Krys Verrall

My work is about the intersection of art and social movements in the 1960s. My Doctoral dissertation is entitled Shortfall: Sixties Conceptual Art and the Civil Rights Movement in Halifax and the Edge of Criticism.





Biography:



BFA, MA (York University, Toronto), Ph.D. (to be conferred June 2007). Research associate, Centre for Media and Culture in Education, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE), University of Toronto. Contract faculty in the Division of Humanities, Faculty of Arts, Fine Arts Cultural Studies and Dept. of Visual Arts, Faculty of Fine Arts, and School of Arts and Letters, Atkinson College.





Professor Krys Verrall's interdisciplinary research interests in sociology and fine arts, belong to the rapidly expanding field of Cultural Studies. The holder of numerous scholarships and awards, her focus is the cultural history of fine art cultural production and its relationship to social movements. She has an interest in contemporary cultural theory with special reference to fine art and popular culture artefacts. As an artist and writer Verrall's practice has included painting and multi-media work with a view to integrating writing with visuality. Verrall has published on the relationship of art to national and personal memory. She has essays in two forth-coming anthologies on public art in Canada, and the material history of the 1960s.



An instructor at York University since 1996, Verrall's teaching expertise is in conceptually based courses in cultural history, yet she has also taught a number of studio courses in the Department of Visual Arts.





Course descriptions:



Worlds of Childhood

Division of Humanities, York University





CO-COURSE DIRECTORS: Professor Jeffery Canton and Professor Krys Verrall





COURSE DESCRIPTION: This course examines the cultural construction of childhood, mainly in Western culture, from the medieval period to the present. In this course we challenge the myth of childhood innocence, as well as the notion that an essential or "true" child exists. We shall consider the representation of childhood in a range of cultural forms, from fiction and picture books, to film, television, photography, and music.





The course is organized around four distinct modules. The first explores the conceptual grounds for childhood as a cultural construct, contrasting the notion of childhood powerlessness with the rights of the child. The second surveys the history of childhood. We look at past representations of children as well as objects made for children. In the third section we examine literary constructions of childhood in contemporary children's literature as a way to explore debates around gender, sexuality and multiculturalism. Finally, in the fourth course module, we will look at contemporary popular culture. Here we will analyze cultural artefacts-such as television, toys, film, video games-given to or created for children as a result of ideas about their nature, needs, and cultural positions. The course ends with two opposing views regarding the current state of childhood among cultural critics. On one side is the argument that childhood is disappearing, on the other, that rather than disappearing, childhood is changing as part of larger societal changes.



Creative and Critical Fictions: War

Fine Arts Cultural Studies, York University





Course Director: Professor Krys Verrall





Course Description: Promotes critical and creative thinking and writing around specific themes in cultural studies. The course encourages a blurring of genres and refuses a necessary separation between creative and critical writing. Students produce a variety of short assignments and participate in online writing circles.



The theme of the course for this term is war. Such a theme asks students to engage with the horrendous yet increasingly invasive militarization of contemporary life through writing. By examining the creative responses of the historical avant-garde and artist-activists in the 1960s to war, students will build an aesthetic vocabulary of critical and creative strategies to contemporary military conflicts. Carefully selected secondary texts provide the critical and theoretical tools to think about war, the fine and performing arts and war, and their relationship to writing. Because our emphasis is on writing by artists, artists' books, and artist book projects, we will not look at conventional literary forms such as novels, poems, or short stories. Instead this course takes an interdisciplinary approach by combining studio artist book projects with developing a writing portfolio informed by critical theory.





The Roots of Modern America



The Humanities, Atkinson Faculty of Liberal Arts and Professional Studies, York University



Course Directors: Professor Wade Rowland and Professor Krys Verrall





Course Description: The course will explore some of the ideas, ideologies and experiences that have been most influential in shaping modern American culture, from the religious radicalism of the early colonists to the evolution of corporate capitalism and consumerism in the twentieth century. Special attention will be paid to first contact between Europeans and native Americans, and the watershed decade of the 1960s.





The purpose of the course is to give students a broad overview of American cultural characteristics, past and present, to assist them in interpreting current events. Students will also be introduced to some of the basic learning and research techniques essential to a successful university career.



The course is organized in four modules, two per term. The first and third modules are designed to provide a broad perspective on trends in American thought and experience from the early colonies to the late nineteenth century, and from the late nineteenth century through to the present. The second and fourth modules are designed to allow students to examine in depth two significant eras, that of the legacy of first contact between European colonists and Native populations, and the culturally fertile era of the 1960s. Canadian contrasts and exceptions will be examined where appropriate.