Ever Said About It J B." The message is stitched in beaded capital letters in different colors including black, green, pink, white, yellow, and blue, along different colored blocks. A black to tan to grey to white beaded gradient flows across the top of the piece with a stitched black and white pattern borders the left and right sides. A patterned black and white fringe borders the bottom.

Learning Log, Session 3 (due 6 September)

Confronting Injustice

to acknowledge how political, social, economic, linguistic & environmental structures marginalise communities

artwork by Jeffrey Gibson
Inga Bard's painting titled "#Intersectionality." The piece features a woman in the center of the piece with a red flower in her mouth and green vine in her hand covered with a white glove. The paintings message is "Feminism without Intersectionality is Still Patriarchy." "Feminism" is written with capitalized blue letters; "without" is written as "W/OUT" just below "Feminism" in capitalized black letters with a white background. Further to the right is "intersectionality" written down the side also in capitalized black letters with a white background. Across the center bottom reads "is Still Patriarchy" in black, red, and green capitalized letters with a white background.

Course Materials, Session 4 (8 September)

Navigating Intersectionality

to explore our identities amidst and knowledge of privilege & oppression as they play out in the world

artwork by Inga Bard

Week 3: Understanding Statistics

Week 3 Checklist:

    • complete Learning Log, Session 5

    • ensure your Learning Log is up-to-date; Becca will be conducting a Unit 1 check

    • attend class on Wednesday 15 September (8am Eastern via Zoom)

    • come to Becca’s office hours if you have any questions or fancy a chat!

Indigenous Beaders with UIHI. This piece shows a collection of lotus flowers that emerge from the bottom of the image up through the top. Each lotus is made entirely of multicolored beads.

Learning Log, Session 5 (due 13 September)

Studying Demographics

to gain familiarity with methods and challenges for population studies, including data collection and analysis

artwork by Indigenous beaders with UIHI
Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum's piece. In this illustration a large, almost sculpture-esque faceless woman cloaked in white sits outside. Small silhouettes watch and examine her through a glass mirror. On the white headpiece and clothes that she wears are several numbers.

Course Materials, Session 6 (15 September)

Measuring Inequality

to appreciate the need for evidence-based policymaking and advocacy around environmental justice issues

artwork by Pamela Phatsimo Sunstrum

Week 4: Segregating Risks

Week 4 Checklist:

John Feodorov's painting titled "Desecration 1." The image is painted on a Navajo rug. The painting features a black factory outlined in white with dark smoke coming out of the factory chimneys. The outermost border is a thick white. The inner border along the bottom of the piece is yellow and creeps up the right and left sides of the rug about a quarter of the way. On the left side of the painting is an animal with long upright ears outlined in yellow. Above the animal is a dark cloud with a faint image of a face. On the right side of the painting is what appears to be a mine outlined in yellow with burgundy stripes. The background of the piece is dark - grey and black riddled with white and yellow closer to the bottom of the piece.

Learning Log, Session 7 (due 20 September)

Revealing Divisions

to determine how environmental harms are unequally experienced by groups, often with systemic intent

artwork by John Feodorov
A piece by Sergio Maciel. The image features a circle in the center with two young children with their backs to one another, each facing different realities on their backgrounds. The child on the left is white wearing a white shirt with red long sleeves and looks out to a clear skies while they blow bubbles. Behind them are green pastures and exciting city in the distance with clear and calm waters below. On the right is a Black child wearing an oversized pink t-shirt. While wearing a black hazmat mask they look out to a wasteland. There appears to be a landfill in the background and a run down baseball field. Outside of and surrounding this circle are clear skies and a group of people walking with signs in protest of the location of the landfill.

Course Materials, Session 8 (22 September)

Calculating Inequities

to realise how racialised patterns feed into unjust outcomes as the direct result of environmental hazards

artwork by Sergio Maciel

Week 5: Controlling Resources

Week 5 Checklist:

Alyssa Osasere's poster titled "Color of Change." The image depicts a bifurcation through two sides of a hill. To the left the image becomes darker. The land is reminiscent of a wasteland. Atop the hill looking down into the valley is a person covered in dark, treacherous vines with thorns with bruises. A black bird sits on their right shoulder. To the right, down in the valley are light and clear skies with a lush valley. A person in a vibrant red has vines from flowers and the grass creeping up their arm.

