UPDATE: In light of NYC’s travel advisory, flash flood warning, and state of emergency declaration of 7/31, and with the safety of the SoRA community in mind, this event has been rescheduled to Thursday, August 7.

In conjunction with the ongoing exhibition featuring finalists of the Strother School’s open call for poster art, this workshop will offer a hands-on opportunity to experience the fundamentals of screen printing and the attention it asks of us as a process of disseminating information. 

Together we will read and hand-print an essay by Lebanese graphic designer and activist Farah Fayyad about the role of print art in Beirut during the protests of October 2019. We will then superimpose it with an image of the Egg, the unfinished movie theater that became a landmark of resistance in the city. By engaging screen printing as a tool between message and image, and between there (Beirut) and here (Brooklyn), we will imagine ways to apply it in our own lives as they cross paths with attention activism. 

This workshop is open to participants with any and all levels of familiarity with printmaking. Materials to create an 11x17 in poster will be provided, and participants are welcome to 

bring their own t-shirts, totes, and other surfaces to print on.

Enrollment is limited to 12 students, based on the order of registration. 

Led by Francesca Barr, a teaching artist and writer from Massachusetts. She has led art programming at The People’s Forum, Penikese Island School, and other community organizations. 

@cesca.barr

Attention is the touchstone problem of our age. Over the last twenty years, an unprecedented concentration of technical and financial power has successfully monetized human attention. The harms of this new system — in effect, the "fracking" of our most intimate selves — are familiar to all. Less widely understood is the nature of the movement that has emerged to fight back against this historic injustice: ATTENTION ACTIVISM.

In this course, we will survey the intellectual and practical foundations of the nascent ATTENTION ACTIVISM movement. We'll draw on texts by Karl Marx, Guy Debord, Shoshana Zuboff, Tim Wu,  and Yves Citton among others. What do the extractive incursions of the Attention Economy mean for shared life in the twenty-first century — and how are communities of activists already working to resist them?

Classes on Thursdays, 8:00 - 9:45pm EST
July 24th - August 7th
Online via Zoom

The Attention Labs are an experiential, participatory workshop curriculum dedicated to the joint exploration of radical human attention. Through group attention practices and guided discussions, we create and test tools to build sanctuaries of attention — as well as networks of solidarity to sustain them.

Register for our DUMBO Lab HERE.

This three-part seminar explores the attentional dynamics of martyrdom, with a focus on rage and love as interconnected forms of sustained collective attention. We will focus on the process of making martyrs and the collective practices that enshrine their memory in public life. Each session will explore how the symbolic spectacle of martyrdom shapes the emotional architectures of social movements and why certain cases can act as historic turning points.

Anchored in the deaths of George Floyd and Khaled Said, and enriched by thinkers such as bell hooks, Lama Rod Owens, adrienne maree brown, Vamik Volkan, Michel Foucault, and Chris Hedges, this seminar invites participants to explore the following questions

How can martyrdom function as a communal commitment to memory and to mobilizing action? How can rage serve as a clarifying, sacred force capable of forging moral clarity? How can love sustain long-term resistance and collective care in the face of despair?

Participants will engage in reading, dialogue, and experimental practices of attention. Participants will also be asked to bring stories of their own personal or community martyrs — figures whose deaths or oppression have shaped their political imagination.

Led by Cam Cassar, an educator, organizer and scholar working at the nexus of criminal justice reform, community justice and liberatory pedagogy.

The 8.5x11 sheet of paper formats our lives. From letters to homework to W-2’s, it collects most of the ink we spill. We print it out, fill it out and turn it in. We hang it up as flyers and scribble on it as scrap. It's anonymous, amenable, and available in most stores. But what is it? And nowadays, what is it good for?

In this course, we’ll turn our attention to the 8.5x11 sheet itself: its shape and scale, its strength and floppiness, its resilience and memory, its transiency and use. We’ll look at its structure and material. We’ll consider its context, its history, and examine its qualities, one dimension at a time. We’ll focus on what we can do with it and, importantly, learn what it does to us. 

The course will be primarily hands-on, with intermittent presentations and discussions, and a few readings to supplement. It is taught by architects who utilize paper in their design process, so we’ll spend time on how the two-dimensional sheet becomes a reliable resource for thinking through and realizing three-dimensional ideas. We’ll practice how to imagine with it. And we’ll explore how making and then attending-to-what-was-made is fundamental to the creative process.

Led by Kyle Winston, an architect and teacher based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Jonathan Toews, an architect and founding partner at Davies Toews Architecture in New York City.

Being attentive is — literally — the beginning of peace. The cacophony of power struggles and the clamor of endless action distract many from the responsibility to find, share and protect peace. In this seminar, we will pay attention to peacemaking stories, and will reflect on the modes of attention that can best facilitate PEACEMAKING. 

