Course Description
Summary
Over the past two centuries U.S. business corporations have gained civil rights originally intended for flesh-and-blood people. In this course we will work as a team of artist-investigators to (1) understand how this happened; (2) what some of the downstream consequences have been; (3) review ways artists and activists have tried to intervene with this development through storytelling or civic action; and (3) design new interventions grounded in scripted or applied theatre.
Alongside our central text, Adam Winkler鈥檚, 鈥淲e the Corporations: How American Businesses Won Their Civil Rights,鈥 we will wrestle with the texts of Supreme Court decisions that gave corporations some of the same rights as living people. We will also view documentaries on the development of the business corporation and corporate propaganda (Manufacturing Consent, The Corporation The New Corporation) and explore ways environmental activists are trying to use corporate personhood arguments to establish Rights of Nature.
All but three class sessions will be delivered remotely over zoom. The three in-person sessions will be spread throughout the semester.