Learning Log, Session 9 (due 27 September)

Assessing Allocation

to analyse realities in the (mis)use and provision of food, water, energy, and other environmental necessities

artwork by Alyssa Osasere
Calida Rawles' painting titled "Pillar." The painting features a Black female with a stern look on their face wearing a white shirt and wading in a pool of clear water. In this moment they hold a brownish grey vase atop their head. The dark blue - nearly black sky is riddled with white stars.

Course Materials, Session 10 (29 September)

Appraising Access

to investigate how marginalised communities are disproportionately disadvantaged by infrastructures

artwork by Calida Garcia Rawles

Week 6: Governing Places

Week 6 Checklist:

Sabiyha Prince's piece titled "Crossing Borders." The painting is both oil, ink, and watercolor on canvas. A thick black, blue, and purple line flies down the piece with similar stripes horizontally near the top and bottom of the canvas. Two more of these stripes emerge from the right side jutting and fading out toward the edge of the right side of the painting. On the left an orange horizontal stripe emerges. Different colored stripes including orange, yellow, pink, and red are riddled throughout the piece. Still there remains a large amount of white or "unclaimed" space.

Learning Log, Session 11 (due 4 October)

Demarcating Territory

to address the connections between colonisation, redlining, borders, and control over environmental spaces

artwork by Sabiyha Prince

Course Materials, Session 12 (6 October)

(De)Colonising Land

to understand spatial politics and how geographical histories of power have have shaped understandings of Land

artwork by Demian DinéYazhi´ and Noelle Sosaya

Week 7: Dismantling Dichotomies

Week 7 Checklist:

Subhankar Banerjee's photograph titled "Oil and the Caribou." The photograph is an overhead shot of several caribou making their way across the land. The migration path begins at the top of the photograph and moves downward through the photo. The path begins out of the frame and ends out of the frame, as well.

Learning Log, Session 13 (due 11 October)

(Un)Building Binaries

to break down false dichotomies that reproduce unequal power dynamics in human-nature relations

artwork by Subhankar Banerjee
Harold Newton's "Untitled (Crashing Waves on Shore)." In this piece waves are seen rolling up and crashing on a small beachy area. On the beach are a few palm trees but nothing more. The crashing waves splatter up in white, while the rolling water is greenish blue.

Course Materials, Session 14 (13 October)

Diversifying Agency

to challenge traditional conceptions of power that undermine the voices of underrepresented stakeholders

artwork by Harold Newton

Week 8: Questioning Representation

Week 8 Checklist:

Harmonia Rosales' piece "The Creation of God." This is Rosales' re-imagining of Michelangelo's "Creazione di Adamo" or "Creation of Adam." Here God is portrayed as a dark skin Black female. They lay naked in the bottom left corner on a bed of red and yellow in the sky with one hand extended and one finger pointed to reach for the creator who is depicted as an elderly dark skin Black female who emerges from the top right. They are covered in a pink tunic on a deep pink, violet colored silk sheet. Crowded behind them are several naked dark skin Black children and women. The background of this painting is mostly white to signify the sky and clouds.

Learning Log, Session 15 (due 22 October)

Examining Portrayals

to critique the ways in which racism and anthropocentrism are reflected in and reproduced by entertainment

artwork by Harmonia Rosales
Tony Capellán's Mar Caribe [Carribean Sea]. This piece features several flip flops stacked on top of each other and spread out. This particular image is a close up shot of the whole piece giving an even more overwhelming visual.

Session 16 (various dates)

Shifting Narratives

to recentre ideologies marginalised by white supremacist approaches to modernisation and globalisation

artwork by Tony Capellán

Week 9: Changing Stories

Week 9 Checklist:

Roberto Lugo's “Pottery Saved My Life.” This splatter paint piece shows a pattern three thick stripes of red, white, then red again. On the first red stripe reads "Pottery" in all caps. On the white stripe below reads "Saved My" in black capital letters. Finally, in the last red stripe reads "Life" in all caps in white.

