Deep Play II
Deep Play II: Performing Myth, Ritual, and Art at Lehigh
A project based course
SPRING 2006 REL/ART 197
Instructor: N. J. Girardot (email njg0@lehigh.edu) with course monitor: Josh Bombino (jlbi@lehigh.edu)
AND SO:
It has been said that “art is the work that is play” and that “religion is a kind of special, playful, and uniquely powerful (and sometimes quite destructive) art form.” As Monty Python knew so well, myth, ritual, art, play, and humor are among the oldest of human activities – often considered as important as eating, sex, and shelter. Why have they persisted so long? Why do human beings indulge in such manifestly non-utilitarian activities as religion and art? Why do they kill for such silly things? Why does every attempt to suppress them result in creating them anew? How can performative play and myth-ritual have any “deep” connection with aesthetic sublimity and/or religious experience?
Coming to grips with the meaning of these teasing statements will require more of an experimental and experiential performance than a “straight” academic exercise in abstract discourse. Therefore in this course we will primarily engage in a ritual circumambulation or myth-ritual “production” of a tangible event-object (knowing always that the process is as important as the product). That is, we will collectively produce the first Spring ArtsFest (the week of April 3rd through 7th) in this inaugural year of the new all-University program called ArtsLehigh. This means that much of this course is self- or team-directed and will only be successful to the degree to which you are passionately committed to doing something existentially and aesthetically different with your academic career at Lehigh. You must be self-motivated and able to work effectively and creatively with a team. There will be some more or less “traditional” classroom time and exercises, but we will also use the classroom (and the entire ArtsLehigh house) as a meeting-office space for our production. Most of what you will do will be out of the classroom and will in a “real world” way depend on your own entrepreneurial initiative, creativity, innovation, adaptability, responsiveness, resourcefulness, and responsibility. You will be graded in three ways: 1) in relation to the academic component of the course (MRP’s, one essay, and written team and individual reports), and especially 2) effective team participation/attendance and the “excellence” of your team “product” and “process” (peer and instructor monitored), and 3) special individual contributions to the team and distinctive creative initiative/accomplishments (peer and instructor monitored).
So what if religion is art and vice versa? What then?
Is such a proposition/equation absurdly laughable?
But perhaps the laughter (and fear) tells us something?
Is there anything we can or should do in response to these issues?
LIKE WHAT?
