This subject introduces students to the theories, processes, and practices behind strategic planning and decision-making in arts organisations today. In addition to generic management issues, students will be asked to identify and analyse issues specific to the arts industry. Students will be introduced to core issues in arts management, including strategic planning, governance, organisational structuring, funding and financing, community and audience engagement; evaluations and indicators; as well as emergent concepts and approaches in the field such as co-creation, agile project management, design thinking and the lean start up method.

This subject introduces students to theoretical perspectives on arts and cultural policy and explains how various historical, political, and cultural contexts shape cultural policies in different nation states. The subject provides a broad overview of multiple aspects of cultural policies including regulating public arts, preserving national cultural heritage, contributing to sustainable economic, environmental, and urban development, as well as protecting cultural diversity on local and global levels. The subject explains how different political and cultural actors are involved in complex processes of creating, communicating, restructuring, or resisting cultural policies and how they affect local economies, reframe social and cultural composition of communities, as well as contribute to place branding.

This subject examines audience development and retention in arts and cultural activities through a variety of professional techniques including communications, programming and content analysis, analysis of existing and lapsed audiences, as well as exploring and critiquing the effectiveness of conventional marketing tools. Lectures and seminars will address a range of themes underpinning audience development. These include research into attitudes to the arts, economic and social trends that impact on attendance at arts events, and the role of artists as promoters of their own work. There will be three guest lectures throughout the semester.

This subject introduces students to the fundamentals of financial management and budgeting in arts organisations. Commencing with an examination of the principal financial reports, the subject takes students through the nature and type of transactions undertaken by arts organisations, how these transactions are recorded in financial statements and the steps necessary to prudently manage arts organisations. In the second half of the semester, students examine the preparation and evaluation of financial budgets in arts organisations. Specifically, students address the budgeting process, budget preparation and the use of financial and performance measurement systems.

This subject addresses ethical issues and legal constraints related to working in the arts and culture sector, including publishing for print and digital media. It will review existing ethical codes and the mechanisms established to police them, as well as offering an overview of how practices are shaped by law relating to such matters as intellectual property, contracts, negligence, privacy, defamation and respect for cultural differences. On successfully completing this subject, students will have gained an understanding of a wide range of ethical and legal considerations for their professional practice.

This subject will examine the various strategies employed by museums and galleries to frame the objects and ideas in their care and in order to communicate to the public about them. It will consider how these display strategies have changed over time, but its principal focus will nonetheless be on current exhibition and display settings, from contemporary art spaces to science and natural history museums. What is the best way - if any - to frame a particular exhibition? What sorts of communications messages should curators and exhibition designers seek to convey to museum and gallery visitors? How effectively do galleries and museums communicate their ideas? What role does the public have in engaging with the objects and ideas in museum and gallery display settings? These and other questions will be asked in order to critically interrogate the idea of the exhibition as a meeting point between the institution and the public and as a site of a charged dialogue of meaning between all the players in the exhibition circuit: from the institution, to the objects and/or ideas in the institution, and on to the public who comes to engage with them. On completion of the subject students should be able to apply a range of critical theoretical, art historical and museological approaches to the study of exhibitions and displays in historical and contemporary settings.

This subject engages with the growing number of texts about Indigenous art and by Indigenous artists and scholars. It introduces students to the history of writing about Indigenous art in Australia, examining key publications, exhibitions, events and innovations. The theories and methods of Indigenous art histories are discussed alongside issues of intellectual property, copyright and cultural protocols. How have Indigenous art histories previously been written? What changes are currently taking place in the field? What international comparisons can be made and what insight does this bring to the changing discipline of art history?

This subject is taught in Alice Springs and Darwin with visits to artistically significant Aboriginal communities. Emphasising Indigenous ownership of cultural knowledge, students will consider the history and development of Aboriginal art in the Northern Territory and the specific social, economic, geographical and cultural effects it has generated. In a series of structured classes, students will be versed in protocols and introduced to traditional owners and community members. During visits to communities, students will witness the creation of artworks and be able to initiate projects based on primary research. They will learn about the key issues and elements governing the contemporary Aboriginal art scene, the relationship between art and culture, including the importance of art in the wider community. Funding, management models and resource availability will be explained in relation to the art centres visited. Students will also study the display and consumption of Indigenous art at institutional and tourist levels.

A quota of 10-12 students applies to this subject.

This subject examines the growth of the museum from its origins in the wunderkammer and antiquarian collections of the 16th century to the dynamic and constantly shifting field of possibilities available to museums today. The subject charts the progression of the museum from the private collections of the Renaissance and Baroque to the vast public institutional spaces of the late 18th and 19th centuries, and beyond. Special attention will be given to the ways in which the changing objectives of the museum (e.g. moral elevation, public instruction, mass entertainment, propoganda) are reflected in the architecture, design and display techniques developed in different counties in different times. Students should develop an understanding of the relationship between museums and concepts of national and cultural identity, focusing on their development within Australia. This will include visits to appropriate sites and institutions.