Peace must be made by those who make war. This entails difficult (and often dangerous) conversations. Yet our attention to others can open new possibilities and create the conditions for lasting peace. Unfortunately, the fragility of attention as well as the insistent pressure made on our attention significantly reduce the probability that peace can emerge in conflict situations.

The seminar uses actual cases of conflict resolution (Mozambique, Myanmar, and Catholic-Anabaptist tensions) to invite insights in the peacemaking process.  Anyone interested in diplomacy, peacemaking, and interfaith or interparty dialogue is welcome to enroll. We’ll think about peacemaking in a geopolitical context, as well as its application to our personal and political lives.

Taught by Andrea Bartoli, Senior Research Scholar at Columbia Climate School’s University and President of the Sant’Egidio Foundation for Peace and Dialogue.

Attention is the touchstone problem of our age. Over the last twenty years, an unprecedented concentration of technical and financial power has successfully monetized human attention. The harms of this new system — in effect, the "fracking" of our most intimate selves — are familiar to all. Less widely understood is the nature of the movement that has emerged to fight back against this historic injustice: ATTENTION ACTIVISM.

In this course, we will survey the intellectual and practical foundations of the nascent ATTENTION ACTIVISM movement. We'll draw on texts by Karl Marx, Guy Debord, Shoshana Zuboff, Tim Wu,  and Yves Citton among others. What do the extractive incursions of the Attention Economy mean for shared life in the twenty-first century — and how are communities of activists already working to resist them?

This three-part seminar explores the attentional dynamics of martyrdom, with a focus on rage and love as interconnected forms of sustained collective attention. We will focus on the process of making martyrs and the collective practices that enshrine their memory in public life. Each session will explore how the symbolic spectacle of martyrdom shapes the emotional architectures of social movements and why certain cases can act as historic turning points.

Anchored in the deaths of George Floyd and Khaled Said, and enriched by thinkers such as bell hooks, Lama Rod Owens, adrienne maree brown, Vamik Volkan, Michel Foucault, and Chris Hedges, this seminar invites participants to explore the following questions

How can martyrdom function as a communal commitment to memory and to mobilizing action? How can rage serve as a clarifying, sacred force capable of forging moral clarity? How can love sustain long-term resistance and collective care in the face of despair?

Participants will engage in reading, dialogue, and experimental practices of attention. Participants will also be asked to bring stories of their own personal or community martyrs — figures whose deaths or oppression have shaped their political imagination.

Led by Cam Cassar, an educator, organizer and scholar working at the nexus of criminal justice reform, community justice and liberatory pedagogy.

The 8.5x11 sheet of paper formats our lives. From letters to homework to W-2’s, it collects most of the ink we spill. We print it out, fill it out and turn it in. We hang it up as flyers and scribble on it as scrap. It's anonymous, amenable, and available in most stores. But what is it? And nowadays, what is it good for?

In this course, we’ll turn our attention to the 8.5x11 sheet itself: its shape and scale, its strength and floppiness, its resilience and memory, its transiency and use. We’ll look at its structure and material. We’ll consider its context, its history, and examine its qualities, one dimension at a time. We’ll focus on what we can do with it and, importantly, learn what it does to us. 

The course will be primarily hands-on, with intermittent presentations and discussions, and a few readings to supplement. It is taught by architects who utilize paper in their design process, so we’ll spend time on how the two-dimensional sheet becomes a reliable resource for thinking through and realizing three-dimensional ideas. We’ll practice how to imagine with it. And we’ll explore how making and then attending-to-what-was-made is fundamental to the creative process.

Led by Kyle Winston, an architect and teacher based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Jonathan Toews, an architect and founding partner at Davies Toews Architecture in New York City.

The Attention Labs are an experiential, participatory workshop curriculum dedicated to the joint exploration of radical human attention. Through group attention practices and guided discussions, we create and test tools to build sanctuaries of attention — as well as networks of solidarity to sustain them.

Register for our DUMBO Lab HERE.

WALKING & THINKING: SoRA On The Move

A moving study from Brooklyn to the top of Manhattan

Many great thinkers have been great walkers, too. From Thoreau to Virginia Woolf to James Baldwin, writing has been a source of intellectual inspiration – and also a unique way of thinking that brings together mind and body, interior life and exterior geography, individual and public.

For this moving study, we’re going to WALK – from the SoRA headquarters in Dumbo, Brooklyn, up to the very tip of Manhattan – and THINK together, on a range of texts (to be read in advance) by Thoreau, Rebecca Solnit, James Baldwin, and beyond. 

Our goal? To explore the embodied nature of thinking, to theorize and practice modes of collective study that take place on the move, and to consider the role of walking & thinking, together, in Attention Activism.

