In this course students will work closely with the New York based avant-garde feminist collaborative, Belladonna* by reading, deconstructing and exploring what it means to be “feminist” and “avant-garde.” Our readings will consist of such state-of-the-art/ ground breaking/ game changing texts as NY writer, vocalist and sound artist LaTasha N. Nevada Diggs’ polyphonic book, TwERK, to the Quebecois French feminist collection Theory, A Sunday. Each text will result in active course discussions, presentations and class experiments. The class’ Visiting Fellow, Belladonna board member and established poet, Marcella Durand, will take us through the history of Belladonna — how it came to exist as a feminist, avant-garde collective. Students will visit Belladonna’s Brooklyn art studio and attend Belladonna readings and events. Because a significant emphasis of this course is to encourage students to form their own feminist avant-garde collectives and communities, students will be asked to curate a final event for the course. This final event will be in collaboration with Belladonna and will hope to exhibit the students’ thoughtful and creative interpretation of avant-garde feminism. This course counts toward the Gender Studies minor.