This subject examines the exhibition of contemporary art in international survey exhibitions since the 1960s, delineating the methods that curators and directors have tested in response to the needs of art museums, bureaucracies, artists and publics across a range of geographic settings. The subject will examine a sequence of exhibitions from Australia and overseas, including early, national pavilion-based Venice Biennales, the director-driven 1970s Documentas, the 1980s global circuit of Biennales (including Sydney's), the newer Asian biennales (including Brisbane's Asia-Pacific triennials), the commercial art fairs (Frieze and the New York Armory Show). The subject considers these exhibitions' impact on contemporary art, as well as the roles of sponsorship, philanthropy and exhibition directors.

Cultural festivals, carnivals and special events are a prominent feature of arts and cultural activities at the local, national and international level. Through a series of international and local case studies, this subject will examine the economic and artistic origins of and rationales for these events in the context of a range of theoretical framings. Students will be asked to consider a variety of professional and critical approaches to evaluating these events, including programming and content analysis, audiences, creative labour, place-making strategies and the role of artistic directors. The influence of ritual, invented traditions and the carnivalesque in contemporary festival practices, along with the historical and political underpinning of festivals, will also be explored in order to appreciate the diverse range of interests that are served by such events and the social and political contexts within which they take place.

This subject will provide students with an understanding of contemporary debates regarding the role of cultural industries around the world. The focus is on the way stakeholders in the cultural industries can negotiate the normative dimensions of cultural creation, dissemination, and consumption. This includes questions about social inclusion, cultural diversity, sustainability, ownership, and so on. Building on a range of examples including countries, cities, international organisations, and civil society organisations) this subject combines a theoretically rigorous approach to cultural industries with thorough reflections on the policy frameworks that exist and/or are needed.

Please note: in 2018, this subject will be delivered as an overseas intensive, at the Institut Seni Indonesia, Yogyakarta, Indonesia.

This subject introduces students to cultural policy studies as a distinct domain of cultural studies. It examines the stakes involved in defining and operating within cultural policy studies by working through the characterisations of creative industries, cultural practices, cultural politics and power. Students will analyse specific instances of cultural policy and creative industry developments in Australia, Asia and elsewhere, produce specific studies of the political dimensions of cultural practices in order to re-think perceived notions of identity, ideology and representation, and comprehend the range and consequences of scholarly involvement in cultural policy studies. Students completing the subject will appreciate the relationship between critical analysis and policy orientation in cultural studies and be familiar with specific instances of cultural policy, creative industry and cultural citizenship development at local, state, federal and international levels.

This subject will introduce students to the current state of the discipline of Cultural Studies. Students will be oriented in relation to the major theoretical traditions, methodological approaches, empirical and political pre-occupations, and national traditions in cultural studies. We will do this by considering particular contemporary configurations of cultural studies in relation to specific research problems. Students will develop both a synoptic sense of the shape of Cultural Studies now and focused expertise which will enable them to engage with some of the most significant contemporary problems from cultural competence and equity to cultural sustainability.

This subject is a study of Australian performing arts from 1960 to the present with a special focus on the shift from national drama to diversity, and from drama to performance, framed by the changing landscape of Australian culture. We read selected plays in relation to context, genre, and performance history; view DVDs of live performance; engage in online and library-based archival research; undertake detailed textual and performance analysis; and investigate the role of performance as a mediation of cultural life. The subject is arranged in sections including a single-author study of Patrick White; the New Wave of the 1970s; Indigenous Dramatists such as Jack Davis and Jane Harrison; the 21st Century stage including Lally Katz; and postdramatic theatre including Back to Back Theatre and Version 1.0.

This introductory subject is designed to induct graduate students into the major issues and current thinking in web-based communication; to familiarize students with the major channels and platforms in use in this field; to develop an understanding of online genres, and teach essential writing and editing skills for online contexts. Students will gain practical experience in writing in a number of different styles and formats and will learn to publish their work on a digital platform.

This subject will examine the development of contemporary film theory from the post-1968 period to the present. Students will be expected to evaluate critically the significance of a number of the following theoretical approaches to an understanding of the cinema. These approaches will be selected from the following: semiotics, post-structuralism, feminist film theory, surrealist theory, psychoanalysis, post-auteurism, postmodernism, postcolonial, queer theory, and recent research in human/animal studies on screen. Students will attend seminars that involve a variety of approaches: close textual analysis, research, thesis writing and the presentations of papers.

This subject examines the histories, cultural contexts and current debates surrounding censorship in the visual arts. Censorship practices and protocols will be defined and investigated in relation to issues of morality, legality and the public sphere. The changing definitions and complexities of censorship will be investigated in instances of creative freedom challenging prohibition in film, performing arts, visual art and media cultures. Students will gain a theoretical understanding of the historical and emerging debates surrounding the controversial area of censorship, freedom of speech and expression. Students will also study censorship in national and international contexts with an emphasis on specific case studies. This subject will also examine how artistic practice influences wider cultural, political and legal prohibitions underlying film, the arts and media.