Register HERE for a spot! Reach out to Peter Schmidt <peter@sustainedattention.net> for any questions.

Being attentive is — literally — the beginning of peace. The cacophony of power struggles and the clamor of endless action distract many from the responsibility to find, share and protect peace. In this seminar, we will pay attention to peacemaking stories, and will reflect on the modes of attention that can best facilitate PEACEMAKING. 

Peace must be made by those who make war. This entails difficult (and often dangerous) conversations. Yet our attention to others can open new possibilities and create the conditions for lasting peace. Unfortunately, the fragility of attention as well as the insistent pressure made on our attention significantly reduce the probability that peace can emerge in conflict situations.

The seminar uses actual cases of conflict resolution (Mozambique, Myanmar, and Catholic-Anabaptist tensions) to invite insights in the peacemaking process.  Anyone interested in diplomacy, peacemaking, and interfaith or interparty dialogue is welcome to enroll. We’ll think about peacemaking in a geopolitical context, as well as its application to our personal and political lives.

Taught by Andrea Bartoli, Senior Research Scholar at Columbia Climate School’s University and President of the Sant’Egidio Foundation for Peace and Dialogue.

Attention is the touchstone problem of our age. Over the last twenty years, an unprecedented concentration of technical and financial power has successfully monetized human attention. The harms of this new system — in effect, the "fracking" of our most intimate selves — are familiar to all. Less widely understood is the nature of the movement that has emerged to fight back against this historic injustice: ATTENTION ACTIVISM.

In this course, we will survey the intellectual and practical foundations of the nascent ATTENTION ACTIVISM movement. We'll draw on texts by Karl Marx, Guy Debord, Shoshana Zuboff, Tim Wu,  and Yves Citton among others. What do the extractive incursions of the Attention Economy mean for shared life in the twenty-first century — and how are communities of activists already working to resist them?

This three-part seminar explores the attentional dynamics of martyrdom, with a focus on rage and love as interconnected forms of sustained collective attention. We will focus on the process of making martyrs and the collective practices that enshrine their memory in public life. Each session will explore how the symbolic spectacle of martyrdom shapes the emotional architectures of social movements and why certain cases can act as historic turning points.

Anchored in the deaths of George Floyd and Khaled Said, and enriched by thinkers such as bell hooks, Lama Rod Owens, adrienne maree brown, Vamik Volkan, Michel Foucault, and Chris Hedges, this seminar invites participants to explore the following questions

How can martyrdom function as a communal commitment to memory and to mobilizing action? How can rage serve as a clarifying, sacred force capable of forging moral clarity? How can love sustain long-term resistance and collective care in the face of despair?

Participants will engage in reading, dialogue, and experimental practices of attention. Participants will also be asked to bring stories of their own personal or community martyrs — figures whose deaths or oppression have shaped their political imagination.

Led by Cam Cassar, an educator, organizer and scholar working at the nexus of criminal justice reform, community justice and liberatory pedagogy.

The 8.5x11 sheet of paper formats our lives. From letters to homework to W-2’s, it collects most of the ink we spill. We print it out, fill it out and turn it in. We hang it up as flyers and scribble on it as scrap. It's anonymous, amenable, and available in most stores. But what is it? And nowadays, what is it good for?

In this course, we’ll turn our attention to the 8.5x11 sheet itself: its shape and scale, its strength and floppiness, its resilience and memory, its transiency and use. We’ll look at its structure and material. We’ll consider its context, its history, and examine its qualities, one dimension at a time. We’ll focus on what we can do with it and, importantly, learn what it does to us. 

The course will be primarily hands-on, with intermittent presentations and discussions, and a few readings to supplement. It is taught by architects who utilize paper in their design process, so we’ll spend time on how the two-dimensional sheet becomes a reliable resource for thinking through and realizing three-dimensional ideas. We’ll practice how to imagine with it. And we’ll explore how making and then attending-to-what-was-made is fundamental to the creative process.

Led by Kyle Winston, an architect and teacher based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Jonathan Toews, an architect and founding partner at Davies Toews Architecture in New York City.

The Attention Labs are an experiential, participatory workshop curriculum dedicated to the joint exploration of radical human attention. Through group attention practices and guided discussions, we create and test tools to build sanctuaries of attention — as well as networks of solidarity to sustain them.

Register for our DUMBO Lab HERE.

Attention is the touchstone problem of our age. Over the last twenty years, an unprecedented concentration of technical and financial power has successfully monetized human attention. The harms of this new system — in effect, the "fracking" of our most intimate selves — are familiar to all. Less widely understood is the nature of the movement that has emerged to fight back against this historic injustice: ATTENTION ACTIVISM.

