New, Revised, and Special Topics Courses: Fall 2025

While some PMA instructors will allow students to enroll in classes that overlap, not all do. If your proposed Fall 2025 schedule includes overlaps, please consult with the faculty in question before enrolling so that you can adjust your enrollment plans if necessary.

Instructor: Sabine Haenni

Class Schedule: TR 11:40 a.m. - 12:55 p.m. (3 credits)

Contemporary World Cinema offers an introduction to some of the most acclaimed international films of the 21st century. We will consider narrative, documentary, animation, and experimental films from multiple national and transnational contexts. We will consider both dominant and alternative forms of storytelling, how funding institutions, festivals, and awards shape the global circulation of films, how genres get transformed internationally, and how films intervene in how we think about specific social issues and political contexts. Specific films and case studies may vary from year to year.

Instructor: J. Ellen Gainor

Class schedule: TR 11:40 a.m. - 12:55 p.m. (3 credits)

The musical is a distinct and significant form of American performance. This course will consider the origins, development, and internationalization of the American musical and will emphasize the interpenetration of the history of musical theatre with the history of the United States in the 20th century and beyond. We will investigate how political, social, and economic factors shape the production of important American musicals-and how, in turn, musicals shape expressions of personal identity and national ideology.

Instructor: Mendi Obadike and Keith Obadike

Class Schedule: W 11:15 a.m. - 1:45 p.m. (3 credits)

This class will look at early text scores (or event scores) and instructions from artists and composers such as Sol Lewitt, Adrian Piper, Felix Gonzales Torres, Yoko Ono, Benjamin Patterson, Raven Chacon, Alison Knowles, Clifford Owens, and Pauline Oliveros to recent work done with artificial intelligence. The class will consist of weekly score discussions, screenings, and listening sessions. Students will critique and produce original scores in the class.

Check out the full list of PMA courses on the Fall 2025 Courses page.