SASAH 2021 Yearbook

In the second half of the Introduction to Professional and Community Practices course (ARTHUM 3380Y), students write preliminary proposals in the form of grant applications for the individual and group capstone projects they will undertake in their fourth-year seminar.

As a first step toward their individual project proposal, each student was required to create a 2- to 3-minute pitch video directly related to the content of their Canada Council for the Arts or Canada Graduate Scholarship Master’s grant application.

In the video, the student was to state which application they would be completing and to focus on articulating their research question or establishing the concept or narrative trajectory for a literary writing project. They were to concentrate on the “why” of the project (Why is this work important? Why is it needed now?) and to not be afraid to be bold about what the project will accomplish. The student had to be the featured speaker of the video. Props and visual sample and music or other sound accompaniments were welcome but not necessary.

The assignment was marked based on the effectiveness of the video: how well the student articulated the key aspects of the grant-related project they intend to undertake and how persuasively they talked about the project’s value and necessity. The appropriateness of the project to the type of application they chose was considered, as was the use of the brief time they were allotted to make their pitch. Their use of voice and overall comportment, as well as the use of relevant and appropriate props, music, etc. was also evaluated.

As one of the cornerstones of higher education, intellectualism (and intellectuals), like the Arts and Humanities, seem to be increasingly under attack, often targets of public suspicion. That is to say, there is an increasingly anti-intellectual mood in the air. Whereas previously the university was a bastion of intellectual work separate from outside response or influence, increasingly we’re called upon to make our research public, to be public intellectuals. But this role goes back at least to Emile Zola’s letter to the President of France in response to the Dreyfus Affair, “J’Accuse . . . !”, even to Socrates, who was sentenced to death for refusing to renounce his beliefs. Investigating the past, present, and future roles of the public intellectual, this course thus urges you to ask as you begin your time in SASAH, and in university in general: What does it mean to be an intellectual in the twenty-first century? Does, can, or should what we do in the classroom and in our research have a more direct public impact? If so, what is the role of the Arts and Humanities in making this impact? Above all, what is your role and responsibility as a public intellectual, whether as a student or elsewhere in your lives, especially at a time when hope for the future seems more necessary than ever? In the process of asking these questions, we’ll look at a variety of historical and contemporary examples and definitions of the public intellectual, and charge you with exploring answers through a variety of assignments both critical and creative.

Back to top