In this course, we will survey the intellectual and practical foundations of the nascent ATTENTION ACTIVISM movement. We'll draw on texts by Karl Marx, Guy Debord, Shoshana Zuboff, Tim Wu,  and Yves Citton among others. What do the extractive incursions of the Attention Economy mean for shared life in the twenty-first century — and how are communities of activists already working to resist them?

Being attentive is — literally — the beginning of peace. The cacophony of power struggles and the clamor of endless action distract many from the responsibility to find, share and protect peace. In this seminar, we will pay attention to peacemaking stories, and will reflect on the modes of attention that can best facilitate PEACEMAKING. 

Peace must be made by those who make war. This entails difficult (and often dangerous) conversations. Yet our attention to others can open new possibilities and create the conditions for lasting peace. Unfortunately, the fragility of attention as well as the insistent pressure made on our attention significantly reduce the probability that peace can emerge in conflict situations.

The seminar uses actual cases of conflict resolution (Mozambique, Myanmar, and Catholic-Anabaptist tensions) to invite insights in the peacemaking process.  Anyone interested in diplomacy, peacemaking, and interfaith or interparty dialogue is welcome to enroll. We’ll think about peacemaking in a geopolitical context, as well as its application to our personal and political lives.

Taught by Andrea Bartoli, Senior Research Scholar at Columbia Climate School’s University and President of the Sant’Egidio Foundation for Peace and Dialogue.

This seminar invites participants to attune their senses to birds—not as objects of study, but as guides in the practice of attention. Through walks, shared listening activities, reading, and writing, we will explore what birds ask of us, and our attention: to slow down, to listen beyond language, to consider flight as metaphor and as a real, embodied gesture. Drawing from ethno-ornithology, poetry, field notes, and soundscape ecology, we’ll reflect on how noticing birds can deepen our sense of place, time, and relation.

Participants will engage in creative exercises (writing, drawing, mapping, recording) to explore how birds shape human imagination and how we, in turn, attend to them — with care, with awe, and sometimes with grief. The seminar will culminate in a small shared offering — a collage of observations, poems, or field texts — composed through the collective practice of attention.

No prior bird knowledge necessary. Curiosity welcome.

Led by writer and science educator Melody Serra.

Phenomenology is the study of lived experience, of what it is like to live here and now. Attention is central to this philosophical discipline — as William James puts it, “My experience is what I agree to attend to.” This experimental graduate-style seminar focuses on three key figures: Edmund Husserl (known as the founder of phenomenology), Maurice Merleau-Ponty (who pioneered the phenomenology of the body), and Martin Heidegger (Husserl’s most famous student, and an intellectual giant of the twentieth century).  

Since attention is a major theme for each of these thinkers, we will engage their thinking through first-person attention practices that “activate” key ideas in their work. Our focus on attention will enable us to do phenomenology on day one, not “just think” about it. Through readings, discussions, and practices, we will explore what phenomenology reveals about the simplest aspects of our daily lives, and about the subtle movements of attention that occur as we go through the day. We will also develop a toolkit and a vocabulary to better understand and guide our attention — and therefore, to push back against the coercive forces that seek to reduce attention (the medium of boundless human experience) to the crude metrics of money value. How can phenomenology help us to create the conditions for human flourishing?

No philosophical background is necessary, just a thirst for knowledge!

 Led by Lawrence Berger, a philosopher and professor at Marist University.

This seminar invites participants to attune their senses to birds—not as objects of study, but as guides in the practice of attention. Through walks, shared listening activities, reading, and writing, we will explore what birds ask of us, and our attention: to slow down, to listen beyond language, to consider flight as metaphor and as a real, embodied gesture. Drawing from ethno-ornithology, poetry, field notes, and soundscape ecology, we’ll reflect on how noticing birds can deepen our sense of place, time, and relation.

Participants will engage in creative exercises (writing, drawing, mapping, recording) to explore how birds shape human imagination and how we, in turn, attend to them — with care, with awe, and sometimes with grief. The seminar will culminate in a small shared offering — a collage of observations, poems, or field texts — composed through the collective practice of attention.

No prior bird knowledge necessary. Curiosity welcome.

Led by writer and science educator Melody Serra.

Phenomenology is the study of lived experience, of what it is like to live here and now. Attention is central to this philosophical discipline — as William James puts it, “My experience is what I agree to attend to.” This experimental graduate-style seminar focuses on three key figures: Edmund Husserl (known as the founder of phenomenology), Maurice Merleau-Ponty (who pioneered the phenomenology of the body), and Martin Heidegger (Husserl’s most famous student, and an intellectual giant of the twentieth century).  

