In Critical and Visual Studies at Pratt Institute's Department of Social Science & Cultural Studies, creativity is a moving target. Intellectual life and social practice are not just what happens when your finish work: they are your work. Global relationships and local crises are what we think about every day, in class and beyond the classroom. But we also spend time imagining the present, the future and the past differently, exploring wide varieties of aesthetic pleasure and cultural phenomena, and putting the self in touch with the world. This is a program for people who care about the arts and are also commited to political and intellectual issues, who are curious about everything and who demand more than the consumerist, utilitarian or narrowly vocational approach to pursuing a career. Here you will meet people whose work is their passion and who love making distinctions, seeking out correspondences, testing theories and challenging preconceptions.
‘Crit Viz’ is for the self-motivated and for students who want to experiment in their studies. Sometimes you will want to go narrow; othertimes you will spread your interests more broadly than you could have imagined. Students who graduate with a BA in Critical and Visual Studies will also have completed a concentration in one of the Minors: Psychology, Sustainability, Documentary Practices, Media Studies, Creative Writing, Photography, Performance, Philosophy, History, Ceramics, Cultural Studies, Literature and Writing, Social Justice, Cinema Studies, or Art History.
