PSY 280 Psychology of Art & Culture

This course introduces several psychological approaches, including psychological, psychoanalytic, psychosocial, and neuroscientific, to the study of art, culture, and society. Areas of application include film, painting, literature, art therapy, psychohistory, consciousness, dreams, surrealism, gender, ecology, and economics. This course is a required course for a range of further psychological and psychoanalytic courses at AAU, including Psychoanalysis and Art, Psychoanalysis and Society, the Psychology of Environmental Crisis, and Screening Desire/Projecting Anxiety: The Psychoanalysis of Film. This course therefore serves as a foundation for and introduction to the key concepts, theories and approaches necessary for a deeper engagement in the psychoanalysis of culture, but also functions as a stand alone course for all those interested in art, culture, psychology or society to understand the basic tools, concepts and approaches in this area.