Since attention is a major theme for each of these thinkers, we will engage their thinking through first-person attention practices that “activate” key ideas in their work. Our focus on attention will enable us to do phenomenology on day one, not “just think” about it. Through readings, discussions, and practices, we will explore what phenomenology reveals about the simplest aspects of our daily lives, and about the subtle movements of attention that occur as we go through the day. We will also develop a toolkit and a vocabulary to better understand and guide our attention — and therefore, to push back against the coercive forces that seek to reduce attention (the medium of boundless human experience) to the crude metrics of money value. How can phenomenology help us to create the conditions for human flourishing?

No philosophical background is necessary, just a thirst for knowledge!

 Led by Lawrence Berger, a philosopher and professor at Marist University.

This seminar invites participants to attune their senses to birds—not as objects of study, but as guides in the practice of attention. Through walks, shared listening activities, reading, and writing, we will explore what birds ask of us, and our attention: to slow down, to listen beyond language, to consider flight as metaphor and as a real, embodied gesture. Drawing from ethno-ornithology, poetry, field notes, and soundscape ecology, we’ll reflect on how noticing birds can deepen our sense of place, time, and relation.

Participants will engage in creative exercises (writing, drawing, mapping, recording) to explore how birds shape human imagination and how we, in turn, attend to them — with care, with awe, and sometimes with grief. The seminar will culminate in a small shared offering — a collage of observations, poems, or field texts — composed through the collective practice of attention.

No prior bird knowledge necessary. Curiosity welcome.

Led by writer and science educator Melody Serra.

Laughter is a universal expression — one cutting across race, class, gender, culture, and creed — that originated in responses to tickle and play among our primate ancestors. (Some of Darwin’s early explorations on the evolution of emotions involved asking zookeepers to tickle chimpanzees to observe their laughter). Yet despite, or perhaps because of, its universality and ubiquity, we tend to pay attention to laughter more often when it is particularly odd or out of place.

In this seminar on The SCIENCE of LAUGHTER, we will become more attuned to this peculiar yet subsumed behavior with the help of three lenses: laughter in relation to the individual, to interpersonal relationship, and to community. Through reading discussions, self-inquiry, field observations, visual art/theatrical/therapeutic exercises, and the construction of ‘laughter maps,’ participants will learn to pick up on laughter as a signal that can reveal where and how people give their attention. 

No scientific background is required to take this course – open to all who laugh. 

Led by Maia Pujara, Assistant Professor of Psychology at Sarah Lawrence College.

Phenomenology is the study of lived experience, of what it is like to live here and now. Attention is central to this philosophical discipline — as William James puts it, “My experience is what I agree to attend to.” This experimental graduate-style seminar focuses on three key figures: Edmund Husserl (known as the founder of phenomenology), Maurice Merleau-Ponty (who pioneered the phenomenology of the body), and Martin Heidegger (Husserl’s most famous student, and an intellectual giant of the twentieth century).  

Since attention is a major theme for each of these thinkers, we will engage their thinking through first-person attention practices that “activate” key ideas in their work. Our focus on attention will enable us to do phenomenology on day one, not “just think” about it. Through readings, discussions, and practices, we will explore what phenomenology reveals about the simplest aspects of our daily lives, and about the subtle movements of attention that occur as we go through the day. We will also develop a toolkit and a vocabulary to better understand and guide our attention — and therefore, to push back against the coercive forces that seek to reduce attention (the medium of boundless human experience) to the crude metrics of money value. How can phenomenology help us to create the conditions for human flourishing?

No philosophical background is necessary, just a thirst for knowledge!

 Led by Lawrence Berger, a philosopher and professor at Marist University.

Laughter is a universal expression — one cutting across race, class, gender, culture, and creed — that originated in responses to tickle and play among our primate ancestors. (Some of Darwin’s early explorations on the evolution of emotions involved asking zookeepers to tickle chimpanzees to observe their laughter). Yet despite, or perhaps because of, its universality and ubiquity, we tend to pay attention to laughter more often when it is particularly odd or out of place.

In this seminar on The SCIENCE of LAUGHTER, we will become more attuned to this peculiar yet subsumed behavior with the help of three lenses: laughter in relation to the individual, to interpersonal relationship, and to community. Through reading discussions, self-inquiry, field observations, visual art/theatrical/therapeutic exercises, and the construction of ‘laughter maps,’ participants will learn to pick up on laughter as a signal that can reveal where and how people give their attention. 

No scientific background is required to take this course – open to all who laugh. 

Led by Maia Pujara, Assistant Professor of Psychology at Sarah Lawrence College.

Laughter is a universal expression — one cutting across race, class, gender, culture, and creed — that originated in responses to tickle and play among our primate ancestors. (Some of Darwin’s early explorations on the evolution of emotions involved asking zookeepers to tickle chimpanzees to observe their laughter). Yet despite, or perhaps because of, its universality and ubiquity, we tend to pay attention to laughter more often when it is particularly odd or out of place.