Learning Log, Session 17 (due 25 October)

Redefining Art

to value the transformative power of creativity for teaching, relationship-building, and changemaking

artwork by Roberto Lugo
Abe Odedina's "Is There Anyone There," 2019. In this painting a Black person dressed in white stands at the center looking upwards toward the black night sky through a gold telescope. There is a soft yellow, golden glow on their forehead from the moon and stars, which surround them in the background.

Course Materials, Session 18 (27 October)

Spotlighting Stakeholders

to co-create a musical production recognising diverse stakeholders and showcasing marginalised actors

artwork by Abe Odedina

Week 10: Advocating Systems

Week 10 Checklist:

EDUCA's digital illustration of Samir Flores Soberanes. This illustration is of the Mexican environmental activist Samir Flores Soberanes, who was assassinated just days before an important referendum. The illustration takes an actual photo of him and digitizes it. Behind him is a brown background the color of the earth. Around his head reads "Quien lucha por la vida nuna muere. No a la termoeletrica en Morelos," which translates in English as "Whoever fights for life never dies. No to the thermoelectric in Morelos."

Learning Log, Session 19 (due 1 November)

Engaging Approaches

to evaluate governmental options and responsibilities with regard to environmental policymaking

artwork by EDUCA
Sonaksha Iyengar's painting. The painting shows seven women doing essential household work in what appears to be a river or some body The top left corner is a brown color, depicting the land. The water is a deep turquoise. At about the midpoint of the painting is a woman in pink and yellow catching fish. Below this a red streak flows to the bottom the painting and a pink streak slightly to the right does the same. At the bottom of the painting are three women, one in green holding a red basket and holding a black cane, another in green and yellow reaching down into the red, and a final woman in black with pink drifting from her skirt.

Course Materials, Session 20 (3 November)

Utilising Law

to support involvement in public planning and be able to protect environmental activists from reprisal

artwork by Sonaksha Iyengar

Week 11: Planting Progress

Week 11 Checklist:

Daniel Chang Christensen's illustration. In this illustration the viewer sees several rooftop gardens in a city. Emerging from the left a person stands at the edge of the building smiling and waving to a neighbor emerging from the bottom right corner.

Learning Log, Session 21 (due 8 November)

Growing Justice

to reduce recidivism and violence through an eco-centric enterprise that challenges ideas of ‘waste’

artwork by Daniel Chang Christensen
Lindsay Adams' piece "Justice." This sketch shows five people in the front of the image. One in the middle in a white dress with long and curly hair holds a white sign that reads "Justice" in all capital letters. To their right are two more people, one in a pink shirt and red skirt, and another in a white dress. To the center person's left is a person with a beard in grey t-shirt and jeans and another in a black top and a black and white skirt. Behind all of them are the outlines of a city with a solid orange-ish red as a the base color.

Music Video, Session 22 (week of 8 November)

Meeting Mentors

to prepare submissions for our community music video celebrating the power of art and nature

artwork by Lindsay Adams

Week 12: Leveraging Grassroots

Week 12 Checklist:

Christi Belcourt's painting "Our Lives are in the Land." This acrylic painting has a black background with white lines throughout in the shape of a spider web. In the center of the painting and web, is a large and colorful spider. Throughout the web are smaller spiders crawling.

Learning Log, Session 23 (due 15 November)

Engineering Campaigns

to organise projects with attention to inclusive diversity that will result in effective, justice-centric change

artwork by Christi Belcourt

Course Materials, Session 24 (17 November)

Generating Knowledge

to co-create environmental research valuing both Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Western science

artwork by Clayton Gauthier

Week 13: Honouring Heritage

Week 13 Checklist:

Ricardo Levins Morales' poster titled "Environmental Justice." This poster displays several high reaching waves approaching a beach where a community stands at the water. In the right corner of the poster stands the community. One person stands tall in front of the others with a child in on arm and the other arm and hand raised as if to say, "no," to the approaching polluted waves. In the background in red letters reads the message, "Environmental justice is our cry of defiance against the onslaught of oppressive toxins and toxic oppressions that threaten to submerge our homes.”

