INTRODUCTION TO MAKING, AN EXPERIMENTAL TRANSDISCIPLINARY SEMINAR

Course Description

This is a collaborative 1 or 2 unit CCS course introducing us to resources for making at UCSB.

This seminar is built on a simple idea: that understanding different ways to make things is good for our creativity. Each week we aim to work with a different material, tool, or process, from code to circuits to textiles to fabrication, with the simple goal of expanding our thinking on what is possible to create. As such, the course will meet in different places each week as we engage with different making spaces around campus.

This class is open to all majors and the only prerequisite is curiosity about how things work and a willingness to try and build something that might not work the first time. My hope is that the class will introduce us to a truly versatile range of tools and materials and that in doing so you can start to see new or unexpected connections. There may be areas that we cover where you already have a great deal of expertise, and others that are completely brand new to you (in fact that is this hope!), I only ask that you attempt to learn something new (even if self taught) in each of the areas we will work over the quarter.

This class is truly an experiment and so if you enroll I am asking for a healthy dose of willingness to take chances: every week you're working with something unfamiliar, and the expectation is that you try things, you fail, and learn from those failures, and you try something else the next time! The structured parts of the course are designed to be accessible to those with no previous experience. However, whatever your level of expertise, you are expected to work diligently at your own pace on the area we are exploring that week, and (most importantly) help create an inclusive and helpful environment for all of your fellow makers.

Interested students should reach out to Timothy Sherwood at tpsherwood@ucsb.edu.