In this seminar on The SCIENCE of LAUGHTER, we will become more attuned to this peculiar yet subsumed behavior with the help of three lenses: laughter in relation to the individual, to interpersonal relationship, and to community. Through reading discussions, self-inquiry, field observations, visual art/theatrical/therapeutic exercises, and the construction of ‘laughter maps,’ participants will learn to pick up on laughter as a signal that can reveal where and how people give their attention. 

No scientific background is required to take this course – open to all who laugh. 

Led by Maia Pujara, Assistant Professor of Psychology at Sarah Lawrence College.

Inspired by DJ Lynnée Denise's DJ Scholarship framework, as well as Ryan Coogler’s film, Sinners, this course will explore poetics as an attentional practice by engaging poetry based on the musical genres of jazz, blues and hip-hop. 

Participants will read and discuss poetry by writers like Jayne Cortez, Sonia Sanchez, Evie Shokley, Amiri Baraka, Langston Hughes, Sterling Brown, jessica care moore, Tracie Morris, Tara Betts, Naomi Extra, Jive Poetic, and others; and will listen to music from musicians like Abbey Lincoln, Nina Simone, John and Alice Coltrane, Louis Armstrong, Mary J. Blige, Kendrick Lamar, Sun Ra, Camille Yarbrough, Ma Rainey, Cornelius Eady and Rough Magic, and other music/sound material. 

Across three sessions,  participants will work with diverse poetic forms that align with and apply the musical practices of sampling and remixing. At the seminar’s conclusion, participants will have generated a “mixtape collection” of poems — with an opportunity  to participate in a closing cypher.

Led by Queens-based poet, artist, and facilitator Sherese Francis.

We are taught to stand for the flag — but what, exactly, does the flag stand for? In this course, we’ll take a long look at the Star-Spangled Banner as a case study in symbolism, nationalism, and the powers (and perils) of collective attention.

We’ll begin by reviewing the history of flags as a social, political, and military technology. Then we’ll zero in on the origins of the red, white, and blue. Through close readings and practices of sustained attention, we’ll explore how the flag has been imagined and reimagined to assert different visions of the United States over time. Is the Star-Spangled Banner a symbol of imperialism or liberation? Is it a tool of war, or a promise of peace? Who gets to decide what the flag represents? 

From Betsy Ross to Beyonce, and from Jasper Johns to Kendrick Lamar, we’ll trace the changing face of “our” flag as a collective inquiry into what, exactly, America can mean.

Led by Peter Schmidt, a writer and facilitator from Missouri.

Inspired by DJ Lynnée Denise's DJ Scholarship framework, as well as Ryan Coogler’s film, Sinners, this course will explore poetics as an attentional practice by engaging poetry based on the musical genres of jazz, blues and hip-hop. 

Participants will read and discuss poetry by writers like Jayne Cortez, Sonia Sanchez, Evie Shokley, Amiri Baraka, Langston Hughes, Sterling Brown, jessica care moore, Tracie Morris, Tara Betts, Naomi Extra, Jive Poetic, and others; and will listen to music from musicians like Abbey Lincoln, Nina Simone, John and Alice Coltrane, Louis Armstrong, Mary J. Blige, Kendrick Lamar, Sun Ra, Camille Yarbrough, Ma Rainey, Cornelius Eady and Rough Magic, and other music/sound material. 

Across three sessions,  participants will work with diverse poetic forms that align with and apply the musical practices of sampling and remixing. At the seminar’s conclusion, participants will have generated a “mixtape collection” of poems — with an opportunity  to participate in a closing cypher.

Led by Queens-based poet, artist, and facilitator Sherese Francis.

We are taught to stand for the flag — but what, exactly, does the flag stand for? In this course, we’ll take a long look at the Star-Spangled Banner as a case study in symbolism, nationalism, and the powers (and perils) of collective attention.

We’ll begin by reviewing the history of flags as a social, political, and military technology. Then we’ll zero in on the origins of the red, white, and blue. Through close readings and practices of sustained attention, we’ll explore how the flag has been imagined and reimagined to assert different visions of the United States over time. Is the Star-Spangled Banner a symbol of imperialism or liberation? Is it a tool of war, or a promise of peace? Who gets to decide what the flag represents? 

From Betsy Ross to Beyonce, and from Jasper Johns to Kendrick Lamar, we’ll trace the changing face of “our” flag as a collective inquiry into what, exactly, America can mean.

Led by Peter Schmidt, a writer and facilitator from Missouri.

Maps aren't objective. They reflect biases, direct attention, and tell stories - often with information chosen by institutional powers. This seminar explores mapping as a tool for reflection and expression. We’ll work across mediums to interrogate and subvert everyday maps. 