Learning Log, Session 25 (due 26 November)

Reclaiming Rights

to identify strategies for reparation and community sovereignty amidst patterns of colonisation

artwork by Ricardo Levins Morales
Ioyan Mani's art card titled "Not Forgotten." In this card, a woman in the center looks off into the distance on the left as she is cloaked is multicolored feathers of red, yellow, white, and blue. The foreground of the illustration is a orange and yellow color. The background are various shades of green, blue, and white. Small orange, red, and brown feathers and leaves float around her. Outlines of people also surround her in the background.

No Class Meeting (Home Campus Break)

Remembering History

to commemorate all those who are “missing but never lost, always present, always remembered”

artwork by Ioyan Mani

Week 14: Connecting Struggles

Week 14 Checklist:

Kira Nemeth's illustration. In this illustration there is a fist sketched in black and white in the center of the image. Above it surrounding the knuckles, almost in a crown-like position is a message in a white background and black letters reading "While we fight for us..." Extending from the fist are rays of red, orange, and yellow that are bordered/outlined in black lines. Below the fist is the Earth. Draped across the Earth is a white banner with black and blue lettering that reads "We must fight for her," as a continuation of the first message. Altogether, the message reads "While we fight for us, we must fight for her."

Learning Log, Session 26 (due 29 November)

Critiquing Allyship

to consider our own positions within racist structures and identify how we can work against oppressive systems

artwork by Kira Nemeth
Shirien Damra's Instagram poster. A blue background is detailed with several white and purple flowers with green stems. There are several people protesting with white signs with various different messages. All of the protestors are wearing masks, reflective of the summer protests during the height of the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Course Materials, Session 27 (1 December)

Transforming Solidarity

to recognise the interconnectedness and interdependence of justice for all while questioning the role of allyship

artwork by Shirien Damra

Week 15: Producing Results

Week 15 Checklist:

Chief Lady Bird's piece. In this digital painting a dark brown muskrat off center holds a tiny piece of an orange-ish brown mud. It's eye is a red circle with a yellow dot in the middle. On its ears are two blue circles and on its back is a blue streak. Further down the muskrat white veins begin to appear as roots that are connected to the green circle in the middle of the picture, likely a turtle, with an image of a tree on it. In the top right corner are waves of red, orange, and yellow.The message in the center of the image reads "We have to be The Muskrat In A New Creation Story."

Learning Log, Session 28 (due 6 December)

Planning Action

to assess how we can leverage distribution, recognition, and participation for better outcomes

artwork by Chief Lady Bird
Ryan Spence's illustration. In this illustration the background holds the colors of a sunset with deep oranges and reds with a goldish hue. There appear to be silhouettes of soldiers in the background as well. In the center of the illustration sits a woman cloaked in white with a small purple crown atop her head sitting in a red and gold chair. She holds two keys in her left hand that rest on her lap while she holds her right hand gently in the air. She looks off and out of frame to the left and into the distance.

Course Materials, Session 29 (8 December)

Showcasing Insights

to celebrate our class community and share our learning from the semester for a wider audience

artwork by Ryan Spence

Week 16: Repositioning Ourselves

Week 16 Checklist:

Maya Lin's installation titled "Systematic Landscapes." In this installation, a map is used as a sculpture.

Learning Log, Session 30 (due 17 December)

Evaluating Impact

to reflect on this course and how we can all work to more purposefully redress environmental racism

artwork by Maya Lin
Alan Michelson's glass etched piece titled "Third Bank of the River." The piece is a photograph of a bridge, the water below it, and the land surrounding it with its mirrored reflections all etched on glass. It has a purple tint to it.

Optional Contact Details Exchange

Maintaining Connections

to continue investing in our individual and collective growth by staying in touch with each other

artwork by Alan Michelson