Literature as Ballet

A number of ballets are based on literary works, so a class around literature, ballet, and the translation between them could be really interesting! This is an outline for the content of such a class; note that this will be far better with students who have reasonable familiarity with ballet and preferably know basic ballet history.

The ballets in the recommended list are all available on DVD. There are some ballets that would be good fits for a class like this (ex. John Cranko's Onegin) but have not been released on film. And of course, if there are ballets based on literary works being performed by nearby companies, go see them!

National History Day 2014: Arts Topics

No topics related to the arts are mentioned in the NHD Theme Book or list of suggested topics this year. Here are a few suggestions, split up by type of art. I might update this throughout this semester, and given the topic this year, this will be shorter than the science lists.

Dance
Soviet ballet defection (I think it's a stretch to relate this to responsibilities, but if you come up with something, it could be fantastic!)
Censorship/propaganda in Soviet-era Russian ballet (a really good starting resource would be Apollo's Angels)
I haven't read it, but there's a book called Dance, Human Rights, and Social Justice that looks really interesting and could be a good jumping off point for a project!
Dancing bans (legal or religious, and again, responsibilities might be a stretch)

Film
The Hollywood blacklist -- could go a lot of directions from here. Could talk about naming others to HUAC or not, pamphlets like Red Channels, or the Writers' Guild working to give proper credit to those who were blacklisted.
Propaganda films and how that relates to rights and responsibilities, either of people or of governments.
Man With a Movie Camera and revolution in the Soviet Union -- this is a really cool film impacted by the idea that a social and political revolution should also induce a revolution in the arts, and it really shows the industrialization occurring in the late 1920s.

Literature/Writing/Philosophy
Thomas Paine's Common Sense and/or Rights of Man
John Locke
Thomas Hobbes
Ayn Rand and objectivism
Adam Smith and The Wealth of Nations
Banned books and freedom of speech -- either in general or focusing on specific books
What is To Be Done? (by Chernyshevsky, by Lenin, or both!) and Bolshevism
Literature and civil rights -- could focus on James Baldwin, Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison, or Lorraine Hansberry
Uncle Tom's Cabin
To Kill a Mockingbird
(This could be such a long list, and here I've focused on just a couple of ideas and given some suggestions. If you come up with a rights issue, search for related literature!)

Visual Art
Political cartoons and freedom of expression. Could choose particular cartoonist, incident/cartoon, etc.
Propaganda posters and the relationship to the rights and responsibilities of people/governments. Choose a country and time period and possibly even a theme within it. (I'm in a Soviet Union class right now, and there are some great examples of propaganda posters here: http://www.iisg.nl/exhibitions/chairman/sovintro.php)


(So sorry there is no music or theater here! I think a lot of the ideas from the others could be carried over to those, but I just don't know the details.)

Education Through Arts: Dance and Theater in Oklahoma City 2013-2014

Local arts events can supplement curriculum or even provide a framework for it. Many ballets and plays are based on books which can be used in literature curriculum (and history to a lesser extent). For students interested in a particular type of art, these performances also provide an opportunity to learn about the history and influential figures of the art form.

This post focuses on the major dance and theater performances in Oklahoma City over the next year. Note that some of these seasons are over the summer (Lyric and Shakespeare in the Park) and some are throughout the school year.