First, we’ll look at “personal cartographies” — methods of documenting and sharing what we notice, remember and care about. Next, we’ll turn our focus outwards to examine the maps (both digital and physical) we most often interact with. What do these maps emphasize, omit, or distort? Who do they serve?  Lastly, we’ll merge inner and outer landscapes to imagine new forms of cartographic practice. We'll design and produce artifacts that propose new ways of seeing, sharing, and navigating, and explore how the mutable technology of maps can redirect, shift, and empower us to reclaim our spatial attention.

No prior experience needed. This seminar is open to anyone interested in spatial thinking: from artists and designers to writers and researchers. All are welcome!

Led by designer, technologist, and researcher Queenie Wu.

Games are an extraordinarily powerful fiction. They can guide the user's attention by setting arbitrary goals, inducing specific kinds of labor, and providing (or limiting) choices. At their worst, games simply replicate the structures of our world, encouraging us to structure our thinking around violence, accumulation, and competition. But at their best, they can help us subvert the systemically induced helplessness and political apathy produced by modern technologies and institutions.

This seminar centers play as an existential mode that can change our relationship to agency. We will examine how games invite participatory engagement, and how this gives them a unique power as a social technology, as an art form, and as a political tool. What’s in a game, and how can this inquiry help us describe the parameters of our existence or the stakes of our interactions? What is the potential of play?  

We will discuss readings that analyze games (both digital and otherwise) through sociopolitical lenses, as well as engage with indie art games, experimental games, and political games. And, of course, we will play with one another.

Led by Hope Yoon, a video game writer and theater artist from Seoul.

Inspired by DJ Lynnée Denise's DJ Scholarship framework, as well as Ryan Coogler’s film, Sinners, this course will explore poetics as an attentional practice by engaging poetry based on the musical genres of jazz, blues and hip-hop. 

Participants will read and discuss poetry by writers like Jayne Cortez, Sonia Sanchez, Evie Shokley, Amiri Baraka, Langston Hughes, Sterling Brown, jessica care moore, Tracie Morris, Tara Betts, Naomi Extra, Jive Poetic, and others; and will listen to music from musicians like Abbey Lincoln, Nina Simone, John and Alice Coltrane, Louis Armstrong, Mary J. Blige, Kendrick Lamar, Sun Ra, Camille Yarbrough, Ma Rainey, Cornelius Eady and Rough Magic, and other music/sound material. 

Across three sessions,  participants will work with diverse poetic forms that align with and apply the musical practices of sampling and remixing. At the seminar’s conclusion, participants will have generated a “mixtape collection” of poems — with an opportunity  to participate in a closing cypher.

Led by Queens-based poet, artist, and facilitator Sherese Francis.

We are taught to stand for the flag — but what, exactly, does the flag stand for? In this course, we’ll take a long look at the Star-Spangled Banner as a case study in symbolism, nationalism, and the powers (and perils) of collective attention.

We’ll begin by reviewing the history of flags as a social, political, and military technology. Then we’ll zero in on the origins of the red, white, and blue. Through close readings and practices of sustained attention, we’ll explore how the flag has been imagined and reimagined to assert different visions of the United States over time. Is the Star-Spangled Banner a symbol of imperialism or liberation? Is it a tool of war, or a promise of peace? Who gets to decide what the flag represents? 

From Betsy Ross to Beyonce, and from Jasper Johns to Kendrick Lamar, we’ll trace the changing face of “our” flag as a collective inquiry into what, exactly, America can mean.

Led by Peter Schmidt, a writer and facilitator from Missouri.

Maps aren't objective. They reflect biases, direct attention, and tell stories - often with information chosen by institutional powers. This seminar explores mapping as a tool for reflection and expression. We’ll work across mediums to interrogate and subvert everyday maps. 

First, we’ll look at “personal cartographies” — methods of documenting and sharing what we notice, remember and care about. Next, we’ll turn our focus outwards to examine the maps (both digital and physical) we most often interact with. What do these maps emphasize, omit, or distort? Who do they serve?  Lastly, we’ll merge inner and outer landscapes to imagine new forms of cartographic practice. We'll design and produce artifacts that propose new ways of seeing, sharing, and navigating, and explore how the mutable technology of maps can redirect, shift, and empower us to reclaim our spatial attention.

No prior experience needed. This seminar is open to anyone interested in spatial thinking: from artists and designers to writers and researchers. All are welcome!

Led by designer, technologist, and researcher Queenie Wu.

Games are an extraordinarily powerful fiction. They can guide the user's attention by setting arbitrary goals, inducing specific kinds of labor, and providing (or limiting) choices. At their worst, games simply replicate the structures of our world, encouraging us to structure our thinking around violence, accumulation, and competition. But at their best, they can help us subvert the systemically induced helplessness and political apathy produced by modern technologies and institutions.

