The Rioting on the Wall: Crisis and Graffiti

3 units

How does it feel to bomb a train? Who would write their name all over a city? Why would you stop in the middle of a protest to paint a wall? Is spray paint dangerous? This class will address these questions and more by examining the significance of graffiti as a cultural practice. It will consider the historical context of graffiti’s emergence from the urban ruin of New York City in the 1970s, as well as the social dynamics that have driven the practice of graffiti into the heart of recent uprisings and revolts, from Cairo to Istanbul to Santiago to Minneapolis. Graffiti is considered by some to be art, by others to be criminal vandalism. What happens if we consider it as both, or, even better, as neither? What if we consider graffiti as a kind of monument, or as a kind of political discourse? In such a way, we might begin to see how a cultural practice like graffiti expresses a desire to change the world, and that the form in which such desire is expressed matters as much as its content. This semester we will read accounts directly from graffiti writers themselves, as well as studies of and reactions to major and minor moments and figures over the course of graffiti’s emergence and development. We will be guided in our work by theories of Black culture, study and struggle, and grapple with these theories’ relation to the history of racial capitalism. We will analyze film, photography, and other media, and leave the classroom and campus for at least three off-site visits.