The Communications and Media Arts (CMA) concentration explores the fundamental questions of human existence and experience, such as “Who are we?” “Why are we here?” and “How should we live?” through a specific engagement with spoken, written, and visual forms of communication and media.
Students who choose to pursue studies in CMA at Providence will become immersed in the Creation, Fall, Redemption framework, studying the art of communications, learning, analyzing, practising, and implementing the tools of great storytellers who came before them.
CMA students will not simply study the great cultural works of literature and film for the sake of their study, as can often be the case with many other programs, nor will they come to understand it as frivolous culture creation, as can often be part of certain Christian perspectives. Rather, students will be pushed to come to the joyful understanding that storytelling is an incredibly creative and redeeming tool through which to share the painful realities of sin, but also the even more powerful and joyful realities of redemption in Christ, bringing truth, beauty, and goodness to the world, both believer and non-believer alike. This is an exceptional viewpoint for this study, further solidified by a strong foundation in a broad and deep liberal arts education.
With this foundation, students will be equipped with the communication and media skills necessary for Kingdom work in a myriad of fields, as well as receive a strong foundation for a graduate degree in language degrees, such as literature, communication, poetics, rhetoric, and composition, creative writing, journalism, and more, where they might joyfully serve and love their Lord and neighbour in their redemptive Kingdom calling.
CMA Concentration Outcomes:
Understand and articulate the historical, cultural, and stylistic contexts employed in the communication and media arts production.
Systematically analyze, interpret, and evaluate the major tools and techniques used in the communication and media arts formation and production.
Articulate central issues and debates in both the philosophy of the communication and media arts and our postmodern world that the communication and media arts address and employ today.
Confidently use the knowledge of these central issues and debates to analyze and interpret major forms of the communication and media arts, such as literature, film, TV, media, print, and broadcast, in light of a Reformed Christian perspective.
Employ all of these tools and techniques used in the communication and media arts to create and produce redemptive communication and media art for the glory of God and furthering the work of His Kingdom.