This seminar centers play as an existential mode that can change our relationship to agency. We will examine how games invite participatory engagement, and how this gives them a unique power as a social technology, as an art form, and as a political tool. What’s in a game, and how can this inquiry help us describe the parameters of our existence or the stakes of our interactions? What is the potential of play?  

We will discuss readings that analyze games (both digital and otherwise) through sociopolitical lenses, as well as engage with indie art games, experimental games, and political games. And, of course, we will play with one another.

Led by Hope Yoon, a video game writer and theater artist from Seoul.

Maps aren't objective. They reflect biases, direct attention, and tell stories - often with information chosen by institutional powers. This seminar explores mapping as a tool for reflection and expression. We’ll work across mediums to interrogate and subvert everyday maps. 

First, we’ll look at “personal cartographies” — methods of documenting and sharing what we notice, remember and care about. Next, we’ll turn our focus outwards to examine the maps (both digital and physical) we most often interact with. What do these maps emphasize, omit, or distort? Who do they serve?  Lastly, we’ll merge inner and outer landscapes to imagine new forms of cartographic practice. We'll design and produce artifacts that propose new ways of seeing, sharing, and navigating, and explore how the mutable technology of maps can redirect, shift, and empower us to reclaim our spatial attention.

No prior experience needed. This seminar is open to anyone interested in spatial thinking: from artists and designers to writers and researchers. All are welcome!

Led by designer, technologist, and researcher Queenie Wu.

Games are an extraordinarily powerful fiction. They can guide the user's attention by setting arbitrary goals, inducing specific kinds of labor, and providing (or limiting) choices. At their worst, games simply replicate the structures of our world, encouraging us to structure our thinking around violence, accumulation, and competition. But at their best, they can help us subvert the systemically induced helplessness and political apathy produced by modern technologies and institutions.

This seminar centers play as an existential mode that can change our relationship to agency. We will examine how games invite participatory engagement, and how this gives them a unique power as a social technology, as an art form, and as a political tool. What’s in a game, and how can this inquiry help us describe the parameters of our existence or the stakes of our interactions? What is the potential of play?  

We will discuss readings that analyze games (both digital and otherwise) through sociopolitical lenses, as well as engage with indie art games, experimental games, and political games. And, of course, we will play with one another.

Led by Hope Yoon, a video game writer and theater artist from Seoul.

“And still it is not enough to have memories. One must be able to forget them when they are many, and one must have the great patience to wait until they come again. ” — Rainier Maria Rilke

Scientists, artists, anthropologists, and writers have long fixated on the powers and limitations of memory. Memories at various levels of consciousness run through our cognition, our decisions, and our attention to the present and future. In this course, we will bring together interdisciplinary studies of memory: from biological research and cognitive theory to portrayals in literature and visual art. Through readings, activities, and guided discussions, we will collectively practice and attend to the act of remembrance — and, as Rilke pointed out, to memory’s necessary converse: the act of forgetting. 

Throughout the three-week seminar, students will design and create an archival project to store personal memory formed within the span of the course.

Led by Czarina Ramos, a neuroscientist and writer based in Brooklyn.

“And still it is not enough to have memories. One must be able to forget them when they are many, and one must have the great patience to wait until they come again. ” — Rainier Maria Rilke

Scientists, artists, anthropologists, and writers have long fixated on the powers and limitations of memory. Memories at various levels of consciousness run through our cognition, our decisions, and our attention to the present and future. In this course, we will bring together interdisciplinary studies of memory: from biological research and cognitive theory to portrayals in literature and visual art. Through readings, activities, and guided discussions, we will collectively practice and attend to the act of remembrance — and, as Rilke pointed out, to memory’s necessary converse: the act of forgetting. 

Throughout the three-week seminar, students will design and create an archival project to store personal memory formed within the span of the course.

Led by Czarina Ramos, a neuroscientist and writer based in Brooklyn.

“And still it is not enough to have memories. One must be able to forget them when they are many, and one must have the great patience to wait until they come again. ” — Rainier Maria Rilke

Scientists, artists, anthropologists, and writers have long fixated on the powers and limitations of memory. Memories at various levels of consciousness run through our cognition, our decisions, and our attention to the present and future. In this course, we will bring together interdisciplinary studies of memory: from biological research and cognitive theory to portrayals in literature and visual art. Through readings, activities, and guided discussions, we will collectively practice and attend to the act of remembrance — and, as Rilke pointed out, to memory’s necessary converse: the act of forgetting. 

Throughout the three-week seminar, students will design and create an archival project to store personal memory formed within the span of the course.

Led by Czarina Ramos, a neuroscientist and writer based in Brooklyn.